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EcoLit ESem
![Anne Dalke's picture Anne Dalke's picture](https://serendipstudio.org/exchange/files/pictures/picture-39.jpg)
POST YOUR THOUGHTS HERE
Welcome to the on-line conversation for Ecological Imaginings, an Emily Balch Seminar offered in Fall 2012 @ Bryn Mawr College, in which we are re-thinking the evolving nature of representation, with a focus on language as a link between natural and cultural ecosystems.
This is an interestingly different kind of place for writing, and may take some getting used to. The first thing to keep in mind is that it's not a site for "formal writing" or "finished thoughts." It's a place for thoughts-in-progress, for what you're thinking (whether you know it or not) on your way to what you think next. Imagine that you're just talking to some people you've met. This is a "conversation" place, a place to find out what you're thinking yourself, and what other people are thinking. The idea here is that your "thoughts in progress" can help others with their thinking, and theirs can help you with yours.
Who are you writing for? Primarily for yourself, and for others in our course. But also for the world. This is a "public" forum, so people anywhere on the web might look in. You're writing for yourself, for others in the class, AND for others you might or might not know. So, your thoughts in progress can contribute to the thoughts in progress of LOTS of people. The web is giving increasing reality to the idea that there can actually evolve a world community, and you're part of helping to bring that about. We're glad to have you along, and hope you come to both enjoy and value our shared explorations. Feel free to comment on any post below, or to POST YOUR THOUGHTS HERE.
![wanhong's picture wanhong's picture](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/86e376284d7d1d420ab3af0dc34b5453.jpg?d=https%3A%2F%2Fserendipstudio.org%2Fexchange%2Ffiles%2Fimages%2FSerendipStudioAvatar.png&s=85&r=G)
Floating mind
I am sitting on the outdoor bench, feeling the cool, autumn wind. I can see my shadow changes with the varying position of the sun and the cloud. For once in my life, I would like to forget about the physics model of earth orbiting around the sun, and believe that the sun is, miraculously, orbiting the world I am living in. This idea warms my heart, as I felt there id always something, someone surrounding me, protecting me, comforting me.
Many students are practicing sports on the playing ground—they are so passionately, enthusiastically in love with what they are doing, and I could not even describe how ridiculous mechanism seems to me. People are doing sports, not because they are programmed to do so. Their instinct is not a CPU, and they are not emotionless robots that mechanically do everything they are told to do. They have soul. They are a part of my sight, my world. They made the playfield full of happiness—they changed, rather than adapted to the surroundings.
They remind me of a girl in my junior middle school. She was a good friend of mine, and I always encouraged her when she got depressed. She was so easy to get depressed, because of her lpw grades, not-so-good appearance, unsatisfying popularity, and so on. She was so easy to be affected by the weather, or other people’s words. Then, when she got depressed, she spread her negative emotions to other people. At first she was sympathized, but after she created a trap of depress for herself, she was more and more isolated.
![mbackus's picture mbackus's picture](https://serendipstudio.org/exchange/files/pictures/picture-1107.jpg)
A Weekend in the Adirondacks
This weekend I had the misfortune to not be able to visit my location of choice on the Bryn Mawr campus, the moon bench. I chose this spot because I think its position gives it a unique and enticing view of the campus. You can look right up senior row through the Pembroke arch, over the valley of athletic fields to Cambrien row, and survey the Merion green. Sadly I wasn’t able to do any of these things, I was however able to attend a picturesque wedding in the Adirondacks of New York, specifically in Saranac Lake. My cousin Adrien and his wife Julia were married on September 22, 2012 at 3 pm in a little white chapel in the middle of the woods. It was perfect; there was no cell phone reception, no noise of the highway, a city, or anything other than the noise of the woods and of the people gathered to celebrate this momentous event. The wedding placed emphasis on the union between Adrien and Julia, as all weddings place emphasis on the couple, however Adrien and Julia made it clear from the start that although this event celebrated them, their relationship would not be possible without the support and love they received from members of their community. This was reflected in the interactive ceremony they had, the potluck, and the contra dancing that all took place that night. Julia is a park ranger in the Adirondacks and her appreciation and care for the environment shown through in their eco-friendly, environmentally conscious ceremony and reception.
