Eco-Literacy 2014

Throughout my time in our Eco-Literacy 360, I have grown to have a better understanding of what it means to be thinking and acting ecologically, honoring the ‘environment’ as an intrinsic aspect of our lives as individuals, and of the communities that we are part of. Teaching and learning with the intentions of ecological literacy can have mind-opening effects on how we perceive and interact with the world, its people, and the environment. With this in mind, I want to take my curriculum to where eco-literacy has been most present in my life and the lives of many of my friends and family members. My curriculum is designed in a very location-oriented fashion, as a learning experience for the oldest age group at Camp Galil. Galil is one of many camps that make up the Labor Zionist Youth Movement “Habonim Dror”, and is located in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. The ideology of Habonim Dror is based on five pillars: Progressive Labor Zionism, Judaism, Socialism, Social Justice, and Hagshama (actualization of values).  These ideals are rooted in the Hebrew phrase “Tikkun olam”, or “repairing the world”, and are the basis of the unique experience that is Galil. This ideology plays a strong part in generating its eco-centric, environmentally conscious community, but I also see eco-centricity rooted in the camp’s physical location, the style of interaction between peers and between counselors and campers, as well as in the playful, fun-spirited, and non-traditionally educational learning that takes place.

ECON 136:  Week 14,  Friday

Effective Communication of Quantitative Information 

Here are the examples I presented in class

Dan Heath on making things stick and the Fishman article on water bottles.

Hans Roling on measuring human progress

Annie Leonard on responding to climate change

I agree with aphorisnt and I also find myself thinking about today's conversation and processing today--and this whole semester. I too feel as if there are times I didn't really allow for absolute and complete porosity of my life, my thoughts, my pursuit of the knowledge and learning we were doing in context to the class and the space that was created with this 360 dynamic.  I was used to compartamentalizing. I was scared to used Serendip, to have my voice and my words being so naked and out there. What if I was wrong? But then, I kept thinking of the progress I felt I had gained in my own experiences. I hesitate even know to bring it back to my own experience. It seems too centric of me, me, me. But that is also the only way I could frame being in this 360. Today, when we were writing, I was at a loss for words. I found myself too facing the tiger, language failing me. But I remembered, I remembered that when all is said and done, when everything has happened, when we plan and go about life, no matter what the end result is, no matter how hard or difficult or twisty and curvy the path may have been to get where you are, my mother always reminded to take a step back to say alhumdullilah. Thanks be to God. Thanks doesn't become to cover the sentiment and connotation of alhumdullilah. In it's purest form it's aknowledging the existence and utter nature of this world as being just the way it is. Sometimes, I think about how our environment shapes us. What does is truly mean to be "eco-literate" ?

still mulling over much of what we said during our shared evaluation this afternoon,
including the report that the dynamic among the three disciplines was a source of tension,
with econ not working very well in concert w/ the other courses (in part because there
were non-360 students in it, and/but/also....?)

When I read sara.gladwin's first sentence to her post "bear with me as I seem to go in circles" it brought me to the relationship between Piya and Fokir, and the full-circledness of their time together. They meet when he saves her from the water, a mysterious sort of water that difracts light every which way. She loses her sense of which way is up, but is Fokir guides her to the surface. In the end they are both trapped in a powerful, uncontrollable water, in which saving Piya from it is the last thing Fokir does. The story is beautiful, but I can't help but feel a bit cheated. I know that Piya and Fokir's language barriers did not cut off their connections with each other, but the language barrier kept me from ever seeing and understanding Fokir. We see how much Piya has gotten from her relationship with Fokir: he saves her life, guides her to her dolphins, saves her again, and again. We never see what Fokir has 'gotten' from their relationship. All it seems is that Piya created trouble in his relationship with his wife and family, promted him to put himself in dangerous situations, and led him to give his own life in order to save her. I try to reach for understanding of Fokir's side of the story, but I find myself going back in circles through the stories of other people. I will never know, but it is all I want to know! But then again, that is what life is. We reach out and make connections with people to try to understand the world, the minds, the thoughts, feelings, and emotions that exist beyond our own minds, but we will never know the story.

This is the post that I had started after last week’s class and spoke about last Monday!

Bear with me as I seem to go in circles….

I was thinking about this after class- why is our first inclination upon recognizing the failures of language to give up on? Why are we so ready to claim that connection is impossible, simply because language does not always meet our needs of expression? I realized that the very rhetoric itself we employ to talk about these things is extraordinarily polarizing… this brought me back for a moment to a sense of hopelessness about the state of language and its connective potential; before I reminded myself that acknowledging that language can fail is not a reason to give up trying to connect or communicate- it is a call to be more attentive to the ways in which we attempt/do not attempt those connections; the words we do/or do not choose to utter. It is committing to the labor involved in creating and maintaining fulfilling connections …

Of course, I realize I have a particular stake in protecting language; a substantial part of my education the only thing I ever felt good at was “reading” language… which is why I spent most of my time at Bryn Mawr under the assumption that the only thing I could ever be was an English Major… being attentive to words and language is a critical tool in what I do on a daily basis.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/29/science/what-does-today-owe-tomorrow.html
an economic analysis ending with the claim that this is actually not an economic question,
but rather a question of how much we believe we owe those living in the future...

In The Hungry Tide, I kept seeing the constant theme of nature's strength intertwining with humanity. I found the writing to be beautifully detailed and Ghosh made it possible for me to track Piya's, Fokir's, Kanai's travels in my own world created with his writing. Nature is constantly being intertwined with the events, and adventures the characters go through, inevitable. The value of human life and the value of nature seemed tied to me, unable to be one without the other. Life's constant attacks and misfortunes happen through nature's wildlife, like the attack sof the tigers and the tidal waves that drown several individuals. 

The value of death and life are constant with the value of nature. Without nature, without wildlife, without it's cycle, we wouldn't be able to survive, to exist. It's all a routine, just like our lives. We are alive and walk among nature and nature is a part of our existence, but also a part of our death, the end of our existence. It's that powerful, I believe. A routine, a cycle not so obvious to aknowledge but a true one at that. What keeps us alive, can also end us.