Reading Group Invitation: Crocheting Reflections on Ecology of Practices: Gifting Children a Problem
Reading Group Invitation
Crocheting Reflections on Ecology of Practices: Gifting Children a Problem
November 30, 2015 – 3:00 – 5:00 pm
January 4, 2016 – 3:00 – 5:00 pm
February 8, 2016 - 3:00 – 5:00 pm
Anchored at the University of Victoria, this reading group takes seriously Isabelle Stengers’ call for opening our work to the vulnerabilities engaged by an ecology of practices, where to live in the world of the Anthropocene is to be entangled in an unknown, complex, fractured cosmos. As we work our way through Cosmopolitics 1, we crochet with Stengers (2005), weaving with her provocations to action.
How can I present a proposal intended not to say what is, or what ought to be, but to provoke thought; one that requires no other verification than the way in which it is able to “slow down” reasoning and create an opportunity to arouse a slightly different awareness of the problems and situations mobilizing us?
(Stengers, 2005, p. 994)
As we crochet together with Stengers, we will collectively craft a ‘gift’ of cosmopolitical inheritance for the children at our local early childhood centre: a human-made forest of woolly forest actors.
The reading group will begin in November 2015 as we gather to discuss the initial sections of Cosmopolitics 1. As the reading group progresses, we will work our way through Cosmopolitics 1, and, at the conclusion of this material, we hope to propose future reading directions for the group. We ask that reading group members, wherever they might join from, crochet with us as we debate what it might mean to engage an ecology of practices in our increasingly digital, waste-ridden, and rapid colonized worlds.
No crochet experience is required for the group, as skilled members of our community have generously agreed to join us in our project. We will each be responsible for providing our own supplies. You might find wool at the Salvation Army or Value Village.
If you are interested in participating or would like additional information, please contact Veronica Pacini-Ketchabaw at vpacinik@uvic.ca
On November 30th, we will discuss the following three documents:
http://wsblog.iash.unibe.ch/wp-content/uploads/Stengers.pdf
https://balkanexpresss.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/stengersthe-cosmopolitcal-proposal.pdf
http://epress.lib.uts.edu.au/journals/index.php/csrj/article/viewFile/3459/3597
Narda, Nicole, Jennifer & Veronica