How It Looks From Here

This month we're rebroadcasting one of our favorites from 2022. Here, Mary talks with Petra Kuppers, a disability culture activist and community performance artist who lives in delighted concert with the natural world, sharing in powerful intelligence, adapdibility and love of True Nature.

Petra holds the Anita Gonzalez Professor of Performance Studies and Disability Culture chair in English and Women's & Gender studies departments at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. She also teaches on the low-residency MFA Interdisciplinary Arts faculty at Goddard College. In her work, Petra uses somatic and speculative writing as well as performance practice to engage audiences toward more socially just and enjoyable futures. She has written academic books on disability arts and culture, medicine and performance, and community performance.

In their conversation, Mary and Petra explore the natural world and its diversity, alongside the political, spiritual and activist considerations that arise from being embodied.

Learn more about Petra Kuppers’ art, writing and activism by visiting her website at https://www.petrakuppers.com

Check out Petra’s poetry books like Gut Botany, her speculative fiction like Ice Bar and her scholarship, most recently in her book Eco Soma with the University of Minnesota Press in the Art After Nature series. You can find more on disability culture in the anthology, Disability Visibility edited by Alice Wong, available as a pdf at the link.

And, in the meantime, Petra has been awarded and is currently a Guggenheime Fellow spending recent months at the Camargo Foundation in Southern France. You can check out the video work she's completed there - Crip/Mad Archive Dances project: a final 35 min video documentary.

She's also completed a new poetry collection, Diver Beneath the Street -- true crime meets eco poetry at the level of the soil, out May 2024.

This month, Mary had the chance to meet up with Cyreena BostonAshby, CEO of Girls' Inc of the Pacific Northwest, an organization that serves girls and gender nonconforming and trnas youth in Portland, SW Washington and Seattle.

Cyreena grew up in Portland, raised in a family focused on social justice and business leadership. She's an alumna of Spelman College, the Historical Black College for Women in Atlanta, Georgia.

For 19 years, Cyreena has been a leader for high-profile public affairs campaigns focused on health care access, youth development and non-profit leadership. She was the first director of the Portland African American Leadership Forum, Imagine Black, and led the Oregon Public Health Institute as that organization's CEO. More recently, she's co-directed the Oregon office of D.C.-based Hilltop Public Solutions as a Partner in providing strategic solutions for non-profit and private sector clientele. Cyreena is also an International Women's Forum Global Leadership Fellow.

In our conversation, Cyreena and Mary take a close and loving look at the climate interests and concerns of girls, young women, and gender nonconforming, gender non-binary and trans youth. You'll also hear Cyreena's insights at the intersection of Black Feminism and environmental thought.

You can learn more about Cyreena BostonAshby by taking a look at the Girls Inc. PNW website. Also, check out her OpEd on STEAM in eschool news and her recent interview on the podcast, At the Core entitled, “Unapologetic Leadership.” Cyreena is so worth learning from and with. Keep your eye on this radiant and generous leader for inspiration and sisterhood into the future. 

MUSIC ~

This episode includes music by Gary Ferguson and these other fine artists.

Sensual Jazz Medium 2

Music by Grand_Project from Pixabay

Background Acoustic Calm

Music by Yevhen Onoychenko from Pixabay

Jazz Lounge Street Food

Music by Alex Cristoforetti from Pixabay

This month, Mary had the chance to meet up with Michael Zellner, a career journalist and business owner, a leader in local and international commu nity-based conversation and an all around agent of positive change. 

Since October of 2020, Mike has served as chief executive officer for the Arizona-based Sonoran Institute.  Mike has 30 years of experience building award-winning collaboratrions for global organizations, including The Nature Conservancy, Dow Jones & Co., and Euromoney. He has helped regional and local stakeholders to conserve more than 450,000 acres and mobilize more than $30 million foer conservation in the Americas.

As a business journalist in Mexico and the Americas, Mike played a leading role in the lalunch of the editorial operations of AmericaEconomia (a Dow Jones & Co. publication) in Mexico City, Sao Paulo, and Miami. He also served as editor-in-chief and owner of the Miami based business magazine LatinTrade.

In our conversation, you'll hear Mike speak of the power of community-based conservation and share perspectives from across his career.

To learn more about Michael Zellner, check out the Sonoran Institute. And while you're on the site, take a look at the informative and inspiring blogs Mike has written over his time as CEO of that organization.

