“We must cherish this planet and the secrets of its deep workings. In the future, the greatest human discovery will be the discovery of our intimate relationship with all the other modes of being that live with us on this planet…Only intimacy can save us from our current imprisonment in a plundering industrial economy.”

Thomas Berry / The Great Work

This year's seminar of the Traveling University of Nature is being held in the landscape of the Ore Mountains, whose face and recent human history reflect the characteristic existential alienation of modern man from the place in which he was born. The first major displacement of the original German population took place here after World War II. In the second half of the 20th century, the instrumental "development" of the chemical and mining industry caused extensive ecological devastation of the Ore Mountains forests and especially the Podkrušnohoří landscape and led to the displacement of the population from more than a hundred municipalities. In this environment, we want to think more deeply about how we could today individually and, above all, collectively renew our identity with the place and with the planet on which we live. How to move from dependence on the extractive economy, which determined the character of the modern era and was driven by the desire to use the world at all costs, to a more intimate and caring relationship with the world, which would be mutually beneficial for both us and the Earth.

The seminar will explore how this shift can be inspired by a new cosmology and the concepts of the Great Work and the Ecozoic Era of the American cultural historian, Earth advocate, and cosmologist. Thomas Berry (1914-2009). Berry's ideas about the renewal of human-earthly relationships are introduced to us by his student and collaborator Gai Vorcelo, the head of Green Mountain Monastery, Jiří Zemánek, Pavel Janšta and American cosmologist Stephan Martin (Thomas Berry's book The Great Work - Our Journey to the Future is published by Malvern Publishing House). We will also be inspired by native wisdom and the life practices of indigenous cultures (Yona French Hawk, Luděk Čertík, Monika Michaelová, Barbora Chmelová), the concept of panpsychism of the Australian philosopher Freya Mathews and a comprehensive program of "active hope" Joanna Macy and Chris Jonstone (Lenka Kubelová, Hana Bernardová, Martin Nawrath).

We will also learn about some local efforts to re-integrate the life of human communities into the broader context of bioregions and ecosystems, how to understand the specific place we live in and how to be beneficial to it. In short, how to become earthlings again and find our home. Mayor of Horní Jiřetín Vladimír Buřt will introduce us to the successful defense of his city against the coal industry's efforts to demolish it; we will recall the activities of environmental associations that led to the creation of the climate movement Limity jsme my (We Are the Limits) (Jan Piňos); Petr Mikšíček's project of rediscovering the Ore Mountains; Luďek Čertík's practice of listening; Monika Michaelová's practice of landscape painting, inspired by the Kogi Indians; the landscape treatment project of a landscape architect Klára Salzmann; the Zdoňov project by Jiří Malík and the Živá voda association; the activities of the Soil Foundation and subversive cultural activities of the International Shepherds' Confederation (Michael Blail). The seminar will also include ritual dance (Milada Chalupová), poetry (Luděk Čertík, Radek Štěpánek, Renata Bulvová) and daily wanderings in the surrounding countryside: to Horní Blatná, to Tisovský vrch and the Pajndl lookout tower, to Dračí skála and to the town of Pernink, to Nejdek and to Křížový vrch. After the seminar, we will set off on a multi-day journey across the Ore Mountains (Krušnohorský kwérunk), which will take us all the way to the Lusatian Mountains.

Seminar lecturers

Vladimír Buřt (mayor of Horní Jiřetín), Gai Vorcelo / USA (Green Mountain Monastery), Stephan Martin / USA (Deep Time Network), Freya Mathews / Australia (philosopher), Yona French Hawk / USA (Cherokee medicine man), Chris Johnstone / England (therapist), Jiří Zemánek (Pilgrim), Luděk Čertík (Pilgrim), Pavel Janšta (Pilgrim), Klára Salzmann (Faculty of Architecture, Czech Technical University in Prague), Alena Malíková (Pilgrim), Monika Michaelová (Bridges / Puentes Endowment Fund), Jan Piňos (Green Circle), Barbora Chmelová (Partnership Foundation), Lenka Kubelová (Alferia / Pilgrim), Hana Bernardová (Land Foundation), Martin Nawrath (Partnership Foundation), Michael Blail (International Confederation of Pastoralists), Andrea Průchová-Hrůzová (Fresh Eye), Renata Bulvová (School of Rhetoric), Klára Čížková (musician), Milada Chalupová (teacher) dances), Radek Štěpánek (Host publishing house), Tereza Bínová (poet).

Collaborators

Tomáš Hrůza, Alena Malíková, Tomáš Gardelka, Barbora Kinkalová, Karel Čtveráček (all Pilgrim).

