Workshop 3.1
In this workshop we wove our intentions and knowledge's together in a series of mini eco-art actions.
Gatherings of tools and knowledge's produced 'Red Rebel Tentacles' and 'Root Day'. http://redrebelbrigade.com/
The eco-art action 'Gra' highlighted love as the common motivation linking all our intentions from the last session for doing this work.
We also reflected on the value of today's workshop as a stand alone session and also as a way to inform the next session.
Gra
Root Day
Red Rebel Tentacles
Workshop 3.2
Gathering our Tools.
In today's workshop we wove some more of our intentions and knowledge's together.
We gathered together prayer flags, FIST, and walking as activist tools.
The workshop culimated in the eco-art action ' We make the road by walking'.
Carving out a playful purposeful pathway together.
Drinking our tea on the Flaggy shore the practice of collective walking as an activist tool was offered.
We talkied about using our bodies for activist, artistic and spiritual purposes.
Red Rebel practices emerged again. A Red Rebel walk was suggested and the use of particluar movements. The importance of protecting ourselves when working in public was highlighted.
This creative action could present opportunities for costume, banner, zine making, digital media, performance, poetry and linking up with other groups.
Other Walks: Afri Famine Walk, The Tree Walk
Afri 30th Anniversary of the Famine Walk - YouTube
Famine Walk – Afri, Action from Ireland
Embodied Practice: We Make the Road By Walking _ -
Walking as activism, as embodied practice, as pilgrimage.
Walking as mindful practice but also creating awareness
Trusting going on a path in-progress, trusting the group process
Temporary, naturally formed art-work ready for dissolution, nature will dissolve
Collaborative Eco-Art Action
Radical Adult Education: We Make the Road By Walking _ - Conversations on Education and Social Change_
' Freire & Horton believed that real liberation is achieved through popular participation'
As we created our eco-art action using our collective intentions, bodies, and the ecology around us, the notion of 'we make the road by walking' was mentioned.
The saying originates from the poem "se hace camino al andar". In radical adult education circles Myles Horton and Paulo Freire (1990) used this phrase to discribe their activist adult education stance (Tisdel, 2013). Our conversation reminded me of their publication bearing that title. In the book Horton and Freire discuss the nature of social change and empowerment and their individual literacy campaigns. The themes they discuss illuminate problems faced by educators and activists around the world who are concerned with linking participatory education to the practice of liberation and social change (goodread.com, 2022). The fortuitous emergence of the concept into our eco-art action created a poweful link between radical, cultural and spiritual practices across time, and reinforced our purpose that we, in this time, continue to make the path for social change through our work.
We Make the Road by Walking: Conversations on Education and Social Change by Myles Horton (goodreads.com) Review
https://codkashacabka.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/we-make-the-road-by-walking-myles-and-paolo-freie-book.pdf Read
Elizabeth J. Tisdell, also 'making the road', used walking in pilgrimage as a method of research on transformative learning. As spirituality was a strong theme from Workshop 3, I've included an extract on pilgrimage and transformation from her paper below.
We Make the Way by Walking: Spiritual Pilgrimage and Transformative Learning While Walking the Camino De Santiago (newprairiepress.org)
Numerous writers have described spirituality as a journey toward wholeness, or a journey toward wisdom (as summarized by Tisdell, 2003) using the idea of journey in its more metaphorical sense. But Kottler (1998) suggests that many adults also attempt to facilitate their own transformation and spiritual development through travel, while others do so by going on a spiritual pilgrimage. A spiritual pilgrimage can be either a metaphorical spiritual journey or actual travel to sacred sites (Cousineau, 1998), and in anthropology, Morinis (1992) discusses different types of pilgrimage, all of which involve a journey and a goal, where a part of the goal is movement along the journey itself from the familiar to something other, until this new other becomes integrated into a new sense of self. This sense of movement is reminiscent of the phrase “we make the way by walking”Tsdell, 2013. p3) .
“Blessed are the peace-makers,” particularly Neil Douglas-Klotz’s (1990) midrash of “Blessed are they who plant peace in every step” brought to mind the peaceful ethos of the Red Rebels in our workshop.
Intersectional-Eco Feminism and Spirituality..more to come.
Reflections _ Why we came back
W.1
W2 - Key themes.
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Meet & connect with other group members sharing simililar concerns and look at our intentions to find our common purpose.
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To hear what others are bringing, and to see what happens, what ideas we are developing, where we can go with this???
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Reconnect with art.
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Have made a commitment.
Reflections: What are the key takeaways from today's workshop, how does it inform the next workshop
Key Takeaways
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Skill & knowledge sharing experiences that might shape our nexts steps.
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Sense of community
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Walking as processing and connection. Walking as mindful practice but also creating awareness. Labyrinth
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Trusting going on a path in-progress, designed by group members, trusting the group process.
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Presence.
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Playfulness.
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What cool things can happen.
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An idea or ideas come together from each person to form a collective action or art piece.
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Everyone has similar ideas or visions that can be woven together successfully.
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Temporary, naturally formed art-work ready for dissolution, nature will dissolve.
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Embodiment, our bodies on the land, our bodied moving and breathing on the earth
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Wishing wall made from gathering (sticks twigs leaves etc). Gathering together, silent in group, connecting to nature, doing no harm or interference. Making shrine, alter and a pathway walk around - Kora, kova.
Next Workshop
Can we refine ideas more, timeline.
To look at these questions (The really useful questions emerging) and get some specific ideas about what we want to do.
H-Edge site escavations 2018
I am reminded of earlier excavations of this research
The Path winds back...
The pilgrimage is not over...
This circling round reminds me of perspectives on
embodied and transdicipliany research -
how experiences are transported across time.