August/September 2005
Cultivating
Relational Intelligence
Nina Simons
Crimes
Against Democracy: An Interview with Thom Hartmann
Jim Guiness
Rebirth
in the Forest
Will Sears
Right
Living, and Surviving, After The Age Of Oil
John Darling
Permaculture
and Place
Steve Gabriel
Think
of Local Food First
Wendy Siporen
Sustainable
Living at Solviva
Anna Edey
Year-Round
Gardening in Home and GreenHouse
Jeffrey M. Smith
The
Greening of Cuba
Caroline Whyte
A
Path of Peace, Kindness and Compassion
Jody Woodruff
From
Hurt to Heart
Eryn Kalish
Epictetus'
Handbook Revisited
Gay Hendricks & Phillip Johncock
The
Sky of Now
Katie Davis
The
Complete Book of Raw Food
Reviewed by Rachel Bendat
Whole
Foods Companion
Reviewed by Rachel Bendat
Cosmic
Calendar
Salina Rain
Permaculture and Place
Linking
humans and landscapes for sustainability
By Steve Gabriel
Many of us are aware of the complex and dynamic systems in existence that are currently driving our culture toward an unsustainable end. Climate change, increases in the level and scale of violence, and the questionable reliability of our most used resource, oil, are just some of the issues of our time. We, as an American culture, are particularly good at consuming too many things in too little time, with too much waste left behind.
While these facts
are well known by many of the population, dealing with the problems and obstacles
can often become overwhelming. General solutions often include the financial
support of environmental organizations and the idolizing of a political candidate
who claims environmental virtue.
Permaculture is one version of a systematic response to the largest difficulties
of our time. The two major factors that make permaculture unique within the
environmental movement are its focus on solution-oriented action and its emphasis
on personal and local transformation. There is no need to wait for a greener
president or for the next generation; we can begin changing today! Permaculture
is often mistaken as a set of recipes for gardening and green living, but
in actuality it is a set of ethics and principles that points us to the way
of designing human settlements in accordance with the patterns of nature.
The phrase “Sense of Place” speaks to an awareness level that is becoming less and less prevalent these days. Few individuals have lived in the same place for years much less generations and such a transient relationship to landscapes has been largely destructive. When places are viewed as expendable they are generally trashed, since the attitude is that there is always more down the road to exploit. As our American landscape continues to be consumed by box stores and chain restaurants, the unique features and characteristics of the land are lost. A desert, a forest, and a prairie all become a parking lot. Reclaiming a sense of place is about reflecting and reexamining our personal values and relationship to the places we call “home.” The intent is to blur the boundary between the environment and the self, to not only know a place but to feel it deeply and personally.
Permaculture design cooperates well with this concept, since sustainable living isn’t possible if we choose to remain outside the natural systems that are the source of all our needs. Food forest gardening is a good example of a practice where both permaculture and sense of place principles meet in a mutually beneficial relationship. The idea of a food forest is to grow the vegetables one desires while also restoring native habitat, by interplanting food crops with native vegetation and encouraging the natural succession of the forest. The goal is not a sizable yield of foodstuffs, but to restore healthy forest ecosystems. This sort of perspective ignites a connection to place that is beyond our lifespan while still providing for current needs.
Building relationships where we rely more on local communities and landscapes for our basic life functions is the simplest and most effective solution to the current environmental crisis. Actually enacting measures for re-localizing what has become global takes time and patience, but benefits to such actions can be immediately felt and seen. Eating food that you’ve grown or purchased from a local organic farmer cultivates interpersonal relationships, helps build soil humus, and creates a more stable economy for you and for your neighbors. The food has higher levels of nutritional content and tastes better, too.
The merging of permaculture and place unifies the people with the land. Neither can exist without the other, and it has come time for us to make this relationship more transparent in our daily lives. The first step of this process is to re-familiarize ourselves with our home landscapes, to reclaim them, and to network with other people committed to loving and protecting them. Only by daily positive interaction with our land base and by taking action as a community to protect the forests, rivers, and soils can we begin to sow seeds of a new, more sustainable way of life.
Steve Gabriel
is currently an intern at historic Trillium Farm in the Little Applegate Valley
of Southern Oregon. He had been studying and practicing Permaculture and the
related arts intensively for the past four years. He deems his “place”
the Finger Lakes Region of New York but is enjoying his time in Oregon tremendously.
Contact him at rhythmstevo@yahoo.com or (541) 899-1696.
