Citizens' Climate Lobby

CCR Ep 59 Black Birders Week with Tykee James

As the government affairs coordinator at the National Audubon Society in Washington, DC. Tykee James has a special role—organizing bird walks with members of Congress and congressional staff! Birding has been important to him ever since he started as a teen in Philadelphia. 

Last year, after a racist incident against a Black birder in New York’s Central Park, Tykee James and fellow birders decided to create #BlackBirdersWeek. They had only hours to organize the event which included using social media to reveal a whole world of birding by people of color. During that week, the #BlackBirderWeek campaign had more than 600 million impressions on social media sites. It also generated national press coverages.

Tykee joins us to talk about the incredibly successful campaign and the need to tell stories about Black experiences that go beyond narratives of trauma. He also shares his plans for this year’s Black Birders Week. 

Tykee James is the government affairs coordinator at the National Audubon Society and sits on the board of directors of the DC Audubon Society, Wyncote Audubon Society, Audubon Maryland-DC, the Birding Co-op, and the Academy of Natural Sciences at Drexel University.  In his personal time he is the audio producer for Wildlife Observer Network, a wildlife media project he started with some wildlife-friendly friends in Philly. Tykee hosts two podcasts: Brothers in Birding and On Word for Wildlife.

The Art House

Citizens Climate Radio host, Peterson Toscano, shares some of his own climate story. In doing so, he evokes the spirit of American poet, Walt Whitman. He reveals there was a lot more to the bard than just his famous book, Leaves of Grass. Whitman evolved from an aimless young man to a dynamic new poetic prophet to a tender and faithful caregiver to young men devastated by the American Civil War. 

Like the need to increase our empathy during this time of the Coronavirus Pandemic, Peterson stresses how climate change requires an opening of the heart. Whitman models this beautifully in the ways he cared for wounded and dying soldiers. 

Influenced by Gary Schmidgall’s book, Walt Whitman: A Gay Life, Peterson recreates the moment of Whitman’s first breakthrough. It happened at an evening in the Opera when he heard the Italian diva Madame Marietta Alboni. Her voice pierced Whitman and opened up his artistic soul. You will hear Fac ut Portem from Rossini’s Stabat Mater available on Archive.org as Peterson narrates the moment.

You can hear standalone version of The Art House at Artists and Climate Change

Good News Story

Our Good News Story comes out of Portland, Oregon. Lane Shaffer is a 15 year old high school student. He is one of several students seeking to change public transportation policy in the Portland area. 

In addition to working on this public transportation project, Lane is also one of the hosts of All in My Head podcast. It is produced by a group of teens that are making a podcast for youth, by youth. They counter stereotypes around mental health in the teen BIPOC (Black, and Indigenous, People of Color) and LGBTQ+ community. 

If you have good news to share, contact Peterson radio @ citizensclimate.org

Dig Deeper

• How to Be an Urban Birder, book by David Lindo
• Hear the full conversation between Tykee James and host, Peterson Toscano
• Black and Latinx Birders Scholarship
• Envisioning an Anti-Racist Sustainable Philly A panel discussion focused on understanding sustainability from the perspective of diverse and often marginalized communities (recording on YouTube)
• Walt Whitman and the Civil War, American Experience on PBS

We always welcome your thoughts, questions, suggestions, and recommendations for the show. Leave a voice mail at 518.595.9414. (+1 if calling from outside the USA.) You can email your answers to radio @ citizensclimate.org  

You can hear Citizens’ Climate Radio on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, SoundCloud, Podbean, Northern Spirit Radio, Google Play, PlayerFM, and TuneIn Radio. Also, feel free to connect with other listeners, suggest program ideas, and respond to programs in the Citizens’ Climate Radio Facebook group or on Twitter at @CitizensCRadio.

CCR Ep 58 How to Keep Your Cool on a Warming Planet with Dr. Krista Hiser and Sarah Jaquette Ray

If you are feeling up,  down or somewhere in between, hopefully by the time you finish this episode you will feel encouraged in the great work you are doing. 

