quercus

Ways of Seeing is a 1972 BBC four-part television series of 30-minute films created chiefly by writer John Berger and producer Mike Dibb. Berger's scripts were adapted into a book of the same name. The series and book criticize traditional Western cultural aesthetics by raising questions about hidden ideologies in visual images. The series is partially a response to Kenneth Clark's Civilisation series, which represents a more traditionalist view of the Western artistic and cultural canon.

CW: Around the 20 minute mark, footage of an execution is briefly shown.

Related essays can be found on ways-of-seeing.com

Interesting tidbit: the creator of this video was arrested in the 1990s during the Satanic panic.

Silvia Federici's Caliban and the Witch is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. Full text can be found on:

libcom.org | theanarchistlibrary.org | gitbooks.io

The depth psychology of C. G. Jung provides a set of concepts for exploring the spiritual aspect of nature. According to this view, spiritual experiences occur when basic patterns or archetypes within the psyche are projected onto natural environments. Implications of this viewpoint for natural resource management and research are discussed.

Treesearch archive / Archive of article (PDF)

Join Iowa attorney and business professor Rosanne Plante as she explains what to do if the “Weed Police” knock on your door!

Most towns, cities, and other municipalities have weed ordinances (local law) concerning what is a weed, what is not defined as a weed in their jurisdiction, and what is allowed to be grown on the property of local citizens. How do you know if you are really in violation, or if your “flowers” just remind others of weeds?

Rosanne presents a handy checklist to use if you are ever accused of breaking a weed ordinance. Many times, citizens are not in violation at all, but can use the citation or threat of a citation as a teaching moment for local government officials.

As a past city attorney herself, Rosanne has extensive experience not only drafting city ordinances of all kinds but also prosecuting offenders. She truly knows what is needed to “prove up” a weed violation.

Download a Sample Native Planting Ordinance: https://wildones.org/resources/

In this episode we film more habitat destruction in South Texas, this time for the purposes of grazing cattle in a desert.

Echinocereus enneacanthus, Coryphantha macromeris runyonii, Ancistrocactus scheeri and others are prevented from being destroyed in this act of senseless bulldozing. Ecotourism possibilities abound here due to the presence of numerous rare birds and cactus species and an abundance of winter texans that would happily pay to see and protect this land, but ranching and cattle are the convention here, and human beings rarely break with convention unless forced to by unforeseen circumstances which are sure to arrrive to the region, eventually.

Monarch on rose milkweed, Asclepias incarnata.

I dug this out myself, roughly 6 feet in diameter and 4 inches deep. Given how fast everything is growing and self-seeding, I'll be able to expand closer to the street next year.

Southeastern USA Plains. This is the last stop for rainwater before the storm drain leading to the Chesapeake Bay.

This is in the Southeastern USA Plains.

The mature plants (seen on the left side) went to seed in the fall. I broke apart the seed heads over the right side in February.

Human Zoos tells the shocking story of how thousands of indigenous peoples were put on public display in America in the early decades of the twentieth century.

For more about the movie, additional information and clips be sure to visit the film's website at https://humanzoos.org/

Often touted as "missing links" between man and apes, these native peoples were harassed and demeaned. Their public display was arranged with the enthusiastic support of the most elite members of the scientific community, and it was promoted uncritically by American's leading newspapers. This award-winning documentary explores the heartbreaking story of what happened, shows how African-American ministers and other people of faith tried to push back, and reveals how some people today are still drawing on Social Darwinism in order to dehumanize others. The film also explores the tragic story of eugenics in America, the effort to breed human beings based on Darwinian principles.

In this revelatory work, Ruha Benjamin calls on us to take imagination seriously as a site of struggle and a place of possibility for reshaping the future.

A world without prisons? Ridiculous. Schools that foster the genius of every child? Impossible. Work that doesn’t strangle the life out of people? Naive. A society where everyone has food, shelter, love? In your dreams. Exactly. Ruha Benjamin, Princeton University professor, insists that imagination isn’t a luxury. It is a vital resource and powerful tool for collective liberation. Imagination: A Manifesto is her proclamation that we have the power to use our imaginations to challenge systems of oppression and to create a world in which everyone can thrive. But obstacles abound. We have inherited destructive ideas that trap us inside a dominant imagination. Consider how racism, sexism, and classism make hierarchies, exploitation, and violence seem natural and inevitable—but all emerged from the human imagination. The most effective way to disrupt these deadly systems is to do so collectively. Benjamin highlights the educators, artists, activists, and many others who are refuting powerful narratives that justify the status quo, crafting new stories that reflect our interconnection, and offering creative approaches to seemingly intractable problems. Imagination: A Manifesto offers visionary examples and tactics to push beyond the constraints of what we think, and are told, is possible. This book is for anyone who is ready to take to heart Toni Morrison’s instruction: “Dream a little before you think.”

Institution: Yale

Lecturer: Professor Shelly Kagan

University Course Code: PHIL 176

Subject: #philosophy #death #metaphysics #valuetheory

Year: Spring 2007

Description: There is one thing I can be sure of: I am going to die. But what am I to make of that fact? This course will examine a number of issues that arise once we begin to reflect on our mortality. The possibility that death may not actually be the end is considered. Are we, in some sense, immortal? Would immortality be desirable? Also a clearer notion of what it is to die is examined. What does it mean to say that a person has died? What kind of fact is that? And, finally, different attitudes to death are evaluated. Is death an evil? How? Why? Is suicide morally permissible? Is it rational? How should the knowledge that I am going to die affect the way I live my life?

Course materials can be found on the Open Yale Courses website.

Joshua Citarella is a visual artist who studies the memes and culture of Gen Z teens radicalized on the internet.