Ecovillages Around the World:
Lessons for Sustainable Community
with author Karen Litfin
Thursday, February 13 FREE
7:30pm-9pm 2014
Ayni Gallery
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J
oin author Karin Litfin as she shares her newly published
book "Ecovillages:
Lessons for Sustainable Community" in an evening talk on
Thursday, February 13, describing her experiences traveling and
visiting Ecovillages around the world.
In
a world of dwindling natural resources and mounting environmental crisis,
who is devising ways of living that will work in a more sustainable way
for the future? And how can we, as individuals, make a
difference?
To answer
these fundamental questions, Professor Karen Litfin embarked upon a
journey to many of the world’s ecovillages – intentional communities at
the cutting-edge of sustainable living. From rural to urban, high
tech to low tech, spiritual to secular, she discovered an under-the-radar
global movement making positive and radical changes from the ground
up.
Not only
is another world possible, it is already being born in small pockets the
world over. These micro-societies, however, are small and time is short.
Fortunately – as Litfin persuasively argues – their successes can be
applied to existing social structures, from the local to the global
scale, providing sustainable ways of living for generations to
come.
WHAT IS AN
ECOVILLAGE? The Global Ecovillage Network (GEN) defines an ecovillage as
an intentional or traditional community using local participatory
processes to holistically integrate ecological, economic, social, and
cultural dimensions of sustainability in order to regenerate social and
natural environments. Because any group can call itself an ecovillage,
the term has been adopted by entities ranging from student coops to
suburban housing developments. In order to have an authentic experience
of ecovillage life, Karen chose to visit larger, more established
communities belonging to the Global Ecovillage Network. She also selected
for diversity in order to experience the full range of ecovillage
culture: rural, urban and suburban; rich and poor; secular and spiritual.
Starting with Earthhaven on the east coast of the US, Karen
worked her way around
the world via Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia, concluding her journey
in Los Angeles.
Karen
Litfin is a professor of political science and environmental studies at
the University of Washington. She grew up in Pittsburgh and Baltimore,
received a B.A. and M.A. from University of Maryland, and a Ph.D. from
UCLA. Karen is a mother, an introspective activist, an avid bicyclist and
hiker, and a second-rate gardener. In her research and teaching, Karen
takes a “person/planet politics” approach, which entails integrating the
intellectual, emotional, practical and contemplative dimensions of
sustainability.
Karen’s
first two books were Ozone Discourses: Science and Politics in Global
Environmental Cooperation (Columbia University Press, 1994) and The
Greening of Sovereignty in World Politics (MIT Press, 1998).
The evening talk takes place on Thursday, February 13, 7:30pm-9pm,
Free, at the Ayni
Gallery (across from the Amtrak Station, free parking nearby at SB City
Parking lot on Helena Ave) 216 State St, Santa Barbara CA,
93101, no reservations required. For more Info,
(805)962-2571, margie@sbpermaculture.org,
www.sbpermaculture.org,
Santa Barbara event facebook page
https://www.facebook.com/events/1417963928444132/
Event Co-sponsors: Santa Barbara
Permaculture Network, SB Time Bank and Sama
Additional Info:
YouTube/Seed Communities: Ecovillage Experiments
Around the World with Karen Litkin
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtNjZaXDGqM
Info on the Ecovillages:Lessons for Sustainable Community and booksigning
tour
http://ecovillagebook.org/
Facebook page for Ecovillages: Lessons for Sustainable Community
https://www.facebook.com/Ecovillagesbook
(805) 962-2571
P.O. Box 92156, Santa Barbara, CA 93190
margie@sbpermaculture.org
www.sbpermaculture.org
P
lPlease
consider the environment before printing this
email.