Finally, take Mike's invitation to look around your community for how you, too can become involved in community-based conservation initiatives. It’s good for the land, for your neighbors, for you - it's for all beings.

MUSIC ~

This episode includes music by Gary Ferguson and these other fine artists.

Wind Troubles the Water

Music by Aleksey Chistilin from Pixabay

Vigilance

Music by Roman Senyk from Pixabay

Touch and Sound

Music by Juan Sanchez from Pixabay

In January, Full Ecology went to Chile. In Santiago, we had the chance to sit down so Mary could speak with two Chilean professionals - friends who share a passion for the environment.

Paola Molina Venegas is a lawyer and judge. Much of her practice involves social justice issues. Alongside that work, she has, in recent years, become deeply interested in the wellbeing of the environment.

Guille is a professional photographer and videographer. He works in the fashion industry and in film. He sees art as vital to truth and community wellbeing. He is a powerfully concerned citizen with interests in doing what he can to support climate repair and every aspect of social justice.

Throughout our interaction, Paola and Guille collaborated on the answers to questions, diving into the most challenging issues facing Chile's vastly varied ecologies and acknowledging the inescapable interdependence of social ecology with the wellbeing of nature.

You can learn more about the issues Paola and Guille describe at the links below. As they said in our time together, we are all connected by air, water, land. The solutions may only be global. It is vital for us to learn of the profound interactions of social and environmental justice as illustrated in Chile and so many other countries around the world.

2021 Constitutional Election 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Chilean_Constitutional_Convention_election 

Climate change data

https://climateknowledgeportal.worldbank.org/country/chile 

Coup 1973

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1973_Chilean_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat 

Environmental injustice threats in Chile

https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2023/05/experto-de-las-naciones-unidas-advierte-que-chile-enfrenta-una-tormenta-de

MUSIC ~

This episode includes music by Gary Ferguson and these fine artists.

--Ahmad Mousavipour 24575281 - Historia de un Amor

from Pixabay

--Sergei Chetvertnykh  - Bossa In My Heart

from Pixabay

 --William_King - Latin Summer

from Pixabay

This month, Mary had the opportunity to sit for a talk with Chef Oscar Yip. Oscar is a culinary expert with international experience, as well as a keen sense of the ecologies of humans and food. Oscar was born in Saltillo in the state of Coahuila in Mexico, where he was raised by his Mexican mother and Chinese father.

He later completed medical school at the University of Monterrey. But upon earning that degree, he realized his heart was with the culinary arts, and changed his life path.  Training in Austin, Texas with a prominent restaurant group, Oscar would also land an opportunity to cook in a 3 star Michelin restaurant. Known by the name “Martin Berasategui,” it was set in the Basque country of Spain, in the town of St. Sebastian.

Oscar continues deeply attuned to the intimate connection between human wellbeing and the wellbeing of the natural world. His culinary craft and practice hold this connection as a lodestar guiding his work with food as well as his presence in life. 

In our conversation we explore this relationship and the way it's available for anyone open to the inquiry.

You can learn more about where Oscar is preparing food by contacting him through Wolf House, an event venue he established in Austin. You can also follow him on instagram at oscarmyip.

Several years ago, Oscar moved out of cheffing for restaurants. Now his main focus is cooking as a private chef for high-end events. That means there's another great way to learn more about Oscar. Come to one of our Full Ecology Retreats this June on the JbarL ranch in the Centennial Valley of Montana. Oscar will be the chef for each of those, and will contribute additional guidance on food for the Full Ecology Solstice Retreat. Check the Full Ecology website or drop an email to Meg at JbarL Ranch - [email protected].

Plan now for June, 2024. Come spend time with beautiful land, deep inquiry over Summer Solstice and, the following week, close attention to weaving your writing craft with your kinship to the natural world.

~MUSIC

This episode includes music by Gary Ferguson and these fine artists.

Same Bossa - Music by William_King from Pixabay

Latin Summer - Music by William_King from Pixabay

Feel Bossa Nova - Music by William_King from Pixabay

This month, Mary had the chance to talk with Paula McKay, a writer and conservation researcher. Paula has studied wild carnivores for the past two decades, and is currently affiliated with the Living Northwest program at Seattle's Woodland Park Zoo.

