Collie's Bestiary

I've had another professor write to me about the Ecofeminism independent study class I took last semester. Her comments were regarding my review of Griffin's Woman and Nature: The Roaring Inside Her. Thinking back now, I absolutely loved how Griffin connected women with nature. I remember quiet tears rolling down my cheeks as I read [...]

Here it is the first day of the newest and most recent world cycle, on the turning of the circular Mayan calendar. We get to start with a fresh new mindset today — let's make it something beautiful! My new worldview is to envision a world where we slowly but steadily shed the various oppressions [...]

This book was both a surprise and a delight; I very much enjoyed the reading. Gaia's Gift is ordinarily presented as simply an analysis of Copernican heliocentric theory, as it applies to James Lovelock's Gaia Theory, with a powerful refutation of both scientific and religious androcentrism. For example, the description from amazon.com suggests the book [...]

I had to work my way slowly through Starhawk's The Earth Path: Grounding Your Spirit in the Rhythms of Nature; I find myself wishing this had been one of the first books assigned. Her description of finding a mostly-natural place for daily meditations is inspiring, especially the parts about using all one's senses to drink [...]

To continue from yesterday, my gut feeling is that if I'm truly, reflectively performing a women's spirituality methodology, then I should already be integrating much of what is of value in these transformative methodological frameworks. I think, however, it would be respectful to note when I am specifically "calling out" some related aspect of these [...]

I think best when writing. I am, therefore, considering methodologies for writing future papers, and simultaneously doing a quick review of them. This should aid me in both improving my vocabulary (as in much use of unfamiliar terms will assist me in becoming more comfortable with them), and in familiarizing myself with the various methodologies. [...]

Journaling for one of my classes; this likely won't be very interesting unless you're into feminist methodological and epistemological questions. Fair warning! ;)   I've now had some time to read through and mentally digest the Hesse-Biber article from her book Feminist Research. This clarified methods and methodology, and I've implemented some of her definitions [...]

Most of my journaling for this class has already been posted here, in Collie's Bestiary. However, in perusing the syllabus for this class, I re-read that the journal is supposed to consist, amongst other things, of "any other personal observations or revelations which may occur. Entries might include observations about the community work and her [...]

In a fascinating storytelling style, Medicine Story shares the startlingly successful program he and various other Native American elders created to assist incarcerated men. Initially it was just for Native Americans, and included women's circles, but over the years (due to a wide variety of reasons) the men's circles were the only ones that continued, [...]

Ending Violent Crime Cheaply & Permanently: A Vision of A Society Free of Violence by Manitonquat (Medicine Story) is an astonishing little book — one I might have had trouble believing if I hadn't already stumbled elsewhere across some of the statistics mentioned. It is self-published as well: surprisingly short but very concise and readable. [...]