Dr. Krista Hiser is teaches  at Kapiʻolani Community College and is currently serving as the Director of the Center for Sustainability Across the Curriculum in Hawaii. Her research uses focus groups, interviews, and reflective writing to learn more about student and faculty perspectives on climate change and sustainability. To share the findings she and her colleague Matthew K. Lynch co-wrote the paper, Worry and Hope: What College Students Know, Think, Feel, and Do about Climate Change. It appears in the Journal for Community Engagement and Scholarship. 

This study is being replicated at universities in the USA and reveals how students are feeling about climate change and where they are learning about it. With this data, Kr. Hiser leads workshops to help faculty expand their teaching strategies in order to help students manage complex emotions related to our climate predicament. 

Dr. Hiser has published on community engagement, service-learning, organizational change, post-apocalyptic and cli-fi literature. She is also the author of Field Notes: Teaching Climate Change in Higher Education, a blog available through Medium.com

The Art House

Sarah Jaquette Ray is a professor of environmental studies, a writer, and a mom. She doesn’t necessarily see herself as an artist. In taking on climate change though, she recognizes the essential role of the arts. On Earth Day 2020, in the midst of an urgent Coronavirus pandemic, she published a book that is helping people navigate their strong feelings about climate change.  

A Field Guide to Climate Anxiety: How to Keep Your Cool on a Warming Planet, provides practical insights and proven techniques for keeping focused on pursuing solutions for a complicated and challenging topic. With warmth, humor, and expertise, Sarah Jaquette Ray will help you better know how to stay engaged without becoming overwhelmed. 

Host Peterson Toscano says, “Reading Sarah’s book, I saw how the concepts she covers are not just helpful for students in high school and college. They also are questions and issues artists who are engaged in climate work consider all time. For storytellers, Sarah suggests we adjust the lens of how we look at climate stories. Telling the stories that will have the most impact takes real work.”

You can hear standalone versions of The Art House at Artists and Climate Change

Good News Report

Dr. Anthony Leiserowitz from Yale Climate Connections shares some good news in addressing a long history of injustice. He chats with Cate Mingoya of Groundwork USA, a network of environmental justice organizations. In order to fight inequality in their neighborhoods, some city residents are using maps to reveal what they have known for a long time. They show how racist housing policies of the past have left residents more vulnerable to the impacts of climate change today.

 

Mingoya says the maps show how the impacts of redlining persist, and provide an important tool for local residents, “to sit down with their local government, with elected officials, with leaders in their community and say, ‘You need to explain why this is still the case and you need to explain what you’re going to do to make things look a little bit different.’”

If you have good news to share, leave a voice mail at 518.595.9414. (+1 if calling from outside the USA.) 

Dig Deeper     

• Kent University Anthropology and Conversation Blog Post: “We must be kind to ourselves and respond rather than react to climate change” – Responding mindfully to eco-anxiety  
• CCR Episode 23 Mental Health and Climate Change with Dr. Natasha DeJarnett and Dr. Lise Van Susteren
• Resilience Hub found at CCL Community provides opportunities for building personal and chapter resilience that supports purposeful action on climate.                                                               

We always welcome your thoughts, questions, suggestions, and recommendations for the show. Leave a voice mail at 518.595.9414. (+1 if calling from outside the USA.) You can email your answers to radio @ citizensclimate.org  

You can hear Citizens’ Climate Radio on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, SoundCloud, Podbean, Northern Spirit Radio, Google Play, PlayerFM, and TuneIn Radio. Also, feel free to connect with other listeners, suggest program ideas, and respond to programs in the Citizens’ Climate Radio Facebook group or on Twitter at @CitizensCRadio.

CCR Ep 57 Bob Inglis - The Tide is Rising

Citizens Climate Education encourages bipartisan support for climate solutions. While people on the Left, Right, and in the Middle might disagree on many issues, Climate Change is one that can bring us together. But this is not always easy to do. It requires listening deeply to others who hold views on issues and policies that differ from my own. 

Climate advocates are wondering: In a time of tense partisan divisions, how can I learn to listen to someone from a different political party? How might I identify shared values and common ground?  In this episode of Citizens Climate Radio we will get some practice in listening. We will hear from the political the right and the left.

