FYI... x-posted from H-ASEH. Sorry for any duplicates. Stefanie Rixecker ECOFEM Coordinator ------- Forwarded message follows ------- From: Steve Holmes <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Environmental life-writing discussion list Date: Wednesday, October 27, 1999 7:37 AM [I posted this notice over the summer, but since a number of folks probably had their mail turned off then and are back on now, I thought it might be helpful to post it again - Cheers, Steve Holmes] Dear colleagues, Greetings! I want to invite any interested persons to join a new interdisciplinary e-mail discussion group on an emerging scholarly field, environmental life-writing - i.e., biography, autobiography, memoir, oral history, fiction, poetry, and theoretical and empirical studies that explore and express an individual's relationship with his or her natural and built environment(s) over time. Focusing on individual lives rather than on general cultural, social, or historical patterns - and often paying attention to the processes of personal development over a life-time - environmental life-writing seeks to understand the role of the physical environment as a full actor and element in the complex whole of an individual life. Thus conceived, environmental life-writing may draw upon the work and insights of a wide variety of fields (including history, literature, psychology, humanistic geography, philosophy, anthropology, and religious studies) in the service of understanding a common theme, that of individual environmental development - and of creating and exploring the particular stories that embody that theme. Of course, many of those stories are found in writings by and about the major historical figures who have shaped the environment and our perceptions of it: nature writers, environmentalists, scientists, farmers, agricultural and industrial workers, hunters, artists, politicians, planners, industrialists, landscape and urban architects, etc. At the same time, I hope that we will also give some thought and attention to the lives of "ordinary" people (including those of us writing our own environmental autobiographies and memoirs), to children (both historical and contemporary), and to reflection on the more general patterns of experience and development that mark individual relationship with the environment. Sound interesting? To subscribe to the list (I'm thinking of it as the "ELF" list, by the way, for Environmental LiFe-writing), simply send an e-mail to the following address: [EMAIL PROTECTED] This isn't an automatic server (except when I'm zoned out on coffee), so you don't need to put "subscribe" in the body of the message etc.; just make sure your intentions are clear. I'll send back an introductory message, and we'll get things rolling! If you have any questions or comments, please contact me at my personal e-mail address, [EMAIL PROTECTED] (note that this is different than the address for the group). I also am compiling a networking list (i.e. a literal list of names etc.) of scholars and writers interested in specific research topics or writing projects; if you have specific areas you're working in, please feel free to contact me about inclusion in that list as well. And please pass this invitation on to anyone else you think might be interested! Steven J. Holmes Lecturer, History and Literature Department, Harvard University Barker Center 122, Cambridge, MA 02138 Home address: 170 Walter St., #1, Roslindale, MA 02131 (617) 323-9764 [EMAIL PROTECTED] ------- End of forwarded message ------- ************************************ Dr. Stefanie S. Rixecker Division of Environmental Management & Design Lincoln University, Canterbury PO Box 84 Aotearoa New Zealand E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fax: 64-03-325-3841 ************************************
