Join the Center's Fifth Anniversary Celebration!
Friday, February 20, 2009 & Saturday, February 21, 2009
Please send your reply card, if you haven’t already done so, for the Center’s Fifth Annual Fundraising Celebration on Saturday, February 21, 2009, 5:00-8:00 p.m. at the home of Mallory and Peter Haffenreffer on Sanibel Island. If you have not received your invitation or would like us to send one to a friend, please send a postal address to cese@fgcu.edu or call (239) 590-7166. Photos of past Fundraising Celebrations From top left:
Board Member, Alison Hawthorne Deming, reads from Aridjis’ Eyes to See Otherwise
Guests linger on the shore of Sanibel Island
Homero Aridjis, Poet and past Rachel Carson Distinguished Lecturer
Mallory Haffenreffer, Host of our Fundraising Celebration Student volunteers await David Orr’s autograph FGCU President Wilson G. Bradshaw and Center Director Peter Blaze Corcoran
Parting gifts from the Haffenreffers
Rachel Carson Distinguished Lecture Panels
Friday, February 20, 2009
10:00 a.m. to 11:15 a.m.
Earth Charter Scholars Panel at FGCU, Academic Building 5, Room 112
1:00 p.m.
Themed Workshops with Scholars, FGCU
7:00 p.m.
Sanibel Island Panel, St. Michael and All Angels Church The Center is hosting two Rachel Carson Distinguished Panel Lectures on Friday, February 20, 2009, on the campus of FGCU and on Sanibel Island.
Featured lecturers include the world’s top educators engaged in scholarship related to the Earth Charter from India, Australia, Costa Rica, Mexico, and Germany, as well as some of North America’s top scholars in environmental education, religion, and ethics. Yale University ecology and religion scholar Mary Evelyn Tucker and renowned ecological literacy educator and writer David W. Orr will moderate the panels. Tucker and Orr are Co-chairs of the Center.
The most celebrated of the visiting scholars is likely Steven C. Rockefeller. He chaired the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, as well as the International Earth Charter Drafting Committee. He also served as member of the Earth Charter Commission.
The substance of both lecture panels will differ. Both events are free and open to the public. A brief reception with the Scholars will follow the Sanibel Island Lecture Panel in the Church Hall.
Scholars include
Top row from left: Steven C. Rockefeller, Mary Evelyn Tucker, David Orr
Second row from left: Mirian Vilela, Michael Slaby, Kiran Chhokar
Third row from left: Rick Clugston, Shafia Succar, Brandon Hollingshead
Forth row: Brendan Mackey
 Our Fifth Anniversary Celebration includes the launch of A Voice for Earth: American Writers Respond to the Earth Charter, edited by Peter Blaze Corcoran and A. James Wohlpart. Details of regional book talks are below. Regional Book Talks
Saturday, February 7, 2009, 4:30 p.m., Sanibel Island Book Shop (Peter Blaze Corcoran and Jim Wohlpart)
Thursday, February 12, 2009, 7:00 p.m.,
Barnes & Noble Book Sellers, Coconut Point, Estero
(Peter Blaze Corcoran)
Friday, February 13, 2009, 12:45p.m.,
Manatee Community College, Sarasota
(Peter Blaze Corcoran)
Please call the Center for details
Wednesday, March 18, 2009, 3:30 p.m.,
Captiva Memorial Library
(Peter Blaze Corcoran and Jim Wohlpart)
Excerpts from the Book
A Voice for Earth: American Writers Respond to the Earth Charter offers a literary language that seeks to bring to life the concepts in the Earth Charter…. The contributions are intended to awaken an understanding of the ethical nature of our current situation and to offer a rich and fertile rendering of the ways in which ethical principles connect our daily lives to wider political, economic, and social concerns (Introduction, p. xxii) - A. James Wohlpart and Peter Blaze Corcoran
The Earth Charter is the most important document in our time, as humans living on Planet Earth. It is important for several reasons. It is a way to open the human eyes so that every living thing will have value, spiritual value. It is a way to open the human heart so that nature will find a home. The human will finally learn to give thanks everyday for creation. From the very souls of men and women and all of the children we can learn to give thanks (p. 54). -Chief Jake Swamp
The United Nations is an ideal, and it remains so. Its Charter articulates its vision “to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good neighbors, and to unite our strength to maintain international peace and security.” Each time I enter its hollowed space designed for dialogue and shared power, I find my wearied hope revived…. In this same way the Earth Charter is an ideal. It is a visionary document that creates a template for ecological consciousness around the world, rooted in local actions. It asks us to embrace the planet while taking care of our own back yards (Foreword, p. xiii). -Terry Tempest Williams
|