Bob Inglis is the Executive Director of republicEn.org. He was elected to the U.S. Congress in 1992, having never run for office before and he served a pair of six-year terms (1993-98, 2005-10). In 2011, Inglis went full-time into promoting free enterprise action on climate change and launched the Energy and Enterprise Initiative (“E&EI”) at George Mason University in July 2012. In the fall of 2014, E&EI rebranded to become republicEn.org. republicEn.org is an online grassroots community of over 10,000 Americans educating the country about free-enterprise solutions to climate change. 

Bob shares some of his own journey about how he got into the climate work, and he tells us about the lessons he learned in reaching out to fellow conservatives. He also reveals to us his thoughts and feelings about the January 6th storming of the US Capitol by supporters of then President Donald Trump.  

The Art House

In the Art House we feature song leaders Annie Patterson and Peter Blood. They are liberal Quakers in New England who have been leading singing for over 30 years. They talk about the songs that motivate and inspire climate advocates. Some are protest songs and others are beautiful ballads. They discuss the role of music in social movements as they offer up their own tiny desk concert. 

Annie and Peterson are the creators of the Rise Up Singing and Rise Again Song Books. These songbooks take on social justice issues like racism, poverty, inequality, and sexism. See them in action on the Rise Up and Sing YouTube channel. 

You can hear standalone version of The Art House at Artists and Climate Change. 

Good News Report

We partnered with Yale Climate Connections to bring us good news out of Hammond, Indiana. After a coal-fired power plant shut down in 2012, the city had to figure out what to do with the site while also replacing the lost tax revenue the plant closure created. They came up with a creative solution. 

If you have good news to share, leave a voice mail at 518.595.9414. (+1 if calling from outside the USA.) 

Dig Deeper                                                                      

• Dan Kahan’s cultural cognition shows why climate-splaining is a fail
• Remembering George Shultz: George Shultz: “Climate is changing,” and we need more action. Former secretary of state — and former MIT professor — urges progress on multiple fronts. MIT News 2014
• Cultural Cognition Project
• EcoRight Speaks Podcast, a project of republicEN
• Bipartisanship improves public opinion of legislators & policy by Flannery Winchester, CCL Blog
• Emma’s Revolution: Our House is on Fire

We always welcome your thoughts, questions, suggestions, and recommendations for the show. Leave a voice mail at 518.595.9414. (+1 if calling from outside the USA.) You can email your answers to radio @ citizensclimate.org  

You can hear Citizens’ Climate Radio on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, SoundCloud, Podbean, Northern Spirit Radio, Google Play, PlayerFM, and TuneIn Radio. Also, feel free to connect with other listeners, suggest program ideas, and respond to programs in the Citizens’ Climate Radio Facebook group or on Twitter at @CitizensCRadio.

 

CCR 56 Tony Campolo--A Christian's Call to Save Creation

Last month we featured three Conservative Christians who told us how their faith compels them to promote creation care and climate change solutions. This month we feature one of America’s most widely known Progressive Evangelical Christian thought leaders. Rev. Tony Campolo is professor emeritus of sociology at Eastern University, and he led the Evangelical Association for the Promotion of Education for more than 40 years. 

Rev. Campolo has written over 50 books on topics that have educated and challenged his Evangelical Christian audience. He has been ahead of his time on a variety of social issues. In 1992 he published the book, How to Rescue the Earth Without Worshiping Nature, A Christian Call to Save Creation. In the book, he seeks to help believers see they have a role to play in caring for creation. 

Rev. Campolo, who is 85 and has never retired, suffered a stroke in 2020. He is at home recovering with the help of his wife Peggy. Before the Pandemic and his stroke, Citizens Climate Radio’s host, Peterson Toscano, was fortunate enough to sit down with Tony and ask him about his 1992 book. 

Rev. Campolo reveals his frustration with fellow ministers and accuses them of not listening to God’s voice in regard to the mandate to care for creation. 

