The Wendell Berry House 2008-2009

It's official, we have been approved for a ten person honor house! We will keep you updated with all of the happenings through this blog and the e-mail alias.

"Against PC's"

My sister Mia just brought an essay of Wendell Berry's to my attention: "Against PC's" (http://www.harpers.org/archive/1988/09/0025614). It was published in Harper's Magazine in September 1988 and denounces the use of computers:

"How Could I  write conscientiously against the rape of nature if I were, in the act of writing, implicated in the rape?"

I do not know if Berry now uses a computer, but this essay poses a peculiar problem for a Wendell Berry blog. Is it possible to have a blog that jives with the ideas of Berry?

I do not know what Berry would say, but I think the use of a blog is key to spreading the ideas of sustainable living to those who are off-put by the "radical" aspects of the sustainable living movement.

As a house, we are trying to reach-out to the computer using-and loving-population. Yes, we want to be involved with the existing movement, but we want to spread the message that sustainability is not a political issue, rather it is something you do everyday within your community.

Thus, the best way to get the word out is through the technologies we use everyday. Yet, we hope to use the blog only as the starting place, the house and our kitchen will be the location of the conversation.

"So I decided to stop writing tracts about just what I believe. I wanted to engage those who had never and would never pick up one of my existing books- books they might dismiss because they challenge the status quo... I wanted to write a dialogue in order to provoke dialogue—to get people talking”. –Francis Moore Lappe

Welcome!

This is the Blog for the Wendell Berry House on the St. Olaf College Campus.

We hope to use this as the vehicle for discussion of Sustainable cooking and everyday living.

Enjoy!