How do we learn about plants? Who teaches us, and in what settings – kitchens, gardens, forests, classrooms, apprenticeships, stories, or moments of necessity?
The 2026 Journal of Medicinal Plant Conservation will shine a light on Herbal Education & Folkways — Learning Pathways to Plants.
We invite submissions exploring herbal education and folkways, with a focus on the diverse pathways through which people come into relationship with plants. This call centers learning as a cultural, ecological, and embodied process shaped by place, lineage, labor, curiosity, and care.
We are interested in work that examines both traditional and contemporary modes of herbal learning, honoring informal, intergenerational, and community-based knowledge alongside structured educational models.
Possible topics include (but are not limited to):
- Learning plants through family traditions, oral histories, and everyday practice
- Apprenticeship, mentorship, and lineage in herbal education
- Folkways of teaching and learning: stories, songs, rituals, and seasonal practices
- Garden-, forest-, and land-based learning
- Self-taught herbalists and autodidactic pathways
- Formal herbal programs and alternative pedagogies
- Cross-cultural, diasporic, and migratory plant knowledge
- Learning through making: medicine preparation, foodways, dyeing, and craft
- Barriers to herbal education and questions of access, class, race, and land
- Ethical transmission of knowledge and responsibilities of learning
- Unlearning, repair, and decolonizing approaches to plant education
- How digital spaces, books, and media shape contemporary herbal learning
We also welcome these contributions from our members:
- We encourage stories from our many program participants – Partners in Education, Forest Farmers enrolled in the Forest Grown Verified program, Deep Ecology Art Fellows, Botanical Sanctuary Network, and Sacred Seeds Gardens.
- News of recent books published and accomplishments by members.
- Info on creative ways members are sharing plant knowledge via classes, podcasts, zines, poems, art and photography.
- Members can submit an ad for your school, zine, podcast, or other creative plant-based activity – at no charge – using the form below.
Submission Specifications:
- Articles should be saved as MS Word or Google Doc format. Anywhere around 1500-2000 words is good. Please include:
- A brief author bio (50–100 words) and a headshot if desired.
- Relevant images or illustrations with captions and credits (if applicable). If your article includes any inserted/embedded images, we ask that you please include the original images as separate attachments so they will print clearly.
- References or acknowledgments where appropriate.
- Artwork and photography should be saved at its original size, high-resolution 300dpi JPG files are ideal. Please rename each file with a short caption and image credit as it should appear in print.
- Display ads should measure 1080px x 1080px (standard square size for Instagram).
Submission Deadline: March 31, 2026