The Art House

Returning to the Art House is Jennie Carlisle, the curator and director of the Smith Gallery at Appalachian State University along with Laura England, a senior lecturer. They are two of three co-facilitators of ASU’s Climate Stories Collaborative. Both Jennie and Laura appeared in Episode 49 and told us about how in spring 2020 they quickly adapted to the Covid Global Pandemic by putting their annual Student Climate Stories Showcase onto Instagram.  

Some climate leaders see art straightforward communication tool. But art overloaded with messages about issues and politics can turn out clunky and preachy. How does an artists stay in a creative space? When producing climate arts, what is more important the process or the product? 

You can hear standalone version of The Art House at Artists and Climate Change. 

Good News Report

This episode we begin a new feature, The Good News Report. Listeners share their climate successes with us. Good news this month comes from Cathy Orlando in Sudbury, Ontario, Canada. She is the International Outreach Manager for Citizens Climate Lobby and also the Canadian Director. Slow, steady, and relentless climate advocacy has paid off! 

If you have good news to share, contact Peterson Toscano: radio @ CitizensClimate.org 

Dig Deeper                                                                      

• Ron Sider, Canadian-born American theologian and social activist
• Tony Campolo’s Christmas 2020 Homily
• Making a Planet Worth Saving: Bill McKibben interviews Reverend Lennox Yearwood, Jr. (New Yorker)
• Amitov Ghosh: Where is the Fiction about Climate Change? (The Guardian)

We always welcome your thoughts, questions, suggestions, and recommendations for the show. Leave a voice mail at 518.595.9414. (+1 if calling from outside the USA.) You can email your answers to radio @ citizensclimate.org  

You can hear Citizens’ Climate Radio on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, SoundCloud, Podbean, Northern Spirit Radio, Google Play, PlayerFM, and TuneIn Radio. Also, feel free to connect with other listeners, suggest program ideas, and respond to programs in the Citizens’ Climate Radio Facebook group or on Twitter at @CitizensCRadio.

CCR Ep 55 Climate Change and Creation Care: What Would Jesus Do?

In a followup to our most downloaded episode,  What Does the Bible Say About Climate Change?, host, Peterson Toscano speaks with two Christian women about their faith, their commitment to creation care, and why they see Citizens Climate Lobby as a place where they can pursue meaningful solutions. They talk about their values, the Bible, the spiritual charge to do the work of reconciliation, especially in a contentious and politically divided country. They speak with conviction about the need for Christian believers to take creation care seriously.

 

Kelsey Grant served as a CCL fellow with the Mountain West Higher Education Region. Currently she is a CCL Conservative Fellow and member of the Conservative Caucus Executive Team. At the University of Colorado-Boulder she is a pre-law student, double majoring in Political Science and Philosophy. She discovered Citizens’ Climate Lobby through her church, where she co-founded environmental ministries, taught about environmental stewardship as a Sunday School teacher, and occasionally served as a guest preacher. She has published over a dozen Op-Eds/letters to the editor. Kelsey was named a 2020 Udall Scholar and 2020 Truman Scholar Finalist for her work on conservative outreach in the climate space and empowering individuals to be effective facilitators of bipartisanship. Kelsey Grant’s Instagram. 

 

Andrea Zink is from Tennessee and has spent her professional career working in the non-profit sector for mission-driven organizations such as The Salvation Army, Vanderbilt University, and Nashville Opera. She attends the United Methodist Church and serves on the United Methodist Circle of Grace prison ministry music team and on several UMC Creation Justice work committees.Andrea joined CCL in 2016 when she discovered CCL's bipartisan approach to climate change solutions. Andrea Zink’s Instagram.

 

The Art House

In the Art House you will meet Lindsay Linsky. A Bible-believing Christian in Georgia, she is the author of the book, Keep It Good—Understanding Creation Care through Parables. Through her book she seeks to break through environmental apathy and partisan noise to show Christians God’s simple yet beautiful message of creation stewardship.

 

As a teacher, Lindsay Linsky understands how challenging it is to correct misinformation, and she recognizes the power of stories to engage people with new ideas. In our show she shares practical insights and a very powerful Bible verse that highlights the call to creation care.

