365 Ways to Sustain Culture
a new and fun collaborative challenge. Let's post 365 Ways to Sustain Culture.
This challenge was inspired at the NJ Council of the Arts Artist Training in September 2011. The Keynote speaker, Noah Scalin, shared a story. "Back in 2007, I heard a voice that said, 'Make a Skull a Day' - and so I did for 365 Days." Noah presented a slide show with remarkable creative skulls made from flower petals, a sheet, scratchboard, soysauce, wire, bottle parts, construction blocks in the middle of NY city, dance steps, videotapes on the shelf..... you name it. The original creations are called Skull a Day 1.0. He is now up to Skull a Day 5.0. This artist has exhibited in major museums, and published books including: A Daily Creativity Journal: Make Something Everyday & Change Your Life. Noah was fortunate to receive lots of ideas from bloggers. I am hoping for the same.
Noah's workshop inspired this collaborative blog to gather 365 ways to sustain culture. The date of my anticipated MA degree in Cultural Sustainability from Goucher is in the Fall of 2012. The goal is to list 365 ways to sustain culture, with lots of ideas from fellow bloggers by the time I graduate. Please join me in this adventure, spread the word to friends and colleagues, and click to FOLLOW MY BLOG.
Blog your ideas in comments and I will add to list.
(Post your ideas in comments below. Thank you so much.)
Blog your ideas in comments and I will add to list.
(Post your ideas in comments below. Thank you so much.)
I'll Start: 365 Ways to Sustain Culture
1) Blog About It.
2) Express gratitude for those who have come before and those we have in the present. (Lena).
3) Include cultural items in your home decor. (TAHIRA)
4) Record an oral history interview with a culture-bearer. (Paul VanDeCarr)
5) Ask family and other elders for books and Bibles with inscriptions (PV)
6) Ask culture-bearers in the community about who influenced them, and create a "cultural genealogy" (PV)
7) Create a Facebook "note" to solicit lists of songs, dances, stories or other cultural artifacts in a particular community (PV)
8) Join and/or support community organizations that work for cultural equity and sustainability. .(Rita Moonsammy)
9) I will seek out culture-bearers and cultural artifacts as I work in my community. (Barbara Reuther)
10) Plant a garden and share the harvest with your neighbors (Michelle Banks)
11) Ask someone about their culture and/traditions.. and then LISTEN (Sunny Fitzerald)
12) Learn a musical instrument and/or teach a child how to play! (Rory Turner)
13) If you are able, pay to see someone perform live (Jeff Gillenwater)
14) Read a child (children) books about other cultures-and watch how their eyes light up and their interests are sparked! (Raisa Lefe')
15) Attend a senior citizen's event in your community.
16) The next time you take a bite of culture (whether food, music, art, language or clothing), ask yourself and/or the person who brought it to you where it came from and how they happened to come by it... (Harold Anderson)
17) Share a youtube video on an international sustainability project, ex. Akilah Institute in Rwanda.
18) Attend a Storytelling Festival
19) Dance with a child
20) Share a game from your childhood with your grandchild
21) Dance with an elder
22) Create time and invent spaces for reflecting, breathing and sharing. (Michele A.)
23) Attend a Kwanzaa celebration
24) Talk about it (Sarai A.)
25) Share a holiday recipe with younger members of the family
26) Look through old photos - share the stories
27) Volunteer to be a docent
28) Attend places of worship (Manshi P.)
29) Share traveling stories (Manshi P.)
30) Exchange family stories as you travel
31) Write letters to the editor about preservation of historical places
32) Speak out at Zoning Board Meetings
33) Learn about and use healing herbs
34) Share a Proverb
35) Visit with loved ones in person
36) Give a Christmas Gift to the environment - Reduce food waste (Sara Jeswani)
37) Create co-working spaces
38) Join co-working memberships
39) Photograph your life! (Lena)
40) Teach someone how to make your favorite food (Lena)
41) Sing (Lena)
42) Laugh with your friends and family (Lena)
43) Join a food co-op
44) Learn the history of your local community (anonymous)
45) Volunteer for community service on MLK day
46) Build a Cultural Sustainability website
47) Exhibit photographs on social media sites or web sites
48) Visit museums
49) Make space for serendipity (Michele Anderson)
50) Explore the edges of your assumptions (Michele Anderson)
51) Share something you have to much of (Michele Anderson)
52) Start new traditions (Michele Anderson)
53) Don't edit the stories you share with children. You never know what will catch fire with them (Jill Boniske)
54) Learn a new language and the traditions of the people who speak it (Jill Boniske)
55) Make things (Jill Boniske)
56) Experiment---try feeding your family, just for one day, using only $2 (Anna Ralph)
57) Listen to Jazz
58) Buy local
59) Use less detergent when washing clothes or dishes
60) Tell historical stories about peacemakers, MLK, Ghandi, etc.
61) Find a saying that has been past on for generations within your family
62) Write a cultural sustainability curriculum
63) Suggest cultural policy ideas to your local government agencies
64) Hire folk artist
65) Have a girls night out
66) Have a guys night out
67) Have a collective family dinner on a regular basis
68) Pray together
69) Visit family & friends - without anything else on the agenda
70) Make a meal from scratch
71) Throw a party
72) Participate in an oral tradition like storytelling
73) Yodel
74) Learn a new craft
75) When your tour, participate in the local culture
76) Participate in drumming circles
77) Attend cultural retreats
78) Attend spiritual retreats
79) Attend family reunions
80) Plan family reunions
81) Study abroad
82) Create cultural youth programming
83) Dance (Tiffany Espinosa)
84) Dance with others (Tiffany E.)
