Beginning Small means we look around ourselves and start Locally.
The quote "Think Globally, Act Locally" has been a major inspiration to me. We need to have the big picture in our minds, but we also need to do the work in our own neighborhood, town, village, district, community. Way back in July, I wrote a post on 'Going Local' (7/26/08), basically a review of three books with themes of local development. The books focused on local economic efforts, but we also need local food strategies, the local production of energy, in fact, thinking about how we can meet most of our needs from what is around us. I referred to this in my post on 'Convergence' (9/20/08), saying that "...we need to have many small, local groups each building something that makes sense in their community." (I've also talked about the local food movements in my post on 'Feeding Ourselves in the Future'--7/24/08.)
A term that is being used now for the return to local strategies is 'relocalization'. (In fact, 'Relocalization' was the first 'Word (or phrase) of the day' in my first post.) The Relocalization Network defines 'Relocalization' as "...a strategy to build societies based on the local production of food, energy, and goods, and the local development of currency, governance, and culture." (Here's the full explanation.) For me 'relocalization' means we put the emphasis back on our local communities. What can we build there? What is already there that we can support? How can we connect the resources around us? Relocalization is about Community, the wider community around us.
If you want to create social change, start where you are.
Quote of the Day: "Relocalization may be a new term, but conceptually it has long roots. Some related recent precursors include ... the 'anti-globalization' movement, the 'slow food' movement, the 'voluntary simplicity' movement, the 'back to the land' movement, 'new urbanism,' and the 'environmental movement.' In general, common themes include decentralization of political and economic structures, less material consumption and pollution, a focus on the quality of relationships, culture and the environment as sources of fulfillment, and downscaling of infrastructural development." - Jason Bradford
Word (or phrase) of the day: Underwater Mortgage
Hero(es) of the day: Phil Ochs
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Tag, you're it!
I've been slow in responding due to family obligations.
Apparently, from CrackerLilo's blog, this is a Bookworm award. The rules are:
"RULE ONE, I have to grab one of the books closest to me, go to page 56, type the fifth line and the next two to five lines that follow.
RULE TWO, I have to pick five people who love books and who could receive the Bookworm award with honor."
In this case, the fifth line on the page was midsentence and midparagraph, so I started with the line following and here is the next two sentences:
"The supporters of the various proposals to discriminate against securities spectators did not conform to the modern caricature of early American farmers as wary of the impersonal market forces that were encroaching upon their world of face-to-face contacts. Indeed, many taxpayer advocates actually employed rhetoric that was agressively pro-market." - Woody Holton, Unruly Americans and the Origins of the Constitution
The five blogs that I picked where I thought the authors enjoyed books were:
Michealann Land http://michaelannland.blogspot.com/
One Smoot Short of a Bridge http://1smootshort.blogspot.com/
Queers United http://queersunited.blogspot.com/
SoapBoxTech http://litetechca.blogspot.com/
undercova mutha http://undacovamutha.blogspot.com/
Phil Ochs factors into one of the craziest stories I think I will ever get to tell. I will have to figure a way to write it out sometime so I can share it with you.
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