 

Lindsay Linsky has been featured on panel discussions at theology conferences as well as podcasts and webinars on Creation Care Radio, Yale Climate Connections, and RepublicEN’s The EcoRight Speaks podcast. Special thanks to Price Atkinson for introducing us to Lindsay Linsky.  

Lindsay earned her PhD in Science Education with a focus on environmental education and ocean literacy from the University of Georgia, and lives with her husband and children in Suwanee, GA. Lindsay Linsky on Twitter.

 

You can hear standalone versions of The Art House at Artists and Climate Change

 

Dig Deeper

• Lindsay Linsky on Why Christians Need to Keep Creation Good (YouTube)
• Evangelical Environmental Network
• Young Evangelicals for Climate Action
• Christianity Today articles on Creation Care
• Church and creation care: we need a theology-before-politics approach by Doyle Sager in Baptist News Global
• Bible Verses on Creation Care  
• How to Rescue the Earth without Worshiping Nature—A Christian’s Call to Save Nature by Tony Campolo, our guest for Ep 56 which premieres on January 22, 2012. 

 

We always welcome your thoughts, questions, suggestions, and recommendations for the show. Leave a voice mail at 518.595.9414. (+1 if calling from outside the USA.) You can email your answers to radio @ citizensclimate.org  

 

In 2021 we will also introduce a new feature to our monthly show. Our Good News Report will give listeners a chance to share those important and often under-reported stories of climate successes. It may be a story of national significance or something happening in your own neighborhood. We want to celebrate your successes. If you have a good news story, email us: radio @ citizensclimate.org.

 

You can hear Citizens’ Climate Radio on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, SoundCloud, Podbean, Northern Spirit Radio, Google Play, PlayerFM, and TuneIn Radio. Also, feel free to connect with other listeners, suggest program ideas, and respond to programs in the Citizens’ Climate Radio Facebook group or on Twitter at @CitizensCRadio.

CCR Ep 54 Justice, Football, and Talking Trash -- Garry Gilliam and Sharona Shnayder

A recent episode of Lew Blaustein’s Green Sports Pod featured a riveting interview with National Football League player, Garry Gilliam. Blaustein writes:

Garry Gilliam experienced this hope-squashing system firsthand during his childhood in the opportunity-deprived section of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Now, the ex-NFL offensive lineman is using his resources and his seemingly boundless energy to try to break that system, replacing it with a more equitable, hopeful one.

His system-breaking tool is The Bridge Eco-Village, an innovative start-up that provides opportunities for African-Americans and other marginalized people to “Work, Eat, Live, Learn and Play” in affordable, high quality mixed-use developments. The pilot is being built in — where else — Harrisburg.

Lew Blaustein has given us permission to rebroadcast an edited version of his interview with Garry Gilliam. You will also hear Citizens Climate Radio’s host, Peterson Toscano check in with Gilliam to find out how things stand with the Bridge Eco-Village today in light of the Covid-19 Global Pandemic. Garry Gilliam has good news to share about the progress of the project.

As the  Coronavirus pandemic shut everything down, Sharona Shnayder, a college student, simply could not stay inside any longer. One Tuesday she joined a friend at neighborhood park. Together, while maintaining a safe physical distance, they picked up trash at a park in Portland, OR near their university.

Not only did people in her community begin to notice and join in; word quickly spread. Now there are Tuesdays for Trash events happening all over the world.

Sharona, who grew up in Nigeria and now lives in the USA, shares how picking up trash is bringing people together, lifting spirits, and getting people engaged in climate work. In fact, this may be a project your own climate group wants to take on in order to connect in a new way with your own community.

We always welcome your thoughts, questions, suggestions, and recommendations for the show. Leave a voice mail at 518.595.9414. (+1 if calling from outside the USA.) You can email your answers to radio @ citizensclimate.org  

You can hear Citizens’ Climate Radio on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, SoundCloud, Podbean, Northern Spirit Radio, Google Play, PlayerFM, and TuneIn Radio. Also, feel free to connect with other listeners, suggest program ideas, and respond to programs in the Citizens’ Climate Radio Facebook group or on Twitter at @CitizensCRadio.

