[Lapg] Permaculture with Patch Adams, Gesundheit! Institute, The School for Designing a Society June 1 - 30, 2005

[Wesley Roe and Marjorie Lakin Erickson]

The School for Designing a Society

Summer Session:
June 1 - 30, 2005
Gesundheit! Institute, Patch Adams
West Virginia
call (217) 367-2804 or send an email to enslin at prairienet.org to participate

Summer Session: June 1-30, 2005
http://www.patchadams.org/gesund_in_the_world/workshops/SDAS.html

Reviews of the 2004 Retreat

The School for Designing a Society is a project of teachers, performers, 
poets, and activists. It is an ongoing experiment in making temporary 
living environments where the question "What would I consider a desirable 
society?" is given serious playful thinking discussion, and taken as input 
to creative projects.

Rather than orienting participants to find a comfy spot in the current 
social system, the School offers time, ambiance, tools, and company in 
which people can imagine and design a system they would prefer.

Based in Urbana, Illinois, The School For Designing A Society will travel 
this summer to the hills of West Virginia and rest at the Gesundheit! 
Institute. The Gesundheit! Institute is the dream of a growing number of 
people, an experiment in holistic health care based on the idea that one 
cannot separate the health of the individual from the health of the family, 
the community and the world. The Gesundheit! Institute's land in West 
Virginia is the future construction site for a free, silly hospital 
incorporating all the healing arts to address the major problems in health 
care delivery and provide a model of joyful service to the world. Situated 
on 310 acres in rural West Virginia — with two waterfalls, a four acre 
pond, extensive gardens and orchards, and several unique buildings — we 
will use the land itself as a teaching tool as well as establishing 
connections between the Gesundheit! project and a desiring and designing 
society.
Participants will explore the question,
"what would I consider a desirable society?"

In addition to asking participants to formulate and consult their desires, 
the classes and projects in the school will make use of conceptual tools 
from the areas of critical theory, cybernetics, political economy, 
feminism, epic theater, theater of the oppressed, radical pedagogy, media 
critique, community organizing, permaculture, and collaborative composition.
Why design?

Criticisms of the problems of the present society are often met with 
justifications. Once these justifications fail, many a conversation of 
hopeful intention is stopped with the (final) statement:
"The present organization of society is the best we have."

or the question:
"Do you have a better idea?"

This is a moment of possibility and not one to be left speechless. Indeed, 
many a time, the respondent finds herself sputtering, filled with a spirit 
of rebellion which unfortunately gets watered down to the mere language of 
complaint. Having had the time and opportunity to create — in conjunction 
with others of diverse experiences — detailed maps, dreams, plans, scripts, 
scores, videos, and blueprints of her desirable society, we imagine the 
situation could go differently. Imagine an atmosphere of audacity: She's 
asked the question: "Do you have a better idea?" Everyone taking a 
coffeebreak looks at her or their shoes. She looks the interlocutor in the 
eye and reaches into her purse? knapsack? briefcase? kitchen drawer? for a 
booklet of proposals, slaps it on the table scattering cigarette butts, and 
answers:
"Here, read this—this will give you an idea of what I want."

For more on the Gesundheit! Institute go to www.patchadams.org/home.htm


For more on the School for Designing A Society go to www.designingsociety.com

Why a desirable society?

We want to address people: our neighbors and our distant neighbors who, 
living in the current social system, find that this system maintains itself 
at the expense of its members so that misery, poverty, hopelessness, 
violence, and human degradation are daily occurrences. Our social system 
tells us that human beings are the problem, and that it, the current 
system, is the solution. We have taken long looks at this system, and we do 
not want it. As any social system is humanly created, not natural, and is 
maintained daily by human action, we wish to create new social systems, and 
to change our daily patterns of action.
Why design?

Criticisms of the problems of the present society are often met with 
justifications. Once these justifications fail, many a conversation of 
hopeful intention is stopped with the (final) statement:

"The present organization of society is the best we have."

or the question:

"Do you have a better idea?"

This is a moment of possibility and not one to be left speechless. Indeed, 
many a time, the respondent finds herself sputtering, filled with a spirit 
of rebellion which unfortunately gets watered down to the mere language of 
complaint.

Having had the time and opportunity to create--in conjunction with others 
of diverse experiences--detailed maps, dreams, plans, scripts, scores, 
videos, and blueprints of her desirable society, we imagine the situation 
could go differently.

