NEW TO OUR PLACE IN NATURE?
considering joining us in Winter?
in order to be successful in general and with the essay project in particular, please pick up some of the readings from last quarter. Here are a few to consider.
Readings:
The concepts in William Cronon's (ed.) Uncommon Ground provided a foundation for our discussions. Link to selections.
A few other texts that you might like to consider:
A Sand County Almanac
A landmark work in the ecology movement, Leopold's work is a combination of reflections and the proposition of a "Land Ethic" as a way to pursue an appropriate relationship to our environment.
Topophilia
Tuan is interested in all aspects of our perception of our environment and the reciprocal relationship between our environment as we perceive it and our personal and cultural identities.
Lure of the Local
Lippard pursues a thesis about a new genre of public art that takes a sense of place and community as its center. As such, ties to nature are secondary in theory, but Lippard's idea helps us to understand place in our culture and the importance of community identity for any kind of political, social, cultural change to occur, including change toward sustainability and an authentic connection to place of any kind.
Idea of Wilderness
A work of enormous scope and daring propositions, Max takes us from paleolithic man to postmodern man to understand our relationship to wilderness and nature. Provides primarily philsophical and historical material but contains large chunks on specific 20th century poets relevant to the ecology/environmental movement.
Technics and Civilizaion
Mumford's bold history opened a lot of eyes in the program. Beginning with the mechanical clock, Mumford traces the emergence of modern man as a regimented, inorganic gear in the surging machine of civilization. link to selections.
When you join the program, you'll find yourself engaged in the following activities:
Lectures and workshops.Rob & Steve alternature (generally) and try to get guest speakers sometimes.The Subjects of lectures are typically related to other work but are not geared toward interpreting or contextualizing readings.
Reading (lots) and Seminar.
Art making: this quarter, monoprint and drypoint printmaking + photography (students will choose two of these three options). (Last quarter, students learned letterpress and linoleum block printing.)
More reading and seminar.
Film-viewing. (the kind where you take notes and talk afterwards.)
Trips/Service. We'll have, most likely, three overnight trips (one of these or one more overnight may be optional), which are still being planned. Overnights will not be as strongly related to readings as they were last quarter. They are, however, great opportunities to experience place, have discussions outside of the formalities of seminar and lecture, and, usually, to meet people working in close connection to the environment. Service is something new we're hoping for this quarter. We met with the director of the Native Plant Salvage project last qtr and got pretty excited about the work they are doing, for instance. Also, Martin Luther King day is coming up and a great many service projects will be happening on that day.