![Susan Anderson's picture Susan Anderson's picture](/exchange//files/images/SerendipStudioAvatar.png)
At Peace with the World
The thing that struck me most about my experience in my spot today was coming back inside. Outside, my hour was peaceful. It was sunny and there was a light breeze. I was for the most part left alone by the labrynth, just relaxing and observing nature. As soon as I started to walk back to my dorm, though, my inner monologue started reciting all of the things I had to do when I got back. I stepped back into my technology and my homework without a thought, leaving the peace I experienced back where I found it. I had an epiphany while reading my art history textbook that it did not have to be this way. I could bring the good feelings I had outside into my attitude even when I was doing work. Needless to say, I was much less stressful after that thought.
![Shengjia-Ashley's picture Shengjia-Ashley's picture](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/09403f0f1ad81498f3818340fbeabd69.jpg?d=https%3A%2F%2Fserendipstudio.org%2Fexchange%2Ffiles%2Fimages%2FSerendipStudioAvatar.png&s=85&r=G)
Natural Deficit Disorder
Why am I the only one in class who adopted an indoor campus site at first? I must admit I have long been “suffering “ from “natural deficit disorder” coined by Richard Louv in his book: Last Child in the woods 2005. I remembered how I causally read that book and didn’t buy his words at all. I have been so comfortable residing within the concrete walls of human creations that I rarely try to look up to the sky.
Sitting on the bench on the plain grass platform behind Thomas Great Hall on Friday night, so how, maybe out of boredom, I looked up the sky. The star were amazing, more beautiful than the night sky I watched in document films, and more approachable. How much more I am missing?
New site I chose
![Anne Dalke's picture Anne Dalke's picture](https://serendipstudio.org/exchange/files/pictures/picture-39.jpg)
End-user expectations
Many of you probably saw (if you didn't, please read!) the lead article in this morning's NYTimes, Power, Pollution and the Internet, which makes it clear that our thinking we are being "green" in this class, by being paperless, is worse than an illusion; what we are actually doing, as we meet virtually each weekend, is helping to waste vast amounts of energy: "what’s driving that massive growth" is "the end-user expectation of anything, anytime, anywhere.”
![Barbara's picture Barbara's picture](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/5b6b8d647a72cd81a9800ecaba4f01ab.jpg?d=https%3A%2F%2Fserendipstudio.org%2Fexchange%2Ffiles%2Fimages%2FSerendipStudioAvatar.png&s=85&r=G)
Sunday Morning at the BM Labyrinth
Detached Moment
Cold in the morning.
Hammock was damp.
Bench was in shade.
Grass was thick and green, nourished by last night's rain.
Sunshine was soft and clear,
and the sun was hiding from me behind the huge pine-like tree.
Walking in the Labyrinth,
not thinking about the route.
Each step brings me to a new angle of view.
Athletic training was going on at the Applebee.
Sunshine gloriously projected on the wall of Rhoads.
Squirrels sneakily jump up and down the trees.
My hot drink was cooled.
I walked faster to keep myself warm.
One part of the Labyrinth was in the sun:
just like the most inviting slice of pizza - tempting.
I ignored the route I was walking on
and indulged in the gentle slow air flow,
the clear sky
the grass dew
the walk
the pleasant quiet alone hour
the meditation.
*Side notes:
I spent six minutes walking from the start to the terminal, which was way less time than one time that I cheated. But I felt the course of time should be longer. It reminds me of the Wellness course of last week where we closed our eyes and followed the instruction to breath in and out, which was an extremely relaxing exercise. That was another time when the psychological time I experienced was longer than the physical time. Whenever I am indulged in something, I feel I am doing more with my time.
