General guidelines
The class project is an activity-based assignment. That is, I want you to get hands-on with sustainable lifestyle issues. The key word here to keep in mind as you think about what you might like to do is "lifestyle". For this seminar, what we're really interested in are the ways most people currently choose to live versus alternative and more sustainable ways of living that most haven't yet experienced. Since there isn't just one sustainable lifestyle to fit everyone's needs, this predicament and its solutions can be conceived of in a variety of ways, depending on one's perspective and goals.
One of the goals of this seminar is to have you come away with experiences that will have taught you something about actually living more sustainably here in LA. So, your project should be something experiential. Each of you will submit a proposal at the beginning of week three, which I will go over with you in class. Week 4, begin your project, if you haven't already done so by then. Your project should take you on a month-long journey into sustainable living. During that time you are required to compose several blog entries that reflect on your ongoing project. These entries should be thoughtful, relevant, well written and perhaps reflective, critical, or descriptive of your experiences that arise from your project.
For your final assignment, you are asked to give a short presentation about your project during week 9 or 10. An outline of your presentation is due Thursday of week 7. By now, you must be wondering what this is all about and what you could possibly do for a project, so without further ado here are your options to choose from:
Project Options
Option 1: Change how you live and then write about it
Use your carbon footprint calculation to identify the areas of your lifestyle that contribute the most to your carbon footprint and reduce them by making some significant changes in your own lifestyle. For example, if you are a heavy meat eater you would go vegetarian. If you drive a lot, you would reduce your mileage and commute by bike or public transportation. Several books/documentaries have been based on this sort of model- the family that only bought American for a whole year, another that tries to reduce their impact to zero (No Impact Man), a PBS reality series where families recreated early American life on the prairie, a guy who eats all the McDonald's he can for a month (Supersize Me), another guy who smokes all the weed he can for a month (Superhigh Me), a writer, Barbara Kingsolver, who moves her family out to a farm and grows all her families food for a whole year,... the list goes on I'm sure. These people do these radical living experiments to 1. Experience life differently and share that experience, and 2. To make some point (e.g. McDonald's is really unhealthy).
Option 2: Be an advocate of change, here on campus
If you choose this option, you have to come up with something very specific that you want to see changed on campus and embark on a mission to make that change happen, or you have to join an ongoing campaign for change that has been organized by one of the student groups (namely E3). If you choose the latter, you must take on responsibilities as a key player in that campaign.
Option 3: Design your own sustainable community
If you are a graphic artist and into public policy-making and architecture, design a sustainable, urban community. Your project should include drawings or models of the community as well as an explanation of all the features that make the community sustainable. This design should embody a philosophy of or perspective on sustainability and should also integrate form, function, and ecology. Go to the art library and look at some architects' books that already do this.
Option 4: Write a guide to sustainable living in LA for folks in the lower economic brackets.
Not everyone has the funds to shop at Whole Foods or savings to buy a cabin in the woods. Write a short guidebook that will persuade the average Jane or Joe Schmo that living sustainably is not only affordable, but healthy and fun for the whole family, or just plain cool. Put your devious marketing savvy to good use by selling sustainability to the masses.
Option 5: Devise an entertaining and educational performance or presentation about sustainable living for K-6, junior high or high school
If you choose this option you will have to perform it for your final presentation.
Option 6: Write your own cook book about sustainable living and sustainable cooking.
Write a cookbook on sustainable eating with sidebars about sustainable living. Cook something that embodies sustainability and feed it to us for your final presentation!
Option 7: Do your own thing
Propose something else to me and if I think it is 1. Doable in the time allotted; and 2. On par with the rest of the suggestions here, then go for it!
Timeline and Details
1. Email me a half-page description of what you propose to do for your project, no later than Monday morning of week 3.
(Note: If the project you have in mind is something that inherently warrants a multiparty effort, then you may work in groups of no more than 3. But if you go this route, your reasons must be well-justified in a joint proposal submitted by you and your partners.)
2. Email me a half-page description of what you propose to do for your final presentation, no later than Thursday morning of week 7.
3. Sign up for a presentation slot, week 8.
4. Present, weeks 9 and 10.
Sunday, April 4, 2010
Monday, March 29, 2010
Exercise 4 (Week 8): Response to Omnivore's Dilemma
To be announced.
