duncans corner- sustainabe living?

ladies and gentlemen we are living on a planet that is floating in a bizarre and beautiful universe.
“A sustainable society is one which satisfies its needs without diminishing the prospects of future generations.” Is how Lester Brown defines things. It is only recently that we started to live unsustainably, we must learn how to simply work with nature again. If we don’t we end life for humans and possibly the planet, that’s it.


easa.antville.org
was posted 25th June because I felt then that we could and should do more to work for a more sustainable world. What are we? We are EASA, the body that makes up the architectural students of Europe. What have we been saying to the world? We want to have fun and don’t care about what goes on in the world. Why do I say this; EASA came about from a need for radical change when students got together in Liverpool city in 1981 to challenge things and improve the city but this quickly (d)evolved to what was the EASA experience of the last few years, mainly 100´s of students going to an island and doing arty farty workshops while having a lovely fun holiday in the sun (which is always important). Thankfully though things have changed, Danish students have made us focus on “sustainable living”, this is a major progressive step. Perhaps this old apolitical and uncaring view was a reflection of the wider architectural world?


So what can we do?

I feel we are going through a massive step in world history; that we are living in the network age. We have the technology to communicate like we never could before and with this some amazing things are happening. Concerned people around the world are starting to question what way this world is being used, with this they are finding that there are some unhealthy social, economic and political systems that are not making our world more peaceful and sustainable.
More people are becoming informed and with that more are starting to take action- “another world is possible” one that is sustainable, peaceful and fun

Communication is the key to all this, spreading the ideas.
Unfortunately though, EASA so far, has not embraced these changes.

We could communicate more, we could be more creative; we could do more exciting things. It is great that we come together for the 2 weeks of the summer, but wouldn’t it be great if we did things all year?


easa.antville.org
EASA`s first european architectural event, was an attempt to get us to DO something positive for European car free day, to recognise that it is a major issue we have to deal with. In Dublin we “reclaimed the streets” and partied.
These can be major fun events
In 1989, 150 people in berlin danced FOR tolerance, respect and communication between nations, 10 years later and there was 1.5million people dancing on the streets of berlin,

and it fu**ing rocked, bigtime


easa.antville.org
a European Baraka screening, was attempted on tuesday the 10th of December, whereby we would all show the film in our own universities at sunset and communicate after on the website. It did not happen

How progressive is EASA?
easa.antville.org
“EASA should become a network” was the advice Don Foresta gave us last year, did we listen?
A network is a community that lives, evolves, creates, plays, and communicates both in the real and the virtual worlds together. By utilizing today’s technology there is no end to what we could do, its there for us to play with, why are we so slow to experiment with what we can do and push things to their limits

“sustainable living” what will be our findings, will we want to improve things? How will we improve things?
Fun is a very powerful force, so to is money, if its cheaper to build eco and its greener, then why are so few doing it?


easa.antville.org
The most important issue to address in this eco discussion is- people and cities. Mankind is moving into the urban like never before, cities are sprouting up in south east asia. There has never been a more important time to explore and make real the idea of “eco cities”

Last Easter some Bosnian students had the vision to develop a workshop around this question. Workshops were done, an exhibition was put into the state art gallery and an the initial steps of an going process were put into place. We are not sure how well things have progressed but expect to hear from the Bosnian team tonight.


easa.antville.org
personally I am very excited living in the world today, there are great challenges, but in facing them comes great experiences, great people, great memories.
Some of us are doing what we can do to make this world more sustainable, peaceful and fun

We ask you to get involved and do what you can.

We all experience life on this world in a different way, make yours whatever you want it to be…

posted by duncan
Sun, 03 Aug 2003 12:32:38 GMT