![mtran's picture mtran's picture](/exchange//files/images/SerendipStudioAvatar.png)
Twilight, random thoughts
Today, I returned to my site with a friend. As we were sitting on the lounge behind Rhoads South, looking at the field without a single person, she told how she dislikes being in an open space on her own. She mentioned the feeling of loneliness as she stands there in the middle a huge grass lawn, surrounded by nothing but the air and sounds of nature, which surprised me. It seemed to me that an empty open space made her insecure and feared. However much I try to understand the logic behind her feelings, I cannot imagine myself in such condition. I am not brave enough to walk in a strange wood alone; however, when it comes to a place familiar or known-as-safe to me, I enjoy being in an open space. It is relaxing to me when I am able to cast a look faraway and up high above, to realize the green field so big and the blue sky so high. I attribute personality to our difference. While I tend to enjoy my own personal space, my friend cannot stay without an accompany. While I am looking forward to being on my own, my friend feels insecure when she is alone. As such, even though both of us love to be outside in nature, criterias defining our favorite places differ.
![Sarah Cunningham's picture Sarah Cunningham's picture](https://serendipstudio.org/exchange/files/pictures/picture-1105.jpg)
labyrinthine thoughts
Where I am sitting now: in a Starbucks on Broadway near 110th St, on the Upper West Side of New York, nearly 10 o'clock on Saturday night, the only place and time I've managed to get internet access and a modicum of space and time to myself. Better do this posting now; tomorrow will be full with rehearsal, and I need to practice my parts before that. This is actually OK with me as a way to live (so far...) The pleasure in the work to be done, and the stimulation and challenge of what I'm learning, more than outweigh the physical fatigue. So I sit and try to travel mentally back to the Labyrinth, and to my time there on Thursday, only a couple of days ago. My path from there to here is like a labyrinth in itself, twisting and turning through different locations and activities, meeting new people, trying to keep track of the threads of different conversations, different communication processes. I'm grateful for the opportunity to think myself back to the peaceful moments at the (Bryn Mawr) Labyrinth, just as I was grateful to have an assigned hour of contemplation. It makes me think, now, that integral to our ecological disaster in the present-day world, is the sheer pace of our life, the speed of it, the quantity of activity and experience we expect to pack into every day. How on earth can we expect to be aware of what is going on around us, of the existence and concerns of non-human beings, of the effect we are having on them and they on us, when we have assigned ourselves a more than full schedule we can barely keep up with?
![Anne Dalke's picture Anne Dalke's picture](https://serendipstudio.org/exchange/files/pictures/picture-39.jpg)
Our "environmentally-friendly" "poem"
At the end of class today, (re-directed somewhat by Zoe!) I asked each of you to write--in the mode that Andrew Goatley describes as an "environmentally friendly alternative to goal-directed grammar" --a description of "what was happening," just then, in the room. Here is what we wrote, and then read to one another (it gives me shivers!):
Talking takes place.
Contemplation and thinking are happening around.
The desks are in a circle.
Shining through the windows.
Silent thinking.
Thinking continues.
Air is moving and responding.
Writing and thinking are happening.
Thought happens. Written words voiced in speech.
Thinking in peace.
Pensively gaze, frown, then scribble.
Pens are rustling.
Mental contortion.
Beings pulsating in peacefulness.
A conversation is going on.
I now want to bring this (lovely, really lovely!) production of ours back into conversation with wanhong's provocative post about the difficulty of describing motion without matter. She reports that--although the discussion in her high school physics class was guided by the motto that "motion is eternal while stability is relative"--every time they studied motion, they diagrammed it using dots or squares to represent the object in motion.
Stepping off from that insight…how might we diagram this poem?
Are there objects (in motion) in it?
(Are they us, or our thoughts?)
![Rochelle W.'s picture Rochelle W.'s picture](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/e170149a2d639827758c583977a179cb.jpg?d=https%3A%2F%2Fserendipstudio.org%2Fexchange%2Ffiles%2Fimages%2FSerendipStudioAvatar.png&s=85&r=G)
Seen but not Labeled
When I visited Bryn Mawr for the first time and for the second time I was given a campus map so that I could find my way around. And at some point in the seemingly constant stream of mail from Bryn Mawr over the summer I got another map. At that time the pictorial map of the campus was one of the most accurate image representations of Bryn Mawr that I had come across. And for the first few days on campus that continued to be the truth. Now that I have been here for a few weeks, and now that I have been prompted to think about it more deeply, I have come to realize that this map can only represent one layer of Bryn Mawr (as any map can only represent one layer of what it is depicting).