View of Earth from space (NASA 2021 / repofoto)

Day 1, Monday, August 2: Forgotten and rediscovered Ore Mountains

from 6 p.m.

dinner

from 7 pm to 10 pm

Evening block

Introduction to the place, the landscape of the Ore Mountains and Podkrušnohoří Mountains and their remarkable history. The history of this unique, rich and extensive landscape is connected with ancient settlement and especially with ore mining, since the 15th century. It is also connected with the post-war displacement of the German population and the subsequent extensive ecological devastation.

At the beginning of our seminar, we will introduce this complex and dramatic historical story of the Ore Mountains, as well as their current revival, resettlement and healing. We will recall the history of mining; reflect on the relations between Czechs and Germans after the post-war displacement of the German population; present their poetic compositions in a performance Turf Renata Bulvová with a musician Klara Čížková. Mayor of Horní Jiřetín Ing. Vladimir Burt will introduce us to the defense of his city and the Ore Mountains against the coal industry and an ecologist Jan Pinos will recall the story of the displaced and destroyed village of Libkovice and the broader context of the local ecological devastation.

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"I have roots here and I would like my children to be able to live in Horní Jiřetín. Everything else comes from that. The knowledge that so many of the villages that only I knew no longer exist is terrible. ... The vast majority of people like to return to the places where they grew up, where they know someone, where they went on vacation. Tens of thousands of displaced North Bohemians no longer have that opportunity. ... "

Vladimír Buřt, mayor of Horní Jiřetín

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Day 2, Tuesday, August 3: Thomas Berry / The Great Work and the Ecozoic Era

lecturers: G. Vorcelo, J. Zemánek, S. Martin

from 8 am

breakfast

from 9 to 9:15

Dances of ancient traditions (Milada Chalupová)

from 9:15

Morning block

Thomas Berry: Voices of the Ecozoic Era / Gail Worcelo (USA)

A new story and "great work" by Thomas Berry / Viability, intimacy and celebration, three keys to entering the ecozoic era / Jiří Zemanek (Pilgrim)

from 12 noon to 1 p.m.

lunch

from 1 p.m.

Trip to Horní Blatná, Blatenský vrch and to Vlčí and Ledové jama (approx. 10 km)

from 6 p.m.

dinner

from 7 pm to 9:30 pm

Evening block

Living a new cosmology – how the ecozoic is coming to life around the world / about the activities of the Deep Time Network platform / Stephen Martin (USA)

Dances of ancient traditions / Milada Chalupová

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“We need to understand the universe primarily as a celebration. …man can be identified as that being in whom the universe celebrates itself and its numinous origin in a special mode of conscious self-awareness…We can think of the viable future of the planet more as the result of our participation in the symphony or as our renewed participation in the numinous presence, manifesting in the wondrous world around us, than as the realization of some scientific understanding or socio-economic arrangement.”

Thomas Berry / The Great Work (Meadow behind the stream)

Day 3, Wednesday, August 4: Thomas Berry, Freya Mathews and Contemporary Nativism

lecturers: P. Janšta, G. Worcelo, J. Zemánek, F. Mathews

from 8 am

breakfast

from 9 to 9:15

Dances of ancient traditions (Milada Chalupová)

from 9:15

Morning block

The ungroundedness of modern man or why do we need indigenous wisdom in the 21st century? / Thomas Berry, Freya Mathews and Annette Lee / Jiří Zemánek

On contemporary native practice / interview with philosopher Freya Mathews (Australia) / zoom

Thomas Berry and the Sisters of the Earth Fellowship / Shaping a Vision for the Future / Gai Worcelo (USA) / zoom

from 12 noon to 1 p.m.

lunch

from 1 p.m.

Trip to Tisovský vrch, to the Pajndl lookout tower (approx. 10 km).

from 6 p.m.

dinner

from 7 pm to 9:30 pm

Evening block

Integration of Cosmos, Earth, and Man / Thomas Berry and Confucianism / Pavel Janšta

“To be native is to have an identity that is shaped by the place to which one belongs: one is a creature of one’s own topography, of one’s own colors and textures, of one’s own saps and juices, of one’s own moods, of one’s own spirits and stories. … one is born into a world that prefigures and predetermines one’s being in every detail. … One respects this space and never compromises the harmony between oneself and one’s world by embracing some radical initiative… The world as it is given to one provides one with material sufficiency, mythical inexhaustibility, and a rich vocabulary for pragmatic and imaginative purposes.”

