Issue 4.1 (Fall 2009)
Special Issue on Sustainability and Community Literacy
Guest Edited by Anne Mareck, University of Kentucky
Consulting Editor, Diane Miller, Michigan Technological University
Anticipated publication date: October 2009
Diane Miller
Neighborliness at the Co-op: Community and Biospheric Literacy
Abstract
In this ethnographic study of an organic-foods cooperative, I examine community through three different facets-the Voluntary Association, the Lifestyle Enclave, and the Neighborhood. I use field notes examples to show how each of these facets corresponds with the three visions of discourse for social change considered by Wayne Campbell Peck, Linda Flower, and Lorraine Higgins in their 1995 article, "Community Literacy." The Neighborhood, which corresponds to community literacy, Peck et. al's most powerful discourse, is the facet that I suggest holds the most promise for developing biospheric literacy as described by Anne Mareck. That is, through the cordial chat of neighborliness, we can ritually enact ways of community making meaning that acknowledge human and non-human community members that interdependently comprise our biosphere and communicate the kinds of understandings that we need to affect positive social change and limit biospheric damage.
Anne Coray
The Closer to Home the Better
Matthew Ortoleva
Narragansett Bay and Biospheric Literacies of the Body
Abstract
This article considers two stories of bodily connections to Narragansett Bay, the major estuary and defining feature of the State of Rhode Island. One story is of profound loss, the other is of unwavering advocacy. Both stories exemplify the possibility of transformational moments that open when body, place and language come together. These transformational moments are the beginning of discovery and affirmation of ecological consciousness, and are the cornerstone of an ethic of sustainability as well as a biospheric literacy which starts with the body.
Elizabeth Giddens
Saving the Next Tree: The Georgia Hemlock Project, Community Action, and Environmental Literacy
Abstract
This article describes a community effort in the north Georgia mountains to stem the spread of the hemlock woolly adelgid (HWA) infestation, which is killing eastern hemlocks throughout their range. The project has raised awareness of the problem, funds to finance research and the cultivation of predator beetles, and citizen science involvement. Participating institutions and groups quickly focused on a shared purpose and have managed the project in a manner that accommodates separate benefits to each entity. In addition, the individuals leading the project have employed a personable, respectful, and flexible contact style, which has attracted participants and appealed to volunteers. Perhaps most important, the project has enabled participants to play active roles in fighting the infestation, rather than merely requesting monetary support or long-term changes to personal behavior; research shows these latter strategies are unlikely to result in authentic understanding of environmental issues or long-term behavioral change. Paradoxically, the field work itself has enabled participants to make connections between ecological crises—such as the HWA infestation—and choices that individuals can control—such as whether or not to use non-native plants in their suburban yards. This account demonstrates strategies that can be successful in many community action initiatives and that should have particular appeal for environmental activists.
Peter Goggin and Elenore Long
The Co-construction of a Local Public Environmental Discourse: Letters to the Editor, Bermuda's Royal Gazette, and the Southlands Hotel Development Controversy
Abstract
As a distinct geographically situated production of public record of daily events that is often imbued with the ideals of the community it serves, the daily newspaper, and the editorial pages in particular, holds a powerful space in the collective mind as a forum and litmus for community opinion. This essay provides a case analysis of community opinion on sustainability and sustainable development in the small island nation of Bermuda through letters to the editor in the country's daily newspaper, The Royal Gazette. These letters, published in that powerful space through invested and dynamic local media literacy sponsorship, illustrate the potential for effective discourse on environmental sustainability that, at least in Bermuda, constitutes productive community activism in its own right and also fosters additional literate social action.
Eric Mason
Greening the Globe, One Map at a Time
Abstract
Literacy is often conceived as the literacy of community members, but rarely as these members’ literacy of their communities. Although our sense of community has become increasingly separated from geography, our local environment is a critical resource for developing the eco-literacy necessary to imagine sustainable futures. The Green Map® movement offers a model for how educators can encourage such literacy through engagement with the local community. Green maps are maps of local green living resources, including sites of cultural, natural, and civic significance. These maps are created by local citizens with support from the Green Map® organization, which has inspired a new era of grass-roots cartography. By involving students in the production of green maps, educators can encourage an eco-literacy that is grounded in the local community and focused on designing shared visions of responsible co-existence.
Poetry
Anne Coray
"Goat's Beard" and "Cold Spell"
Missy-Marie Montgomery
"The Language of Birds" and "At Twilight I Watch the Woodcocks' Wild Dance"
Books Reviewed
Horton, Lynn R. Grassroots Struggles for Sustainability in Central America.
Reviewed by Susan Meyers
Speth, James Gustave. The Bridge at the Edge of the World: Capitalism, the Environment, and Crossing from Crisis to Sustainability.
Reviewed by Peter Moe
Lopez, Barry and and Debra Gwartney, eds. (2006) Homeground: Language for an American Landscape. San Antonio: Trinity University Press.
Reviewed by Kurt Stavenhagen
Hawkins, Paul. Blessed Unrest: How the Largest Social Movement in History Is Restoring Grace, Justice, and Beauty to the World.
Reviewed by Anne Mareck
McKibben, Bill. Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future.
Reviewed by Casey Rudkin
Nel Noddings, ed. Educating Citizens for Global Awareness.
Reviewed by Daylanne Markward