By Dr Laila Abdel Aal Alghalban
You are not alone!
Every time you visit parks, walk or hike, how many plants can you name? Have you ever given a thought to the different species of grass you walk on or do you just see them collectively as greenery? Do dewdrops falling on the sidewalk outside your house go unnoticed? Do you step blindly on the dry leaves? Have you ever noticed a plant growing from concrete in the cracks of old buildings you pass by? When you see a giraffe eating tree leaves, are you visually more attentive to the giraffe than the tree? If yes, then you suffer from a disease called “plant blindness”. But hold on, don’t panic. You are not alone! We all, in one way or another, have that cognitive condition!
What if plants could talk?
On my way to my birthplace to spend Eid vacation with family and friends, I tried to take notice of every plant I see. “Each tree I pass by,” I thought, “has a wealth of stories to tell. Trees are silent witnesses to so many events.” Questions kept popping in my mind: “Were trees able to talk, what would they say? What secrets would they break? What complaints would they make against humans?” I am sure that they would talk bitterly about our transgression and atrocities.
Not such a big deal
Studies show that humans, for cognitive and cultural reasons, are able to store more accurate and active mental images of animals than plants. This results from the close affinities we have with animals; they look like us to a great extent and strike a chord in our hearts; we assign them human characteristics, and in case some animals are on the brink of extinction, conservation work stays afoot. Plants, on the contrary, are not such a big deal. They are largely unnoticed, always placed in the background. We ignore them most probably because they stand still, look like one another, seem to be a green block, and rarely pose a threat to humans. Botanists call this phenomenon “plant blindness”. Humans see only what they know. Hence plant blindness makes plants less visible, less important to us and, therefore, not worthy of protection against extinction.
The impact of plant illiteracy
The environmental impact of plant illiteracy is massively destructive, given the current climate change. The decreasing interest in and fund for plant research lead to shutting down botany departments in many universities. Humans share a symbiotic relationship with plants: they give us oxygen, food, and affections, and we give them carbon dioxide. Plants sustain the life of humans and animals, and are almost in everything around us: what we eat, wear, manufacture, etc. Plant-derived medicinal products are always imperative to fight against diseases in western medicine. We are also amazed by the fact that the interestingly and exclusively plant-based indigenous medicines are effectively employed to control deadly diseases in very remote areas around the world. Last but never least, the groundbreaking research on plant gene editing is making a stunning daily headway in crop improvement to feed the increasing population everywhere, with less ethical issues.
Communal trees
How can plant blindness be cured? A desperately needed thing to do is to celebrate literary work (botanical literature) that stars plants, depicts them as key players in our environment, and humanise the plant family members. Fortunately, this goes in line with many recent studies that show that trees interact with one another through an underground network. This network pumps food, knowledge, instructions and emotions to the rest of the colony. Some trees exercise power on smaller ones. Emotions of love, hate, solidarity are exercised underneath. Wars are waged. Alliances with other tree species are formed. Even when one tree dies, the rest eventually die, too. Trees stand stationary but their roots are communicating very sophisticatedly. However, what we know about plant communication system is still extremely little.
School gardens
Plant blindness, if not tackled, would lead to having new generations unaware of their environment and the hazards of plant extinction on our life and our planet earth. Let’s start with schools. Botanical gardens at schools could be the open source of knowledge about plants of the immediate environment. Curricula designed to promote plant literacy are urgently needed as well. Let’s make gardens of all types the place in which we read, eat, connect to nature, grow our favourite plants, care for birds, animals and let all thrive peacefully and harmoniously together.
Citizen science projects
To combat plant blindness as well as other issues related to raising ecological awareness, many top universities and conservation societies around the world initiate “Citizen Science Projects” and “Year of Citizens Science.” Such fascinating and engaging projects aim to get the ordinary citizens and nature lovers involved in collecting data on plants, birds and animals in their immediate environment for research. For example, volunteers, especially environmental nerds, can listen and categorise sounds of animals in their vicinity, count and spot the distribution of wild plants, send videos, publish peer-reviewed papers, donate money for research activities and events, among many other types of volunteer work. Citizen science projects have invaluably contributed to identify various endangered species of animals and birds, find some species thought to go extinct for decades, grow endangered plants, and create more eco-friendly attitudes and practices.
Shouf wi t’allim
The call for looking at plants, especially flowers, pops up in my mind the song of the legendary Egyptian singer Umm Kuthum “Shouf wi t‘allim” (See and learn). The repetitive call to “ look at flowers; they teach lovers how to talk,” resonates with the call for removing our blindfold to see the magnificent beauty of the universe. God creates everything for a certain purpose. All plants, animals and humans count. All make up the ecosystem that govern our life, and all are worthy of respect and protection.
Finally, every time, you see red apples, strawberries or tomatoes , green lettuce, onions, cucumbers, cabbage, oranges, carrots, just hold one or some, then close your eyes, feel the skin, smell it, take a tiny bite, keep for awhile in your mouth, enjoy the taste and the texture, and ask yourself what would the world be without plants? Absolutely, nothing!
By Dr Laila Abdel Aal Alghalban
Professor of Linguistics
Faculty of Arts
Kafr el-Sheikh University
Email: [email protected]
