COLLECTIVE PRACTICES presents STORIES FROM THE FUTURE: Crisis as catalyst for carbon-neutrality a workshop series with Lisa Pettibone & Dylan Harris (June - December 2020).
Registration for the workshop series is now closed! But you can follow up the program by joining the upcoming live streams: on CP's Website and on Acud TV.
Workshop#2 Live stream
6th September 4pm CEST
moderated by Lisa Pettibone & Dylan Harris
with guest speakers Lyn Ford & Mako Muzenda
We have ten years to solve the climate crisis, and the even more acute crises of sustainability, from economic inequality to biodiversity loss to nitrogen imbalances. So let’s imagine—together—how our world will look 10 years from now. How have we addressed these problems? Have we used the current public health crisis and global calls for racial justice to force dramatic change?
In our second public workshop, we bring in different forms of knowledge to help us envision a more inclusive carbon-neutral future with two guest speakers. Lyn Ford will draw on her experience as an Afrilachian (African American + Appalachian) storyteller to help us understand how to tell stories that challenge and provoke change. Then, Zimbabwean journalist and scholar Mako Muzenda will share African visions of the future, such as Afropolitanism.
STORIES FROM THE FUTURE
This workshop series will run throughout COLLECTIVE PRACTICES, picking up the thread in each of its four explorations (#NARRATIVES, #KNOWLEDGES, #CARE, and #RESISTANCE) to imagine—and begin to build—the future we want: Participants will collaborate in several events that bring together scientific knowledge, creative energy, personal connections, and the will to act to envision the better way we want to be—10 years from now. What does it mean to “degrow,” and remove fossil fuels from the economy in a way that improves our lives? As we discuss, we will create artifacts from our vision of the future. These artifacts could be short stories or poems, sculpture, technological prototypes, or scientific articles written in 2030. In creating these artifacts, we will share what we have learned through our collective investigation.
Together, we will present at a final event in December: a piece developed collaboratively that uses degrowth ideas to present bold ideas for a sustainable future. And with luck, we will discover how to learn from each other to create something none of us could alone.
The series includes 4 public workshop sessions, initiated by Lisa Pettibone, moderated together with Dylan Harris, with additional speakers invited to give impulse presentations. The active participation in the workshop series includes regular closed working sessions (about once per month).
Lisa Pettibone
... is an independent sustainability teacher, researcher, and writer. She is interested in radical belief systems like degrowth and the ideological change needed for societies to move away from capitalism. In addition to teaching, she enjoys experimenting with different media to talk about such a change, from academic writing to speculative fiction and performance to her podcast “My Climate Diet” (myclimatediet.org).
Dylan Harris
... is an Assistant Professor of Geography and Environmental Studies at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs. His work focuses on the stories we tell (and don't tell) about climate change; why stories are important in the context of crisis, climate change being one of many; and how to tell meaningful stories about and for a more just, equitable future. He is interested in how topics as diverse as folklore and fermentation can help to better articulate and enact ideas like climate justice and a just transition. He is also a contributing editor of the project/blog Not Afraid of the Ruins (http://unevenearth.org/not-afraid-of-the-ruins).
GUEST SPEAKERS
Lyn Ford
... is a fourth-generation Affrilachian storyteller, author and keynote speaker, whose work has taken her across the United States and beyond its borders to Australia and Ireland. For many years, Lyn shared and nurtured the power and promise of storytelling in preschools, elementary schools, correctional facilities and juvenile detention centers. Now, Lyn is a Thurber House mentor to young authors and adult workshop facilitator, a teaching artist with the Ohio Alliance for Arts Education (OAAE) and the Ohio Teaching Artists Roster, and a Certified Laughter Yoga Teacher. Lyn is a member of the Transformative Language Arts Network Council, the National Writing Project Writers Council, and the National Association of Black Storytellers Circle of Elders. Lyn likes to work at play that creatively stretches the mind and heart and connects us to the joy of simply and comfortably being who we are. Lyn’s latest books (with friend and fellow storyteller Sherry Norfolk) are the September 2019 publication Speak Peace: Words of Wisdom, Work and Wonder, and 2020's Supporting Diversity and Inclusion with Story. In November Lyn will be a storyteller for the Freedom Stories Project of the International Storytelling center.
Mako Muzenda
... is a Zimbabwean writer and journalist. A graduate of Rhodes University and a Mandela Rhodes scholar, her journalistic work includes African current affairs and popular culture. She was written for Mail and Guardian, Daily Maverick, NPR, UN Dispatch and This is Africa. Mako's academic interests focus on representation, ideology and semiotics. If she does decide to pursue a PhD, her research would be on pop culture and the Zimbabwean liberation movement.
