This week's readings ask us to reflect on themes of destruction, collapse, renewal, and growth. While the essays might not appear to tackle the course's focus on environmental sustainability directly (especially the essay "Upon the Mathematics"), that's not the case.

Instead, the texts explore our semester-long focus indirectly by inviting us to consider how we experience destruction, collapse, renewal, and growth personally (e.g., a friend's suicide) and publicly (e.g., September 11, 2001 and the Mardale Green dam).

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Thinking about "Upon the Mathematics." Throughout the first section of Confessions of a Recovering Environmentalist, Kingsnorth explores the themes of collapse, destruction, rebuilding, and renewal. Notice, for instance, the shorter sections in the essay, "Upon the Mathematics":

Control: We have no control over others' actions, even when those actions prove catastrophic.

Ash: We can rise from ashes of the destruction (whether personal or public).

Chess: We must endure and embrace human chaos.

Home: Collapse is inevitable but renewal is possible.

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Thinking about the "The Drowning World." In the essay, "The Drowned World," Kingsnorth is concerned with how we experience destruction, collapse, renewal, and growth in our physical environments. Specifically, Kingsnorth writes:

What happened in Mardale Green is still happening, on a bigger scale and with more pain attached, across the planet. In China, more than 1.2 million people have been forcibly displaced to make way for the Three Gorges Dam: a dubious world record. In India, the Narmada Bachao Andolan have been fighting for decades to stop the Indian government building a series of over three thousand dams in the Narmada valley, displacing hundreds of thousands of people and destroying pristine ecosystems.

The story is the same. An expanding economy needs water, or electric power, or both. (29)

Kingsnorth isn't wrong: There are more than 7.6 billion people on this planet all competing for resources. We see it all the time regarding food, water, fossil fuels, animal welfare, waste.

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Thinking about Downsizing. Throughout the film, Downsizing, we see several themes related to environmental sustainability that are relevant to our reading from Kingsnorth. As you're watching the film, consider how the movie approaches issues of the 5 E's: environmental sustainability, economics, ethics, excess, and exploration.

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For this week, then, you will:

Explore/Learn:
- Read "Upon the Mathematics of the Falling Away" from Confessions of a Recovering Environmentalist.
- Read "The Drowned World" from Confessions of a Recovering Environmentalist.
- Read "Strategies for Success: Reading in Academic Contexts" (in JtC, NCTC Preface, xx).
- Watch Downsizing.
Connect/Collaborate:
- Complete Wk 2: Weekly Discussion.
Experiment/Apply:
- Complete Wk 2: Writing Reflection.