In 2015, she earned an MFA in creative writing from Pacific Lutheran University, and earlier served as managing editor for Noninvasive Survey Methods for Carnivores (Island Press). Her work has been published in Deep Wild, Wild Hope, Earth Island Journal, and elsewhere. 

A central part of Paula's research is the practice of non-capture-based survey methods, opting to use cameras and other noninvasive techniques in the wild rather than more invasive practices like trapping. At the heart of her vision and mission is rewilding - that now-global effort to restore natural processes and species, to allowing nature to express its full genius.

Paula lives on an island near Seattle with her husband and more-than human dog in the company of elder trees. Today we talked about why and how of being in deep relation with the wilderness - within and around us.

You can learn more about Paula by visiting her website . Spend some time with her published essays and with her blog, Wild Prose. Check out her essays on rewilding, wolverines, grizzlies and urban mammals, among many more.

~MUSIC

This episode includes music by Gary Ferguson and these fine artists.

Sedative - Music by Oleksii Kaplunskyi from Pixabay

Coniferous Forest - Music by orangery from Pixabay

Far from the City - Music by Zakhar Valaha from Pixabay

Tyler Mark Nelson is an advanced student in the Masters of Divinity program at Yale Divinity School. He was raised on the northern banks of the Mississippi River, a stretch of the world that figured deeply in helping him come to know who he is.

Tyler began his work life with several years in horticulture, supporting human resources and sales at a large Minnesota greenhouse, leading operations with a university vermiculture and compost program, and farming at an organic lavender farm in eastern Washington state. He’s also spent a great deal of time in the wilderness, most recently with people new to time in wild nature.

Tyler is a Christian. He is a writer and theologian. He’s a climate activist and he’s also a person who has lived with significant mental health challenges. Tyler finds eco-theology and his own experience in the natural world to be reliable supports for living well these days on Earth.

In our conversation we weave childhood clarity with adult wisdom and consider how we may all reach out to the natural world for guidance when the going gets tough.

You can learn more about Tyler by visiting the links below. In particular check out his recent article - Environmental Justice and the Religious Imagination - recently published in the Yale Divinity School Journal, Reflections.

You’ll also find below links for several resources Tyler mentioned today. Each of them helpful to considering how, religious or not, your way of making sense of the world is affected by listening to nature’s wisdom and honoring that kinship. 

Tyler's work with the BTS Center in Maine

GreenFaith

Dr. Willie James Jennings, The Christian Imagination.

William Blake. 18th Century. "To see a world in a grain of sand and a heaven in a wild flower, hold Infinity in the palm of your hand and eternity in an hour."

~MUSIC

This episode included music by Gary Ferguson and these fine artists.

Calm My Mind, Music by LesFM from Pixabay

Relaxing by Music for Videos from Pixabay

Touch and Sound by Juan Sanchez from Pixabay

This month, Mary has the unique treat of listening to and learning from Dr. Elizabeth Bernays. Liz is an entomologist by training having received her Ph.D. from the University of London. But her love of the natural world began as a child in Australia where she was free to roam and to watch and befriend the animals and insects who lived there.

She began her career as a field entomologist for the British government, took an academic post at Berkeley, and followed that with service as head of Entomology at the University of Arizona where she is currently a Regents' Professor Emerita. Along the way, she obtained an MFA in writing and has since been contributing beautiful literary nonfiction with the effect of reawakening any reader's love for the natural world.

Liz describes herself as a biologist turned writer with over 200 scientific papers, books and several popular biology articles. She's also published fifty poems and essays in a variety of literary journals and authored three nonfiction books. Her newest - Across the Divide: The Strangest Love Affair - was published to great acclaim in May of 2023. With her wife, Linda Hitchcock, she's also published three children's books.   

You can learn more about Liz’s work and life at her website elizabethbernays.com. 

But don’t miss checking her out on Google. There you’ll find jewels of literary nonfiction like Kamquat, Time in the Desert, and Pond.

Give a read to Liz's recent essay, In Praise of Looking.

Along the way, treat yourself to her books,

Six Legs Walking: Notes from an Entemological Life Across the Divide: The Strangest Love Affair.

Let yourself be captivated by Liz’s wonder, awe and kinship with the natural world - a delight that carries the sense of truly coming home.