85) Encourage people to dance with you. (Tiffany E.)
86) Know the music of your heritage (Tiffany E.)
87) Encourage people to make more music from their heritage. (Tiffany E.)
88) See shows of your musical heritage (Tiffany E.)
89) Buy CD's from the music of your heritage (Tiffany E.)
90) Tell everyone about the music of your heritage (Tiffany E.)
91) Make music especially if you think you can't (Jamie Andrew)
92) Talk to both elders and children (Tiffany E.)
93) Frequent your local coffee shop. (Amara Watkins)
94) Walk (Amara W.)
95) Bike (Amara W.)
96) Sit on a porch stoop (Amara W.)
97) Smile at others (Amara W.)
98) Talk to a neighbor (Amara W.)
99) Say hello (Amara W.)
100) Sing Happy 100th birthday to someone who has lived a centennial.
101) Apply for folk arts grants to support community programming
102) Visit residents in a nursing home (Jessica Guild)
103) Engage perspectives that are different than your own (Jessica G.)
104) Paint a picture (Jessica G.)
105) Listen and love deeply (Jessica G.)
106) Consider repairing and balancing before re-building (Michele A.)
107) Live smaller ( Jill B.)
108) Read a good book together as a family, using only candlelight (Anna R.)
109) Do something kind for a friend or stranger without expecting anything at all in return (Anna R .)
110) Explain to your children "why" your family does things in particular ways -- don't just assume they'll "catch" it by watching. The significance helps it live on. (Anna R.)
111) Spend an hour doing something with someone whose language you don't speak (and who doesn't speak your language). Try to accomplish some kind of task together (Anna R.)
112) Foster a sense of "otherness" in your children and yourself (Anna R)
113) Be provocative - Ask your friends how they can lessen their carbon footprint
114) Begin teaching sustainability in pre-school
115) Attend an open mic
116) Create a line dance for your family reunion that includes moves from different generations.
117) Teach kids to put down the video games and technology (Candace Chance)
118) Have trivia night with the family using questions about your family and history (Candace C.)
119) Support mom and pop businesses and restaurants (Amy Skillman)
120) Cherish difference while standing on common ground (Amy S.)
121) Never stop telling the stories of those who have gone before you (Amy S.)
121) Never stop telling the stories of those who have gone before you (Amy S.)
122) Recognize humanity in everyone (Amy S.)
123) Sing the old songs (Amy S.)
124) Hire Queen to tell stories at your next family reunion (Amy S.)
125) Learn something from your mother (Amy S.)
126) Learn something from your father (Amy S.)
127) READ
128) Make your own soap
129) Make your own lotions and body oils
130) When moving call Move For Hunger to donate your non-perisables to a Food Bank
131) Attend a Chinese New Year Celebration
132) Create a family recipe book and add family sayings
133) Sing a lullaby in a newborn's ear
134) Enroll your children in folk culture workshop
135) Mentor teenagers under local folk artists
136) Travel to another state, region or country to mentor under a folk artist
137) Participate in NEA Our Town Grant Projects
138) Tweet about it
139) Sit at the foot of an elder and just listen
140) Make your own cards using your own words
141) Attend an Open Mic
142) Create an Open Mic Day at your local High School
143) Drum
144) Pursue a Masters in Cultural Sustainability at Goucher College and apply
145) Volunteer at Folk Arts Festival, i.e. The Smithsonian Folk Arts Festival
146) Employ folk artists in community, church and school programming
147) Create a Holiday Festival at your local school celebrating holidays across cultures
148) Create a Holiday Festival at your local school celebrating holidays across religions
149) Host a folk artist residency at your school
150) Present a folk artist series at your local university
151) Present a cultural music series at your local university
152) Involve community members in planning of economic, cultural and social projects
153) Watch Soul Train
154) Try Zuumba
154) Learn a second language
155) Wear your hair natural
156) Enjoy a cultural Staycation, visiting local restaurants, galleries, historical sites
157) Embrace the 'MY" - My deli, My hairdresser, My barber, etc... Post them on facebook
158) Learn new ways to engage youth by connecting them to their ancestors and helping them learn how their roots inform who they are. (Jessica Guild)
159) Create ritual around cooking. Bring children together to make family recipies at certain times of the year while sharing the stories of the individuals they came from and listening to the music they loved. Sense memory is powerful and lasting. (Jacqueline K.)160) Research your family genealogy
161) Join prayer circles
162) Attend sporting events with family and friends
163) Research the meaning and origin of your first and last name
164) Collect family healing remedies
165) Wear ethnic attire
166) Find creative and healthy ways to cook unhealthy traditional foods
167) Hang photo collages of family and friends in your home
168) I will bless the Lord at all times, and His praise shall continuously be in my mouth (Mitzie Baldwin)
169) BBQ with family and friends (Lee Baldwin)
170) Ask someone: What is your favorite Scripture?
171) Vote
172) Hire teaching artists
173) Engage teaching artists in creative aging workshops and residencies
174) Do Random Acts of Kindness (http://www.366randomacts.org/)
175) Create a family cookbook together (Lilly Lips)
176) Write, create, produce theatre that reflects multi-generational reality. (Mark Lutwak)
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