Freya Mathews / Becoming Native

Day 4, Thursday, August 5: on the cultural contribution of indigenous cultures

lecturers: L. Čertík, Yona French Hawk, M. Michaelová, B. Chmelová

from 8 am

breakfast

from 9 to 9:15

Dances of ancient traditions (Milada Chalupová)

from 9:15

Morning block

American Dawn: Joy Harjo, Linda Hogan, and Robin Wall Kimmerer / Ludek Certik

Bridging the Ancient Past and the Ancient Future / Cherokee Medicine Man / Yona French Hawk (USA) / zoom

from 12 noon to 1 p.m.

lunch

from 1 p.m.

Trip to the town of Perninka and to Dračí skála and Bílá skála (approx. 10 km)

from 6 p.m.

dinner

from 7 pm to 9:30 pm

Evening block

Man, nature, home / about the customs and culture of the Kogi tribe / Monika Michaelova

Indigenous knowledge / paths to sustainable models of farming and care for the Earth / experiences from Ethiopia, the Philippines, Madagascar, etc. / Barbora Chmelová

“And think of the life of the ocean depths… Of the fantails, the puffins, the lilies, the migrating crabs. … And think of the Ahabian gaze of the terei, of the phaeton with its white spurs. And tell me, doesn’t it all seem like a delightful dream to you? And don’t you long to step into those hungry mouths and renounce your mainland self forever?”

Ludek Certik / Many rivers (Imagination on the theme of the ocean)

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Day 5, Friday, August 6: On active hope and caring for the world

lecturers: K. Salzmann, A. Malíková, L. Kubelová, H. Bernardová, M. Nawrath

from 8 am

breakfast

from 9 to 9:15

Dances of ancient traditions (Milada Chalupová)

from 9:15

Morning block

Landscape treatment / Klára Salzmann (CTU)

Remembering our intimate connection with the land / Alena Malikova (Pilgrim)

from 12 noon to 1 p.m.

lunch

from 1 p.m.

A trip by train to Nejdek and from there to Křížový vrch and Krásná vyhlídka, and further under Tisovský vrch and the Hamerská path to Nové Hamry (6-7 km).

from 6 p.m.

dinner

from 7 pm to 9:30 pm

Evening block

Active hope for a troubled world / online interview by Martin Nawrath with Chris Jonstone (England) / zoom

Guardians of the Future / on the concept of active hope by Joanna Macy and Chris Jonstone / Lenka Kubelová and Hana Bernardová

Active hope is an awakening to the beauty of life, on whose behalf we can act. We simply belong in this world.

Joanna Macy

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Day 6, Saturday, August 7: Poetry, the ethos of counter-modernity

from 8 am

breakfast

from 9 to 9:15

Dances of ancient traditions (Milada Chalupová)

from 9:15

Morning block

Patevče, to hell with it! / Current possibilities of pastoral subversion / Michael Blail /

The New Ecology of Action in Thinking by Isabelle Stengers / Andrea Průchová-Hrůzová

from 12 noon to 1 p.m.

lunch

from 1 p.m.

A trip along the photographer Rupert Fuchs trail to Dvorský vrch and Javor (4 km).

from 6 p.m.

dinner

from 7 pm to 9:30 pm

Evening block

Music and poetry in the life and work of the shepherd, poet and visionary Jeremiáš H. / Michael Blail

Poetry by Luďek Čertík, Radek Štěpánek, Tereza Bínová, Martin Nawrath

About the Dark Mountains project by poet Paul Kingsnorth / Ludek Certik and Jiree Zemanek

Dances of ancient traditions / Milada Chalupová

“The Dark Mountains Project is an invitation to confront the converging crises of our century as a cultural challenge… How can we create cultural responses that undermine the poisonous myths we have inherited from the past: myths about the centrality of humanity, about materialism, about progress, about the separation of “humans” from “nature”? Where do we find new stories or old stories whose time has come? What other ways of understanding can change the understanding of our situation?”

Paul Kingsnorth / The Road to Dark Mountain

Day 7, Sunday, August 8: Departure home

MORNING

Breakfast, farewell and departure home

Program and catering event dates

• Breakfast from 8 to 9 am / Lunch from 12 to 1 pm / Dinner from 6 to 7 pm /
• Dances of ancient traditions from 9 to 9:15 am / Morning lectures from 9:15 am to 12 pm /
• Afternoon trip from 1pm to 5:30pm / Evening lectures from 7pm to 9:30pm to 11pm

"When we learn 'about' nature, nature becomes the object of study, which leads to its exploitation. But when we learn 'from' nature, we establish a close relationship with it, which presupposes humility and respect for the mystery of natural processes."

Satish Kumar

Contacts and other information

• George Zemanek / sarvanga@centrum.cz, 777,117,466;
• Alena Malikova/ alena.malikova@bioinstitut.cz, 604 905 611;
• Tomas Hruza / tomashruza@gmail.com / 775 052 607
• Barbora Kinkalova, b.kinkalova@seznam.cz, 776 123 969