Transition Culture has moved
I no longer blog on this site. You can now find me, my general blogs, and the work I am doing researching my forthcoming book on imagination, on my new blog.
Come find me at robhopkins.net
Sorry, back again, definitely the last post this time … I wrote here before about the wonderful Totnes Christmas Markets that take place here the 3 Tuesdays before Christmas, but here’s something lovely and Christmassy that took place at this week’s final one….a short film by Emma Goude, who directed ‘In Transition 1.0’.
I know that I have officially signed off for Christmas, but I can’t resist the temptation to post this now, think of it as my Christmas gift. About 3 weeks ago, I travelled to a snow-covered West Sussex to meet one of my heroes. Christopher Alexander, architect, thinker, designer, author of the seminal ‘A Pattern Language’ and of the more recent extraordinary ‘The Nature of Order’ series of books, has long been someone whose work I have admired greatly. It is sometimes said that it is generally best not to meet your heroes as they usually disappoint, but that wasn’t the case here. I met Chris and his wife Maggie in their beautiful old home (I’m starting to sound like a writer for Hello! magazine), and after lunch and a general chat about the Transition approach (about which Chris knew very little in advance of our conversation), we did the following interview. I am deeply grateful to them both for a fascinating and illuminating afternoon.
Well now, here’s an idea. At last week’s ‘Confronting Change’ event in London (see left), a question was asked about politics, and how Transition might be accelerated in terms of mainstream politics. Polly Higgins, who is a barrister, and who is promoting the idea of international legislation to outlaw ‘ecocide’, suggested that, in the same way that certain key pieces of enabling legislation have led to great advances in the past, perhaps the time is right for a Transition Enabling Act, designed not to ban lots of things, but positive legislation that enables all that needs to happen in order for Transition to scale up rapidly over the next 5 years. This was met with much excitement, with Michael Meacher MP saying that were such legislation to exist, he would be happy to help drive it through the House of Commons. So, how about it? What we need now is your input, debate and discussion…. (read on…)
A fantastic evening last night at the South Bank Centre in London, organised by Transition Finsbury Park. The event was a sell-out, and proved to be an inspirational coming together of London Transition initiatives, under the title “Confronting Change”. Polly Higgins, a barrister and author of ‘Eradicating Ecocide’ was the host and got the evening underway. She had recently returned from the COP16 negotiations at Cancun, and talked about what had happened there.
Training for Transition - Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN: May 22-23 2010.
I am midway through doing one of final few remaining ‘ingredients of Transition’, this one on Transition Training, but it is all looking rather dry and boring and is rather bereft of your stories and anecdotes which are the things that bring them to life. So, I would love to hear your stories: why did your initiative organise a Transition Training? Why did you go on one? How did it help your initiative? What surprised you about it? How did it change your understanding of Transition? (Thanks to Transition US’s Flickr set for this pic).