CCR 53 Andrew Stuhl with Lessons from a 1972 Flood and Lynn Neuman is Dancing with Plastic

Andrew Stuhl, an associate professor of environmental studies and sciences at Bucknell University, has been interviewing residents from Pennsylvania’s Susquehanna River Valley about what they remember about 1972. He keeps hearing about the powerful smell of flood mud. This was the pungent odor throughout the Susquehanna Valley after Hurricane Agnes brought historic rainfalls and a massive flood which upended lives and reshaped towns and waterways.

“It reminds me of the connection between smell and memory, and how quickly a memory can come back to you if you smell something in the present day,” Andrew tells podcast host, Peterson Toscano.

"I like to think about that as a metaphor for the importance of history and the importance of moments like Hurricane Agnes. They’re always with us, and sometimes they don’t come to our immediate senses, but they can be triggered, and they can be brought up really quickly. I like to believe in the power of memory and history, to mine those experiences, to reflect on them, and recognize and regard them, so we that can walk today in the difficult moments, and get through them.”

Andrew talks about his community-based research, the Agnes Flood Project. You will learn why this one storm is still so important, not just for the region, but for the entire country. Lessons drawn from 1972 and the resiliency modeled by local residents during and after the storm will help us in coping and caring for each other during the Coronavirus Pandemic and with the growing risks of climate change.

If you or someone you know have Hurricane Agnes stories to share for the Agnes Flood project, contact Andrew Stuhl and the team. They are also looking for pictures from the hurricane and its aftermath. Email agnesrevisited@gmail.com. This story was made possible through a collaboration with Susquehanna Life Out Loud podcast.

The Art House

How does an artist decide to do the work she does? How does that work evolve overtime? What impact does it have on the audience and how can an artist deepen that impact? During a recent conversation with dancer and choreographer, Lynn Neuman, Peterson Toscano encountered an artist with boundless curiosity. This curiosity drives her work.

As director of Artichoke Dance Company, Lynn recognizes the vital role art plays in addressing issues like climate change. Entertaining and Educating not enough though for Lynn and her company, though. They always want to do more to get people to act. Through community engagement and direct outreach to lawmakers, they are training community members how to change legislation.

And in this time of the Coronavirus pandemic Lynn Neuman and Artichoke Dance Company have been adjusting and adapting once again. See their Covid Creations. “It reflects our feelings of isolation and desires for connection during the corona virus. Filmed at various times of day, the series reflects the available bandwidth of the internet.” 

Dig Deeper

• Hurricane Agnes, National Weather Services

• Tropical Storm Agnes devastated Pa. in 1972: ‘Battered, lashed, flooded and paralyzed’ Penn Live

• The 1972 Agnes Flood at Milton, PA, video with archival footage

• Dancing In Plastic — How One Woman Is Shining A Light On Plastic Pollution, Medium and accompanying video 

• Waste Side Story, Robin Michals photography collaboration with dancer Lynn Neuman.

• New York State’s Bag Waste Reduction Law, NY Dept of Environmental Conservation

We always welcome your thoughts, questions, suggestions, and recommendations for the show. Leave a voice mail at 518.595.9414. (+1 if calling from outside the USA.) You can email your answers to radio @ citizensclimate.org. 

You can hear Citizens’ Climate Radio on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, SoundCloud, Podbean, Northern Spirit Radio, Google Play, PlayerFM, and TuneIn Radio. Also, feel free to connect with other listeners, suggest program ideas, and respond to programs in the Citizens’ Climate Radio Facebook group or on Twitter at @CitizensCRadio.

 

CCR Ep 52 Doug Parsons on Adaptation, Resilience, and Bouncing Forward

Climate change related work often comes down on one of two sides: 1. Mitigation to reduce or end human causes greenhouse pollution in order to slow down and lessen the impacts of global warming. 2. Adaptation of our communities and infrastructure in order to prepare for the impacts of climate change and respond to extreme weather and other consequences of climate change.

