By bbuck92
A Challenge in my project, which talks extensively about stewardship and caring for the environment, has been the simple act of defining the "environment" or "nature" that the Valpo Surf Project seeks to protect. In the search for such a definition I turned to an activity I read about during my research for the project.
In the introduction to “In Search of Nature” writer William Cronon describes an activity which helped him and his co-writers to work toward an an understanding of nature in its many forms. This “Found Object” activity, in which every participant brought an object or memory to the discussion which to them best represented “Nature,” gave Cronon and his roundtable points of reference to the various understandings and preconceptions of nature that the group held. For example the most enigmatic and intellectually challenging of the “objects” was the Rocky Mountain Arsenal in Colorado. This site was contaminated due to chemical weapons manufacturing to the extent that it was left untouched by human development. As a result wildlife moved in and the area became home to a host of biodiversity including endangered species. This “Object” represents some of the difficulties of defining nature in that it contains both a human destruction and a reincarnation though wildlife. What humans deemed “unnatural” and dangerous, other fauna and flora found to be an unmolested ground for growth. The idea of this natural unnatural placed facilitated much discussion within the group and advanced their definition of Nature.
The plan for VSP is to open up discussion with a “found object” activity similar to the one exercised by Cronon, not necessarily to work toward a collective VSP definition of nature, but to take a look at how the VSP students understand and choose to represent nature. Through activities such as beach cleans, making “Eco-Ladrillos,” and surfing itself, the VSP offers a certain narrative of what nature ought to be and how to care for it. What should be interesting is seeing how that narrative “translates” to the students.
To conduct the activity, we sent home along with the students the following instructions:
Para tí, ¿Qué es el medio ambiente? ¿Cómo lo representarías con un solo objeto? Para la próxima session de surf, traen un objeto que represente el medio ambiente. Debes estar listo para explicar tu objeto. Si olvidas traer uno, tendrás que contar una historia o experiencia que viviste en el medio ambiente. Después de explicar todos nuestros objetos y contar nuestras experiencias, tendremos un foro para entender mejor lo que el VSP como comunidad entiende por el “Medio ambiente.”
The next surf lesson we will facilitate a discussion with the students to better understand what the VSP as a community understands as the environment.