Imagine an atmosphere of audacity: She's asked the question: "Do you have a 
better idea?" Everyone taking a coffeebreak looks at her or their shoes. 
She looks the interlocutor in the eye and reaches into her purse? knapsack? 
briefcase? kitchen drawer? for a booklet of proposals, slaps it on the 
table scattering cigarette butts, and answers: "Here, read this--this will 
give you an idea of what I want."
When we enter a system, we want to be able to formulate and institute 
schemes or setups whereby we coordinate our desires in conversation. We 
refer to the coordination of desires in the schemes or set ups of choice as 
designing. Even when designing is adequate for the circumstances in which 
it is implemented, it may prove inadequate in changing circumstances. When 
we encounter unforeseen circumstances, we want to be able to invent and 
pursue desirable possibilities for designing such that we conserve the 
coordination of our desires in conversation.


Why a school?

A school can provide the necessary initial chaos to encourage the 
generation of new thoughts.

Anyone can learn anywhere at anytime, and does; in a school, one is more 
likely to find someone who will teach.

Teaching is one of the few professions to which the sharing of power is 
indispensable.

In a school people can meet with the shared purpose of questioning 
premises, questioning givens.

A school provides a temporary enclave against profit driven work.

What Distinguishes this School from other Schools?

There are no more than a handful of schools, in any country, based on the 
desire for social change; this school proposes in addition, that social 
change be based on desires. In no other school are the desires of its 
students given such a high priority.

This school is organized by people who make a point of knowing how to 
accept an invitation.

There are no administrators.

Unusual stress is placed on performance; but performance understood in a 
particular way. Not athletic performance, bottom-line year-to-date economic 
or competitive scholastic achievement award winning performance. 
Performance, rather, in the sense of having an intent and choosing, from 
alternatives, a preferred way of presenting that intent. Thus, this school 
emphasizes performance not only in the sense of practicing music, movement, 
speech, the "Performing Arts", but also in the sense of daily performance, 
the performance of social roles, the performance of our identities. And 
further, the interest in performance is not academic, reporting the way 
things are, but active: performances, including the daily seemingly natural 
ones, are treated as changeable and choosable. There will many 
opportunities in this school to have fun with, to play with, to experiment 
with ways of presenting intent.

We want to address language: how we speak and how language speaks us. 
Inherited linguistic patterns form one of the strong arms of a social 
system, often hiding and justifying oppressive structures while ruling out 
the creation of alternatives to these. This strong arm is frequently left 
unexamined or considered to be of minor importance. In this school, while 
studying a subject, discussing an event, making a decision, we will squint 
nervously at the language used, prodding each other into moments of created 
eloquence.
-- Susan Parenti

This school invites looking for links between composition and designing 
society, where composition is taken to mean broadly the putting together 
things that have never before been put together in such a way that together 
they do something they wouldn't do apart.

According to this view of composing one might learn from writing a piece of 
music a new way of organizing a kitchen, or see analogies between new ways 
of painting a canvas and new ways of thinking about friendship.

Structure influences content. This school tries out new learning formats 
and watches how these new formats effect what is discussed.

This school is not an academic institution; is not anti-intellectual; is 
not interested in doing what once worked and does not now work; is not 
interested in doing what was then now yet is now then; is not interested in 
basing arguments on what comes naturally.

Anti-communication and composition:

"I use the word "communication" whenever I wish to speak of a human 
relation between persons and things which emerges and is maintained through 
messages required and permitted by already available coding and decoding 
systems or mechanisms.

I use the word "anti-communication" whenever I wish to speak of a human 
relation between persons and things which emerges and is maintained through 
messages requiring and permitting not yet available encoding and decoding 
systems or mechanisms.

"Communication" feeds on, and speeds, the decay of information in systems 
on which depends the significance of human relations.

"Anticommunication" not only retards this decay, but even creates systems 
whose significance depends on human relations.

Insistence on "communication" ultimately leads to social and physical 
violence.

"Anticommunication" ultimately leads to the insistence on "composition" and 
peace.

I use the word "composition" whenever I wish to speak of the composer's 
activity and the traces left by it. The composer is motivated by a wish of 
bringing about that which without that composer and human intent would not 
happen." -- Herbert Brun

"We want to compose ourselves, and, in so doing bring forth a world. Our 
interrelationships bring forth ourselves and one another; we want to 
romance and theorize and carefully alter our interrelations. We want the 
world and the people in it to live and thrive collectively. We want to wear 
lively, funny hats made out of deadly serious newspapers. We are interested 
in the creation of new problems. We are interested in the significance of 
experiment for the realization of social change."
-- William Gillespie
What Happens in the School?