Doug Parsons, the host of the America Adapts Podcast talks to us about what he has learned from nearly 100 episodes interview adaptation experts. He will discuss differences between adaptation and resiliency. He highlights efforts to adapt to sea level rise, wildfires, and flooding, and points out an impact of climate change that will affect almost everyone at some point in their lives—extreme heat.

You will also hear an excerpt from a conversation Doug Parsons has with s Dr. Carolyn Kousky, the Executive Director at the Wharton Risk Management and Decision Processes Center at the University of Pennsylvania. They discuss how wildfires in California drove their utility into bankruptcy and what policy reforms are needed to prevent this from happening again.

Doug also reflects climate adaptation in light of the Coronavirus Global Pandemic. What lessons are climate adaptation experts learning? What challenges do they face?

The Art House

Joining us in the Art House is Musician and composer Jason Davis. Jason curates ClimateStoriesProject.org. The site hosts videos from people all over the world. They reveal the impacts of climate change in their lives, and how they are responding. Jason takes some of these stories and composes music to accompany them. You will hear a moving and powerful testimony from John Sinnok, Inuit elder in Alaska. Woven around the story is Jason’s haunting and beautiful composition for the double base. He calls the piece Footsteps in Snow. You will also learn how you can share your own story on the website.  

Jason wants to hear your climate story. He invites you to explore his site to read other climate stories then consider contributing your own. That website is climatestoriesproject.org

We always welcome your thoughts, questions, suggestions, and recommendations for the show. Leave a voice mail at 518.595.9414. (+1 if calling from outside the USA.) You can email your answers to radio @ citizensclimate.org. 

You can hear Citizens’ Climate Radio on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, SoundCloud, Podbean, Northern Spirit Radio, Google Play, PlayerFM, and TuneIn Radio. Also, feel free to connect with other listeners, suggest program ideas, and respond to programs in the Citizens’ Climate Radio Facebook group or on Twitter at @CitizensCRadio.

 

CCR 51 Art and Identity in a Time of Climate Change

Those of you who regularly listen to this podcast know that when addressing climate change, we believe in the power of art. Artists take on a unique role in helping the public better understand the many issues connected to climate change. They also play an important part in helping us process our strong emotions about our rapidly changing world. 

 

Poet and climate advocate Clara Fang shares her powerful and moving poem, The Children on Why They are Striking for the Climate. She also tells us about the poetry she reads and how it connects her to the natural world. Clara serves as Citizens’ Climate Lobby Student Engagement Coordinator. In her role, she engages students in climate advocacy and helps members conduct outreach to higher education.  She holds a Master of Environmental Management from Yale University and a MFA in Creative Writing from University of Utah. In the episode she announced plans to organize a creative writing action group on CCL Community. 

 

Photographer, writer, and climate advocate, Princella Talley tells us about the vital role of art in her life and her work. Her interests in visual art and storytelling started at a young age when observing dolphins in the ocean. After a successful career as a professional writer, Princella worked on a freelance writing assignment that ultimately drew her into the world of climate change and her role as diversity outreach outreach coordinator at Citizens’ Climate Lobby. In her conversation with host, Peterson Toscano, Princella speaks candidly about the challenges of being a person of color in predominately white climate spaces. 

 

Before joining the Citizens’ Climate Education team, Princella spent more than a decade as a photographer and writer. She covered topics ranging from climate change and ecotourism to artificial intelligence and mobile app development for major news outlets with more than 60 million online visitors, independent publications, and tech startups in Silicon Valley. She’s written for CBS Las Vegas, worked as a former copy editor for a digital publication with 135,000 weekly readers, and created content for a GRAMMYs campaign.

Princella is also a business owner of Louisiana Food Fellow, a cohort of change leaders working within local food systems. In Central Louisiana, she partners with community leaders to provide environmental education and implement sustainable and eco-friendly programs in economically disadvantaged communities.

 

Krista Hiser, PhD is a professor of composition and rhetoric at Kapi'olani Community College in Honolulu, Hawaii. She also directs the Center for Sustainability Across Curriculum within the University of Hawaii System. In the spring she taught the course, Landscapes in Literature—Cli-Fi, Sci-Fi, and the Culture of Sustainability. In this episode, Dr. Hiser outlines for us the difference between science fiction and climate fiction and provides examples for each. She also raises concerns about the many apocalyptic narratives that flood the Cli-Fi market and that play a prominent role in climate conversations. She believes there are batter ways to talk about climate change. 