Due: Counts as one blog entry for week 8.
Due: Counts as one blog entry for week 8.
Exercise 2 (Week 2): Calculating Your Ecological Footprint
Calculate your ecological footprint (not carbon footprint as previously stated) for the month based on what you do in a week. Use the footprint calculator described in Radical Simplicity, pages 94-122, along with the forms and tables supplied in the appendix. Read the pages about the calculator carefully as you go through and make calculations, because they tell you exactly what to do. Compose a 1-2 page writeup that:
1. Summarizes the results of your footprint calculations and compares them to the average American footprint (see page 93 in RS).
2. Briefly discusses those results; sets short, medium, and long term goals for lowering your score; and indicates how you plan to lower your footprint to meet your short term goal by the end of this quarter.
3. Includes your calculations and all tables/forms from RS that you used (these don't count towards your page total).
Due: Tuesday of week 4.
1. Summarizes the results of your footprint calculations and compares them to the average American footprint (see page 93 in RS).
2. Briefly discusses those results; sets short, medium, and long term goals for lowering your score; and indicates how you plan to lower your footprint to meet your short term goal by the end of this quarter.
3. Includes your calculations and all tables/forms from RS that you used (these don't count towards your page total).
Due: Tuesday of week 4.
Exercise 3 (Week 3): Response to Radical Simplicity
For one of your blog entries this week, write a one page response to Radical Simplicity. Make sure to address the following questions in your review:*
1. Now that you have read RS, imagine yourself and your lifestyle 10 years from now. What does it look like? How did you envision yourself 10 years from now, before you read the book? Has your vision changed? Your answers should include a brief characterization of your current lifestyle and a discussion of your material and immaterial goals as they relate to sustainable lifestyles.
2. Does the lifestyle that Merkel lives seem radical to you? Do you think he goes too far? Why or why not? Don't just answer yes or no. Be specific and thoughtful, utilizing the concepts from RS to reflect on your own willingness or unwillingness to live as simply as the author advocates.
Due: Counts as one entry for week 3.
* You can blog this in whatever manner you devise as long as your answers- regardless of what form they take- remain clear to the reader. In other words, feel free to get creative.
1. Now that you have read RS, imagine yourself and your lifestyle 10 years from now. What does it look like? How did you envision yourself 10 years from now, before you read the book? Has your vision changed? Your answers should include a brief characterization of your current lifestyle and a discussion of your material and immaterial goals as they relate to sustainable lifestyles.
2. Does the lifestyle that Merkel lives seem radical to you? Do you think he goes too far? Why or why not? Don't just answer yes or no. Be specific and thoughtful, utilizing the concepts from RS to reflect on your own willingness or unwillingness to live as simply as the author advocates.
Due: Counts as one entry for week 3.
* You can blog this in whatever manner you devise as long as your answers- regardless of what form they take- remain clear to the reader. In other words, feel free to get creative.
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Exercise 1 (Week 1): Personal Trash Inventory Instructions
For this exercise, you will keep track of everything you throw away over the course of a typical school week. There are three stages to this exercise so please read CAREFULLY.
1. Take inventory
While following your usual habits and routines-that is don't try to change what you do, at least not yet- take inventory of everything you throw away or recycle (if you normally recycle). Carry a small notebook wherever you go and jot down a description of every item you throw away or recycle for each day.
2. Organize a tally
Once you have a raw inventory, sort it into larger categories like "plastic bottles" and "paper items" and decide how you want to present a total tally. Then, enter this information into a spread sheet and email it to me.
Your record should be organized by date and the types of items you throw away. It should also include grand totals for the entire week. Details and embarrassing or confidential information need not be conveyed to me nor to the class; however, during the initial recording stage, do keep detailed descriptions to aid you in your organization of the data. For example, we don't want to hear about "36 squares of toilet paper at 8 AM" though you should write that in your notebook. Instead try to come up with larger categories of materials that include particular items and ways of quantifying them. You might estimate quantities in number or area. So, instead of "1 dirty tissue" or "1 empty Coke bottle" you might create the categories "Sq. footage of paper items" and "#'s of small/med/or large plastic containers" then do the math. You won't know exactly how your spread sheet should look until you have completed part 1 above.