Participants will explore the question, "what would I consider a desirable 
society?" In addition to asking participants to formulate and consult their 
desires, the classes and projects in the school will make use of conceptual 
tools from the areas of cri tical theory, cybernetics, political economy, 
feminism, epic theater, theater of the oppressed, radical pedagogy, media 
critique, community organizing, permaculture, collaborative composition.

Previous summer sessions of the School for Designing a Society, (usually 
lasting 4 weeks) have included such topics and projects as:

In 1992 in Urbana: describe the capitalist system at a dinner table in five 
minutes; a booklet of language games; gadgets...

In 1993 at the Gesundheit! Institute in West Virginia: a video, "You Could 
Live Differently"; classes formed as a result of a Problem Jostle; a 
production for radio called "Spoilsport News"; s alsa dancing; design 
groups; a research project on prisons; a loading dock cabaret...

In 1994 in Sioux Falls: the participatory economics model of "Looking 
Forward" (Michael Albert and Robin Hahnel); modeling capitalism and 
patriarchy; site specific art; oogling metaphors for social change; two 
House Theaters; garage roof poetry...

In 1995 at the Horizons High School in Atlanta: doors in the sombrero of 
criteria; discussions of California's Proposition 187; multiculturalism and 
racism; weekly performances; the movie "Panama Deception"; music for 
whirligigs; toy hammers, and squibs...

In 1996 at Dreamtime Village in Wisconsin and at Gesundheit: permaculture 
workshops; neologisms; experiments in painting; puppets; Brechtian theater; 
youth liberation workshop; newspoetry...
Who Might Attend?

All interested people are encouraged to apply. In previous Summer Schools 
for Designing a Society, organizers and participants found that the wide 
range of ages and variety of backgrounds of the participants was fruitful 
and appropriate for discussing the possibility of a society designed by all 
of its members.
When and Where and How Much?

The first session runs September 7th through October 29th, 2004. The second 
session runs January 18th through March 11th, 2005. After a 2-month break 
for planting, travel, other projects, there will be one-month session 
beginning June 1, 2005 at the Gesundheit! Institute in West Virginia.


A maximum of 20 participants will be accepted for each session. For 
participants juggling other commitments, part-time participation is an 
option and tuition costs will be adjusted appropriately.

Meetings, classes, and projects will happen in various studios, foundation 
spaces, and in our homes. The organizers will assist participants coming 
from out of town in finding inexpensive places to live. We encourage 
participants living communally; regular communally cooked dinners will be 
part of the school.

College credit may be arranged for those participants already enrolled in a 
college or university. Home schooling credit may be arranged for those of 
high school age.

Tuition is $1000 per session due on the first day of classes. Monthly 
payments may be arranged. Some need-based scholarships are available. 
Indicate in your application how much you need and why. You may also 
contact us directly about scholarship opportunities and part-time work 
opportunities in the area.

"Nestled among the featureless agri-business grids of east central llinois, 
Champaign-Urbana sits against the horizon like one twin small metropolis in 
a region protected from tornadoes by its subtle topography. Home to the 
nation's oldest experimental agricultural field, and some football team, 
but the third largest university library in North America, this small town 
is the home of a disproportionate number of artists, scholars and 
activists. There is art here. There are quiet safe streets. But there is 
one of the highest per capita beer consumption rates in the United States. 
When the evening fades to dusty blue stained glass, the trees throw their 
branches across the emerging stars as if frantic apparitions fending off 
time's carcinogens. On nights like these we gather quietly on porches with 
our cellos, baritone ukuleles and radical economic blueprints to tonight 
compose the songs that will make us nostalgic tomorrow, and, the following 
day, will seem weirdly quaint. This is one of the last footholds of desire 
in a country destroyed by a flood of money now diminished to a trickle. 
Urbana's clock tower and airraid sirens, its post office and donut shop, 
its cobblestone streets lit by incandescent globes all serve to provide a 
focus only vaguely akin to community. But then there's us."
--William Gillespie
School instructors:

Mark Enslin:

composer; actor; bassoonist; has worked with composition students in 
Brazil; taught such classes as "Music and Protest" and "The Art of Acting 
as Audience" at the University of Illinois; cofounder of the Performers' 
Workshop Ensemble. enslin at prairienet.org

Susan Parenti:
composer; playwright; poet; has written and lectured extensively on 
composition and feminism; has taught courses on creativity in activism, 
"Protesting the Forms of Protest;" present interests: creating a feminist 
composition curriculum, cybernetic theory, the politics of managed health 
care, the politics of vocal timbres. Has published a book of plays,
"THE POLITICS OF THE ADJECTIVE POLITICAL AND OTHER PLAYS",
and a book of poems
"I AND MY MOUTH AND THEIR IRRESISTIBLE LIFE IN LANGUAGE"
sparenti at ux1.cso.uiuc.edu

