This curbside memorial, in all its exuberant chaos of blossoms, balloons, toys and statuettes, represents for me the awakening of the sacred in space, just as the church bell represents the emergence of the sacred in time. This is where it happened, where two lives were prematurely cut off. And this is where the community [...]
Something about the make-shift assembly of this particular sign caught my eye. The neighborhood had been blanketed with the “branded” poster at the top of the photo, but this entire configuration displayed an ad hoc flow of imagination with a passion for capturing the attention of any and all passing by. The “branded” poster has [...]
Church bells and carillons are the legacy of times past, when the rhythms of worship and prayer structured the lives of the surrounding community as a reminder of what time it is now, and what we are called to do with the time we have. And those same bells would interrupt routines in alarm or [...]
Here are a few overall musings on the Liberating Voices Pattern Language and Civic Engagement, based primarily on conversations that occurred during and after the series of workshops I conducted at The Evergreen State College over the past two years, while also drawing upon my experience in community development with the Institute of Cultural Affairs [...]
This posting is something of a dedication for the new series of articles under the category of “Inner Voices,” which I have introduced in another posting as a music-based, rather than psychological, metaphor for a vital aspect of emerging community. I’m not even going to try to be rigorously consistent in my observations at this [...]
OK, it’s time to start anew, and to symbolize a fresh beginning, I’m opening up a new category, Inner Voices. I intend to use the term primarily in it’s musical sense and the structural development of complex harmonies, not so much in its psychological associations with internalized dialogue or personal identity construction, although I suspect [...]
This is the last of four articles focused on the Liberating Voices practicums conducted for the two Public Thinking Public Health classes held at Evergreen College at the end of 2009 and beginning of 2010. The earlier articles focused on the overall context for the sessions, the structure of the group breakout work, and the [...]
This is the third of four articles focused on the Liberating Voices practicums conducted for the two Public Thinking Public Health classes held at Evergreen College at the end of 2009 and beginning of 2010. The earlier articles focused on the overall context for the sessions and the structure of the group breakout work. This [...]
This is the second of four articles focused on the Liberating Voices practicums conducted for the two Public Thinking Public Health classes held at Evergreen College at the end of 2009 and beginning of 2010. A slide presentation of completed “game boards” is provided on the first article of this series. This article focuses on [...]
This is the first of four articles focused on the Liberating Voices practicums conducted for the two Public Thinking Public Health classes held at Evergreen College at the end of 2009 and beginning of 2010. The actual tools, templates, session plans and reports are available from the Download tab of this site. This article focuses [...]