The place that I am going to visit each week is the space behind the English house (the backyard of the English house?). There were some shiny leaves there the last time I went and I liked them very much. This spot is connected to the pictorial campus map because it is on the map, but it isn't labeled.
![mbackus's picture mbackus's picture](https://serendipstudio.org/exchange/files/pictures/picture-1107.jpg)
All the Wonders Great and Small
The Bryn Mawr College campus is a beautiful, complexly interesting place that few maps can capture every aspect of. This map I have selected is no exception. The map I have selected is located front and center of the campus center, and its border reads, "Here lies the Bryn Mawr campus, all its wonders great and small twill fold to fit your pocket or unfold to fit your wall." Well.... yes and no. This map does depict many wonders of the campus, but not all of them. Firstly, let me start off with saying this is an AMAZING map. It is beautiful, and every aspect of it is symbolic. The colors that are used to draw the map are exclusively blue, light blue, red, and green. A coincidence? I think not. This map places huge emphasis on the traditions, the people, and the buildings that make up Bryn Mawr. It gives a fun, quirky representation of Bryn Mawr that it is more than accurate in describing the amazing community and the people who make it up. However one glaring aspect that is not done justice in this representation is the fact that the equally beautiful enviornment in which the campus is set in is muted. The green of the landscape is represented, but it is flat, not only in color, but in dimension. The undulating lascape (most notably the valley separating the Pensby Center and Brecon from the rest of campus) is absent, and the many different types of trees and flowers are nowhere to be found. Not only the is the plant life underrepresented, the animal life is completely ignored.
![ZoeHlmn's picture ZoeHlmn's picture](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/7dc77bcf7bda49153194b1f8107f1b92.jpg?d=https%3A%2F%2Fserendipstudio.org%2Fexchange%2Ffiles%2Fimages%2FSerendipStudioAvatar.png&s=85&r=G)
May Day in its Hay Day
I choose this photo because of how it representst he past as well as the present. This is a picture of the first May Day ever held at Bryn Mawr. It was held in the year 1900. I choose it because it helps to capture the essence of Bryn Mawrs community, as a fun loving group of women that like to have a good time. During parade night I felt that same essence of the community first hand, everyone wanted to be a part of the tradition and enjoy it. One site that I have choosen to revist throughout the year is the campus green. I feel that in the photo above that huge area of open space symbolizes the freedom Bryn Mawr women have and the green on campus signifies that as well. Also since the green is currently under construction it will be an interesting this to revisit throughout the year because it will be constanly changing.
here is a link to the imgae: http://www.lowermerionhistory.org/photodb/full/164-2.jpg
I do not know why the image is not working.
![](https://serendipstudio.org/exchange/files/imagecache/featured_450px/164-2.jpg)
![Elizabeth's picture Elizabeth's picture](https://serendipstudio.org/exchange/files/pictures/picture-1108.jpg)
Kate the Great
This image of Katharine Hepburn was the picture that I used as my visualization of the Bryn Mawr campus for my essay on Friday. It’s a photo from Hepburn’s acting days, and one that I thought could easily be associated with Bryn Mawr. Throughout my short time here, I’ve heard Hepburn, who graduated from Bryn Mawr in 1928, referred to numerous times in connection with the college. A quote of hers is on a wall in the Student Center, the Katharine Houghton Hepburn Center is named after her (and her mother), and she is one of the most famous Bryn Mawr graduates. (And the administration is awfully proud of that!). I didn’t think that this picture could possibly encapsulate all that there was to Katharine Hepburn. Even if it did, though, it also wouldn’t be able to accurately describe Bryn Mawr. Although I think that the community of Bryn Mawr makes us so special, I also think that as individuals, we are extraordinary, but only one of us can’t encompass all that there is to Bryn Mawr and its community. I have begun to associate one special tree with Bryn Mawr, though. It’s a weeping birch that we sat next to on our first outdoor class, and I’ll be sitting in it and next to it this semester.