How old are you? Do you know how old your district’s City Council representative is? One clue: the youngest is 30. And why do I ask? I have to answer that question with another question: have you heard of peak oil, or permaculture?
As young people, we will live with the consequences of peak oil and climate change longer than any older generations.
Humanity is separated. We are separated by our “individualism”, and at the heart of individualism lies a culture and, most often, its religion.
When a society creates a particular institution, such as a religion, its community is conditioned to uphold that establishment in order to survive in the battle against other cultures and their establishments.
College students watch a lot of late night television. This is because college students stay up late, own TV’s, and drink Red Bull when they’re bored.
The college student is wise when awful things appear on the screen in front of them, and change the channel before the dire information can stew.
January 20, 2009, I was a witness to the fulfillment of Martin Luther King’s dream that people will judge others by the content of their character and not the color of their skin.
More than twice the population of Maine stood before, behind and around the Capitol Building with more people spilling out of Metro gates like the march of the penguins and walking the streets of DC in hopes of finding a giant Jumbotron where they could watch the swearing-in ceremony.
Lately, I have spent a lot of time thinking about human nature. I’ve been thinking about collective consciousness, the power that it may have, and how greatly our emotions really affect our lives.
There are two emotions that all other feelings stem from-love and fear.
Over winter break, I fell into a normal, domestic routine that comes with time spent at home. No cable means I am woefully dependant on network television to fulfill my entertainment needs.
As I lazed around the homestead, I watched as The Price is Right gave way a solid three hour late-afternoon block of courtroom judge shows, followed by my now-close friends, Ellen, Phil, and of course, The Big O.
Dear Sandra Eustis Bracket and President Botman;
Parking has been a huge issue, this year due to the added Hannaford Conference Facilities and the WishCamper Campus for Ollie Students. I have been a student at USM since 1999, as a non-traditional single mother who relies on commuting both to the university and to my children’s schools.
With the spring semester quickly approaching, many students at USM already have their sights set on the next round of textbooks. Textbook season is usually a sad time for students and involves dishing out cash on books when they would much rather be spending it on other things.
Upon entering the University of Southern Maine in the fall of 2005, I took an instant liking to the University’s website. When I wanted to register for classes, check my student bill, or just print out my schedule, it was simple. A few clicks and I was on my merry way.
In 2007, Zeitgeist: The Movie, undoubtedly one of the most important films on our culture, was released. The movie aims to evolve human consciousness, or at least to educate some unknowing citizens. The German word “zeitgeist” translates into “spirit” of the “time”, and is defined as the general thought process and mood of society during a particular period of time.
As I sunk into the couch after a heavy Thanksgiving dinner, my eyelids heavy and unable to concentrate on the one-sided NFL offering, the family elders gathered mischievously over their wine glasses in the kitchen, scheming to end Christmas as I know it.
With the youngest of my cousins now entering high school, the extended family gift-giving regimen had lost the wild-, eyed, wrapping paper tearing frenzy of Christmas pass.
A large crowd of Maine island residents gathered in the Portland Museum of Art last Thursday to hear a lecture presented by Soren Hermansen from Samso Island, Denmark, which since 1998 has reduced its carbon foot print by 140% with renewable wind energy.
During this chilling transition into winter, things can start to look grim for the coming months. Shorter daylight hours can get anyone down, and if winter sports aren’t your thing, the prospect of snow might do nothing more for you than conjure up images of backbreaking, early-morning shoveling.
Sitting in class on Wednesday, I was struck by a strange feeling. It was a strange amalgamation of pride, possibility, respect, and as tired as meaningless as the words has become – hope. Less than 12 hours before, our nation had ignored racial prejudice, demonstrated its maturity, and elected an African-American man to the country’s highest office.
For many of us today, the world is becoming increasingly unaffordable. With a crumbling economy, an endless war, and a collective ignorance about the environment, the most powerful country in the world has become the most indebted and wasteful country in the world.
Maybe they think it’s appropriate, maybe they don’t see us as a captive audience, or maybe George Bush is the funniest man alove, but USM professors espousing their political views in the classroom is a practice that divides our community along it’s political fault lines, and often shifts focus away from the subject at hand.
Kindle, the northern New England Bioneers conference was hosted, among other places, at USM. Every year the Bioneers have a conference in several locations on the same weekend. The conference aims to teach its participants how culture, society, and business are connected with issues of environment sustainability.
As winter slowly creeps into Maine and things start to look at little drearier, I sometimes wish I had accepted that full ride badminton scholarship to Pyongyang University In North Korea.
That is, the scholarship I might have been offered if I had just taken those backyard games a little more seriously in my childhood – my grandfather claims I had a heck of a backhand.
Now hiring for the position of Vice President of the United States. Minimum requirements include the following: carefree attitude, folksy catchphrases, an unfounded sense of “Maverickness”, ability to memorize talking points, and a general incompetence of every major issue.
In the past few years I’ve become more passionate about politics than I ever thought possible. I started to question the government around the time of 9/11, and later on scrutinized it even more when I fell in love with a soldier. I have always been unquestionably liberal, and have never felt particularly judgmental of other peoples’ opinions until fairly recently.
I crossed the threshold into Bates College’s “Grey Cage”, and was greeted by a glistening spectacle of flesh, ironic neon clothing, and alcohol-impaired dance moves. The one-man dance party that is Girl Talk, a.k.a. Pittsburg’s prolific mash-up “artist” Greg Gillis, was set to take the stage around ten p.
It’s a funny ritual to watch. Students trudging down the aisles of the USM bookstores, eyes slowly scanning the shelves until they find their required texts, then begrudgingly lugging them to the checkout.
If sticker shock could kill, college bookstores would be horrific places.
As I begin to see more and more Nader ’08 stickers popping up on vehicles around Portland, I begin to ask a few questions in my head. ‘Who are these people?’, and then invariably, ‘what are they thinking?!’.
I understand the desire to break up the two-party structure in this country, and I am all for it.
The Farmer’s Almanac might not have that same academic ring to it as, say “Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics”, but those plucky stalwarts of the meteorological profession have made a bold prediction about emerging climate trends for the next 50 years, and Al Gore is not going to be happy.