Ecofem Tales

In the face of ecological collapse and gendered injustice, one wonders how might storytelling help us reimagine resistance? We see this in legends of the past. We return to the soil, to Queen Nzinga, the 17th-century ruler of Ndongo and Matamba (present-day Angola), who defied Portuguese colonization with diplomacy, strategy, and unwavering courage. Nzinga was a political icon and a guardian of the land itself? In this imagined version of her legend, Nzinga sees the Earth and women suffering together; forests stripped bare, rivers poisoned and mothers walking miles for firewood. Recognising this pain, she plants a sacred ring of native trees and declares: “Only those who ask permission from the Earth may pass.” When invaders attempt to conquer the land, the trees rise. Roots entangle their weapons; winds push them back. The forest listens because Nzinga listened first. In her reign, women lead, rivers return, the soil breathes again. Nzinga's story is both historical ...

  In the heart of Kenya’s highlands, where the soil is rich and the trees once stood like sentinels of life, a woman planted trees and a quiet revolution. Wangari Maathai, the fierce and compassionate founder of the Green Belt Movement, was more than an environmentalist. She was a warrior for justice, a mother of trees, and the matriarch of African ecofeminism. Her life was interwoven with themes of resistance, renewal, and radical love for the Earth and its people, especially its women. At Ecofem Tales, we remember Maathai not just as the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, but as a profound embodiment of what it means to stand at the intersection of ecological protection and gender liberation. Her story is not a relic of the past, it is a living call to environmental action. In the 1970s, Kenya was facing rampant deforestation, soil erosion, and a decline in water levels. All of these were consequences of colonial land mismanagement and post-independence devel...