Danielle Chynoweth:

sculptor; singer; performer; activist with a degree in politics from the 
New School for Social Research, NY; present interests: performing, making 
radio shows with twelve year olds, workers cooperatives, and community 
organizing around local economic development policies. chyn at onthejob.net
Guest Instructors:

Lori Blewett:

coordinator of the In Residence program at Unit One/Allen Hall, a 
living/learning program at the University of Illinois; has taught courses 
on feminism, language and politics, race relations, conflict resolution, 
public speaking; is currently research ing anti-racist activism. 
lblewett at uiuc.edu

Warren Burt:

Warren Burt is a composer, performer, visual artist, radio producer and 
writer who is based in Melbourne and also spends time in Urbana. He 
probably travels too much, which sometimes leads to a very fluid sense of 
identity.

Karina Lepley:

Karina is a gloriously loud life performer and self ascribed sexualist. She 
continues lustful and dramatic love affairs with care, conflict, and 
conversation. Co-founder of the Ethical Slut Posse, staunch Radical 
Cheerleader and full bodied Singer. Frequently answers the question, "How 
are you?" with "Hard as hell and going (s)well!"

Gossa Gebre Selassie:

gossa worked with a group co-workers at 906 s.race >in the late 1990's to 
set up a painterly environment.such aspace maybe referred to as a 
vibeosphere.this experience grew out of Aa Bu Gi Da in the early 
1990's.gossa is currently into constructing vibeospheres in an extended 
sense.sundustrialization being one of the aspects,seting up guest student 
possibilities in ethiopia being the other.nowadays he holds formal 
geometric discourses in his dreams(6/01)

Sam Markewich:

parent, Marxist-feminist psychotherapist, unabashed communist, writer, 
composer-listener/percussionist, teacher, activist with an undying interest 
in propagating new perspectives while relating with people through serene 
movement, former Urbana resident and teacher/organizer of the School for 
Designing a Society s7markew at earthlink.net

Bethany Cooper:

composer of music, puppets, masks, clothing, and collages; degrees in music 
composition from Hampshire College and the University of Illinois; has done 
research in the history and music of women composers.brcooper at uiuc.e du
Visit her on-line collage book.

Arun Chandra:

works with students in composition, performance, and the politics of art at 
The Evergreen State College, conducts the Olympia Chamber Orchestra, 
composes music with computers and for performers.

Maria Isabel Silva:

anthropologist with extensive research experience in Latin America and the 
U.S.; organizer of a non-governmental organization to promote indigenous 
culture and ecology in Ecuador; She is studying communications and video 
art. Currently she is making a video documentary about the Migrant Workers 
in the Midwest of the United States. mi-silva at uiuc.edu

Larry Richards

Past president of the American Society for Cybernetics; has taught 
engineering management and cybernetics at Old Dominion University; 
currently he is vice chancellor for academic affairs at Indiana Univeristy 
East.

Sigfried Gold

The local community and environment created by the School for Designing a 
Society inspired and helped Sigfried Gold to found a computer programming 
business designed around the desires of its workers. OJC Technologies 
(formerly On the Job Consulting) currently employs 17 people, several of 
whom are or have been part of the SDaS community. This project also spun 
off a not-for-profit organization that teaches Linux-based computer 
programming classes for free: The Computer Learning and Mentoring Center 
(CLAM).

William Gillespie:

writer; artist;radio host. willgill at prairienet.org
Visit his newspoetry site and a site of poetry assignments and examples: 
Table of Forms

Patch Adams:

doctor; clown; traveling lecturer; instigator of the Gesundheit! Institute, 
a large scale project to build a free, silly hospital in rural West 
Virginia and transform the present society's understanding of health care.

Rick Burkhardt:
composer, playwright, member of Utopia Train theater collective and the 
Prince Myshkins music group.
Past instructors:

Herbert Brun (1918-2000):

Professor Emeritus of music composition at the University of Illinois; has 
held seminars in the social significance of experimental composition; has 
been an invited guest at numerous conferences and held several guest 
professorships in the United States and Europe; interests: how language 
speaks us instead of us speaking language, the retardation of decay of 
artwork, language, bodies, and love.

Steve Sloan (1948-2001):

Has taught cybernetics and systems theory, and Tai Chi Chuan; studied with 
Heinz Von Foerster at the University of Illinois Biological Computer 
Laboratory in the 1960s and 70s; the Steve Sloan Library at 409 N. Raace 
St. in Urbana was dedicated September 15, 2001.