3. Blog it
In a blog entry titled "Personal Trash Inventory", reflect on and answer the following questions as best you can:
1. Do you think you throw out a lot of trash? Did you consider yourself wasteful before this exercise? What about after?
2. If you can identify an area of particular wastefulness, what is it and how can you reduce your waste in that area?
3. What aspects of your current lifestyle are reflected in your trash inventory? What did your inventory reveal about your own personal, familial, and cultural values, beliefs, and practices as they relate to sustainability and the environment? [For example, why is it that in the US we tend to take for granted and not questions the availability and consumption of disposable items that we use on a daily basis- cups, bottles, packaging- when we could use the same cup or bottle and no packaging at all in most situations. In fact, reusing vessels or containers over and over again has been the rule not the exception throughout history, across different societies. Why is it that we toss valuable and limited resources with little or no second thought then?]
4. What did your inventory reveal that you did not already know? How does this lifestyle that you see reflected in your trash inventory compare and contrast with one advocated in the first few chapters of Radical Simplicity?
Due: Tuesday of second week.
1. Take inventory
While following your usual habits and routines-that is don't try to change what you do, at least not yet- take inventory of everything you throw away or recycle (if you normally recycle). Carry a small notebook wherever you go and jot down a description of every item you throw away or recycle for each day.
2. Organize a tally
Once you have a raw inventory, sort it into larger categories like "plastic bottles" and "paper items" and decide how you want to present a total tally. Then, enter this information into a spread sheet and email it to me.
Your record should be organized by date and the types of items you throw away. It should also include grand totals for the entire week. Details and embarrassing or confidential information need not be conveyed to me nor to the class; however, during the initial recording stage, do keep detailed descriptions to aid you in your organization of the data. For example, we don't want to hear about "36 squares of toilet paper at 8 AM" though you should write that in your notebook. Instead try to come up with larger categories of materials that include particular items and ways of quantifying them. You might estimate quantities in number or area. So, instead of "1 dirty tissue" or "1 empty Coke bottle" you might create the categories "Sq. footage of paper items" and "#'s of small/med/or large plastic containers" then do the math. You won't know exactly how your spread sheet should look until you have completed part 1 above.
3. Blog it
In a blog entry titled "Personal Trash Inventory", reflect on and answer the following questions as best you can:
1. Do you think you throw out a lot of trash? Did you consider yourself wasteful before this exercise? What about after?
2. If you can identify an area of particular wastefulness, what is it and how can you reduce your waste in that area?
3. What aspects of your current lifestyle are reflected in your trash inventory? What did your inventory reveal about your own personal, familial, and cultural values, beliefs, and practices as they relate to sustainability and the environment? [For example, why is it that in the US we tend to take for granted and not questions the availability and consumption of disposable items that we use on a daily basis- cups, bottles, packaging- when we could use the same cup or bottle and no packaging at all in most situations. In fact, reusing vessels or containers over and over again has been the rule not the exception throughout history, across different societies. Why is it that we toss valuable and limited resources with little or no second thought then?]
4. What did your inventory reveal that you did not already know? How does this lifestyle that you see reflected in your trash inventory compare and contrast with one advocated in the first few chapters of Radical Simplicity?
Due: Tuesday of second week.
Grading Policy
Participation = 33%
- This includes attendance and participation in class and on fieldtrips. It also includes reading and commenting on your classmates' blog entries and completion of any readings and exercises assigned in class.
Blog = 33%
- Assessment of your blog is based on the quality of writing, originality and accuracy of content, its informativeness and whether you complete all blogging assignments. If I: 1. enjoy reading your blog, 2. learn something from it, and 3. can see that you are learning something too, well, then you're doing an awesome job!
Project = 33%
- This includes whatever you decide to do outside of class for your project as well as your final presentation of that project.
A mid-quarter report will be available sixth week, so you can track your progress.
- This includes attendance and participation in class and on fieldtrips. It also includes reading and commenting on your classmates' blog entries and completion of any readings and exercises assigned in class.
Blog = 33%
- Assessment of your blog is based on the quality of writing, originality and accuracy of content, its informativeness and whether you complete all blogging assignments. If I: 1. enjoy reading your blog, 2. learn something from it, and 3. can see that you are learning something too, well, then you're doing an awesome job!
Project = 33%
- This includes whatever you decide to do outside of class for your project as well as your final presentation of that project.
A mid-quarter report will be available sixth week, so you can track your progress.
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