This episode's music:

Endless Beauty - Music by Zakhar Valaha from Pixabay  

Far From the City - Music by Zakhar Valaha from Pixabay 

Playing in Color    Music by 29811401 from Pixabay 

With this episode we begin our fourth season. Our very first episode  of How it Looks from Here went live September of 2020. The pandemic was just getting going. We were being asked to work from home, to keep our distance from each other. A huge cost of this distance was that we wouldn’t be hearing how other people were making sense of Covid in their lives. How were people coping? How could we learn from each other with so little face-to-face contact? How did the world look to the people we weren’t seeing on the street, at work, in the grocery? Our first season was dedicated to hearing from people across the country and in many different roles about how they were navigating life in the time of Covid.

By September of 2021, we began extending our focus, keeping an eye on the pandemic, and looking to see what more we could learn from each other for living well in the time of climate change. Over the years, I’ve had the opportunity to speak with poets and dancers, with wildfire experts, ranchers and reproductive health advocates from all walks of life. The archives are live and worth diving into to learn from this wide range of perspectives.

That brings us to today - to launch this fourth season. In this episode, I speak with Gary Ferguson, a highly acclaimed nature writer, co-creator of Full Ecology, and my life partner.

Only recently have we realized that, in January of 2024, we’ll have been developing and learning from Full Ecology for 10 years. It only seemed right to begin this season with a conversation on what Full Ecology has taught us - and what it continues to teach.

Gary is the author of 27 books in which he renders science in story. In this podcast, we revisit the origins of Full Ecology and make our way to speaking about the impact Full Ecology has had on Gary’s work as a writer and mine supporting organizations committed to healthy work culture.

To learn more about Full Ecology visit the Full Ecology website. Drop us a line at [email protected] and we'll get your name on the list for the monthly newsletter.

Also, if you'd like a slightly different slant on what we talk about in this podcast episode, check out our Full Ecology September Viedo Update on YouTube. After all of that you won't be able to keep yourself from writing to let us know what your thinking and seeing in your own life. And we'll love hearing from you.

In addition to our theme song, you heard music by:

LesFM | Acoustic Love - Creative Commons CC BY 3.0

Michael Kobrin | NightLife - 95bpm

Chris Haugen | Campfire Song

Dr Zaher Wahab is professor emeritus of Education at Lewis & Clark College, and former senior advisor to the Afghan Ministry of Higher Education. Dr Wahab, also taught at American University of Afghanistan from 2013 to 2020.

Zaher was born and schooled in Afghanistan. He was the first person in his family’s history to attend the "village school," a boarding school in Kabul, and later received scholarships to attend college in Lebanon and the US. He earned a BA in sociology from The American University of Beirut, an MA in comparative education from Teachers College at Columbia University, and both an MA in anthropology and a PhD in international development education from Stanford University.

Zaher is dedicated to praxis - the practical application of our best thinking to real life challenges. He and Mary take this time to dig deep into the ways praxis can be applied in support of climate justice and repair.

In our conversation you will get a sense of the vast and direct knowledge Zaher has of education and society across the globe. Listen to this advocate for global understanding and respect. Consider with us how these fundamental ways of being naturally show up in our honoring of both interdependence and sovereignty.

You can learn more about Dr. Wahab's work and vision by searching through his abundant contributions on the internet.

Peace Action: https://www.peaceaction.org/tag/zaher-wahab/

Columbia University Center for Oral History: https://oralhistoryportal.library.columbia.edu/document.php?id=ldpd_8095968

Connect with Zaher’s most recent thoughts by watching the you tube of his 2022 talk, with the Schiller Institute and entitled, “Dialogue, Not a Clash of Civilizations.”

Learn more about the Brazilian educational philosopher Paolo Freire who has been such an inspiration to Zaher.

FACTS:

Kabul is ranked the 12th most polluted capitol in the world.

Afghanistan is the 6th environmentally the most damaged country in the world.

Ecological disasters in Afghanistan have displaced millions of Afghans.

Only 13% of Afghans have safe drinking water and 15% electricity.

MUSIC CREDITS:

Podcast score: Original music by Gary A Ferguson.

Arabic Instrumental,  Music by DMD_Production from Pixabay

Islam Dream, Music by SergeQuadrado from Pixabay

Desert, Music by ArtSlop_Flodur from Pixabay -