 

Climate Fiction and Science Fiction discussed in this episode

• The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
• Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
• Generation Z by Peter Meredith
• We Are Unprepared by Meg Little Reilly
• The Man with the Compound Eyes by Wu Ming-Yi
• A Rain of Night Birds Dsena Metzger
• Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver
• Mr. Eternity by Aaron Thier — Hear him speak and talk about his novel on CCR Ep 10
• Code Blue by Marissa Slaven — She discusses the book and does a reading from it in CCR Ep 33

We always welcome your thoughts, questions, suggestions, and recommendations for the show. Leave a voice mail at 518.595.9414. (+1 if calling from outside the USA.) You can email your answers to radio @ citizensclimate.org. 

 

You can hear Citizens’ Climate Radio on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, SoundCloud, Podbean, Northern Spirit Radio, Google Play, PlayerFM, and TuneIn Radio. Also, feel free to connect with other listeners, suggest program ideas, and respond to programs in the Citizens’ Climate Radio Facebook group or on Twitter at @CitizensCRadio.

CCR 50 Big Climate Problems Require Even Bigger Global Solutions

Think of this  as a patchwork quilt. Instead of one long main segment, the Art House, and the Puzzler Question, we have sewed together five shorter segments from around the world that each stand alone. Together they tell a larger story. 

 

Olivia Oguadinma in Nigeria discusses the role of storytelling in motivating her peers to meaningful action. Through her Gems on Earth podcast she reaches young people throughout Western Africa and beyond. 

 

Doerte Wihan, a mother of five and a kindergarten teacher in Berlin, Germany had not given climate change much of a thought. Then she attended a student climate strike with one of her children. This one event launched her into the world of extreme climate change activism. She is now a member of the climate protest group, Extinction Rebellion. She talks about her dramatic transformation and the strength she has found being in community with fellow climate activists. 

 

Artist Shane Petzer in Barrydale, South Africa talks about turning trash into art. Through the Magpie Art Collective, he and fellow artists create breathtakingly beautiful chandeliers all made from trash. Two of these hung in the White House in the Obama’s private quarters. During this time of Coronavirus lockdown, Magpie Art Collective have partnered with the Quakers in the Western Cape to create #QuakerPeaceDoves. Find out about how you can take part in the collective remotely and turn your trash into art.  

 

And in the USA we feature Solomon Goldstein-Rose. In 2017 at the age 22 Solomon was elected to Massachusetts legislature. After a two year term, he decided he would not run again. Instead he has been ramping up his efforts to get us thinking and acting about climate change. In March just as the Covid-19 Global Pandemic shut everything down, Solomon published his first book: The 100% Solution. A Plan for Solving Climate Change. The book is filled with whimsical and technically accurate illustrations by visual artist and writer, Violet Kitchen. She tells us about the role art can play in change movements.  

 

Since this is our 50th episode, friends of the show have left us messages. You will hear greetings and well wishes from listeners and also from former guests, Dr. Natasha DeJarnett (many episodes,) Solemi Herandez (ep. 43,) Katie Zakrzewski (ep 48) and Brian Ettling (Ep. 24.) We also share messages from follow podcasters.

• Doug Parsons from America Adapts Podcast
• LaUra Schmidt and Aimee Lewis-Reau with the Good Grief Podcast
• Lew Blaustein from Green Sports Pod

We always welcome your thoughts, questions, suggestions, and recommendations for the show. Leave a voice mail at 518.595.9414. (+1 if calling from outside the USA.) You can email your answers to radio @ citizensclimate.org. 

 

You can hear Citizens’ Climate Radio on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, SoundCloud, Podbean, Northern Spirit Radio, Google Play, PlayerFM, and TuneIn Radio. Also, feel free to connect with other listeners, suggest program ideas, and respond to programs in the Citizens’ Climate Radio Facebook group or on Twitter at @CitizensCRadio.