CIVILIZATION’S IMPACT ON THE ENVIRONMENT

ENVMT 19/ENVMT 50 CODE: 43725
3 UNITS
FALL 2010 SYLLABUS
Robin Freeman, 510-434-3840 robinf5713@aol.com
Tuesdays 6:30-9:20pm beginning 10/5 at the Environmental Center, Self-Reliant House (SRH)

Course Requirements: The course may be taken for credit/non-credit (audit) or for a letter grade. For credit or a letter grade, reasonable attendance, participation, and completion of reading assignments are required. For a letter grade, written papers and the data annotation project are also required. To use the course towards a certificate or degree you must take it for a letter grade. At the end of the semester, you will evaluate the course and suggest your own grade.

Text: Freeman & Rauh; Hope, Stress and Authority, Reader Version 3.1,The Conservation Press, 2010
Recommended Reading: (Available at bookstores and on line.)
Diamond, Jared, Guns, Germs, and Steel, Norton 1999
Taylor, Shelley, The Tending Instinct, Times Books Henry Holt, 2002

Learning Outcomes should assist in being able to:
1. Describe the basic psychological, cultural, and economic systems of humans.
2. Analyze and describe ecosystem concepts as they relate to human behavior.
3. Explain and discuss examples of sustainability problems, solutions, and scales from both a human psychosocial and an ecological perspective.
4. Analyze and discuss methods of measuring obstacles and opportunities for action.
5. Propose or identify potential psychological and sustainable ecological interventions and plans.

Oct 5– Introductions, Hunches, Evidence and Research and What is Human Nature?
– Ecosystems Where And How We Live In Them
a. Ecosystem and system definitions
b. Homeostasis and feedback loops
c. Niches
d. Exponential growth
e. Stress and carrying capacity
f. Adaptive/maladaptive behavior
About course, Introductions

Assignment: list what you think are basic human nature characteristics. Read pages 5-13

Oct 12 Tuesday 6:30-9:20pm – Psychological Development and the Natural History of Humans
Key Background concepts and definitions- , Human development, learning, and psychology, Sustainability, Infrastructure, and Ecosystem

Assignment Due: Human nature list due

Assignment: Write about a childhood experience of friendship, good will, and/or bullying, and fear. Read, Glossary p14-22

Oct 19 Tuesday 6:30-9:20pm – Civilization, Authority, Stress and Collapse; Characterizing the Problem
Despair vs. Hope; what is our sense of the future? Naming the problem.
Do human development and ecology interact?

Assignment: - Write about an expansive, inspiring, pivotal, important or epiphinal experience, or the closest thing to it you have had.
Read pages 21-43 Which terms from the glossary apply to each case study?

Oct 26 Tuesday 6:30-9:20pm
- Authoritarian Stress Syndrome Caretaking, Tending and the Infrastructure of solutions.
Chaos theory, scale and interventions. How does it all fit together?
The nature of hope. Connect the Dots

Assignment: Analyzing systems and research methods: Choose a data set to read and annotate.
Read 44-78 and pages 97-98 Which terms from the glossary apply to each case study?

Nov 2 Tuesday 6:30-9:20pm – The Shared Narrative and Sequellae;
Characterizing the Solutions Maintaining the Problems
- Empire, Social Class, Power, Money Decision Making And Democracy
– The Invention Of Economics And Corporations
- Symbols of Authority
- Creating Violence; Infrastructures Of Addiction
- Creating Peace Environments Integrated Against Alienation
Building a village by hand, Building a city by fiat. The Artisan and the Empire

Nov 9 Tuesday 6:30-9:20pm – Infrastructure and Interconnections
– Give Hope a Plan– Institutional capacity
– Characterizing the Solutions/ Building a Research Agenda and an Action Plan

Choosing the future: Creating visions, plans, next steps, strategies:
a. Planning methods
b. Developing a vision: Where ideas come from, uses of the imagination
c. Social-based marketing
d. Designing interventions

Assignment: Read: pages 79-93

Nov 16 Tuesday 6:30-9:20pm –Case Studies and Developing a Plan Research Data Case Histories

Nov 23 Tuesday 6:30-9:20pm – Case Studies/Data sets

Nov 30 Tuesday 6:30-9:20pm – Case Studies/Data setsFinal

Assignment Due: Final Project

Dec 7 Tuesday 6:30-9:20pm – Next steps/Roundtable
Course evaluations.

Final Project: Review and write an annotation about 2 of the case studies listed on page 97/98. We will discuss how to find the data to review from the Institute archives or by interview. We will also choose an application of the concepts during the class to work on together.