Seeding Hope: Environmentalism, Sustainability & the Reclamation of the Sacred

Green College
Several recent polls have indicated that most young people today are concerned about the environment they will inherit. Sometimes this can lead to what psychologists are now calling “ecological grief”. In this class, we will shine a spotlight on existing projects that successfully unite diverse groups of people in grassroots efforts to protect and restore natural resources. We will focus on what we can learn from them about protecting the environment, sustaining human communities and increasing social justice. We’ll look at seeds, literally, as part of in-person and remote activities based on campus and at the SLU Sustainability Farm, and then metaphorically, as we examine how regenerative agriculture can serve as an organizing principle for environmental and community activism. From there, we’ll explore how other communities across the U.S. have organized to protect biodiversity, soil, water, forests, grasslands, and fisheries. This includes examples from Indigenous communities and others that bear disproportionate environmental burdens as a function of race or socio-economic class. Along the way, we will contemplate what we consider sacred, and examine ways we can sustain ourselves as activists with food, music, movement, contemplative practice and art.  This course fulfills the FYP general education requirement.