| TNS Events | | Mar 16: Sarah Hobson
Working with Women in Sub-Saharan Africa
~NEW DATE~
TNS End of Life Conversation
May 1: Frank Ostaseki
Being a Compassionate Companion
June 12: Jean Shinoda Bolen, Francesca Zambello, and Kristina Flanagan Goddess-Archetypes in the Ring Cycle and in Us: Psychological, Political, and Spiritual Parallels -------------
Visit our website for more information.
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Art Exhibitions
| Feb 5 - Apr 15 Site-Specific:
A Retrospective by
Corrie McCluskey
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| TNS Online | NEW Podcasts
Gregory Orr The Blessing: Poetry as Survival (Recorded Feb 11) Dr. Margaret Kripke Environmental Cancer Risk: What We Can Do Now (Recorded Feb 7) Dr. Stuart Lord East-West Contemplative Education at Naropa University (Recorded Feb 1) Dr. Kai Lee Compass and Gyroscope: Integrating Science and Politics for the Environment (Recorded Dec 31) Eric Karpeles
The Last Threshold: Artists and Mortality
(Recorded Dec 5) Scott Eberle, MD, Rob Feraru, and Susan Braun The Final Crossing: Learning to Die in Order to Live (Recorded Nov 12) See our website
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The New School
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 Dear New School Friends,
A Tunisian fruit vendor, cursed by a municipal inspector, douses himself with gasoline and lights a match. A conflagration of democratic yearnings explodes across the Arab world. Even China feels the heat. In less than three weeks, the world is transformed. The uprisings spread via social media - Facebook and Twitter.
Once dictators had to control the airport and the television station. Now they need to find the off switch for the Internet. The Internet is a classic example of what is called a "disruptive technology" - a technology that changes everything.
These social network revolutionaries seek (at least) to be nonviolent. Who wrote the handbook for these new nonviolent revolutionaries? Who connected them to the legacies of Tolstoy, Gandhi, and Martin Luther King?
Gene Sharpe, an obscure elderly American social theorist, writing from his home in East Boston, first inspired Eastern European democracy activists. They connected via the Internet with the young planners of the uprising in Egypt. The amazing story is on the BBC.
Personal acts often appear to have no power to change the world. But the Tunisian fruit vendor's act of self-immolation reverberated across the Internet and changed everything. And Gene Sharp's reflections on effective nonviolent tactics against despots spread from Eastern Europe to North Africa.
We cannot know what will become of these new pro-democracy revolutionaries as they seek to follow the path of Tolstoy, Gandhi, and Martin Luther King. We do know that the aspiration for justice, freedom, and and a decent life is universal. It never dies. Poets, fruit vendors, obscure old men, and young men and women willing to risk their lives keep hope alive.
Keeping hope alive is what The New School is about. Thanks for being a part of it.
Michael Lerner
Commonweal Co-Founder
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 Wednesday, March 16, 2pm-4pm
Conversation with Sarah Hobson
Working with Women in Sub-Saharan Africa
Sarah Hobson is a writer, documentary film-maker, and foundation director. A West Marin resident, Hobson is author of Through Iran in Disguise and executive director of New Field Foundation, which supports rural women creating change in sub-Saharan Africa. Hobson previously served as executive director of International Development Exchange (IDEX), partnering with community organizations in Asia, Africa, and Latin America on grassroots economic development. She is founder and trustee of Open Channels, a British nonprofit working with indigenous peoples in Africa to define their lands, resources, and rights. Hobson is author, contributor, and editor of eight books and producer of many documentaries for television. She is a mother and grandmother, with a strong sense of the critical issues facing the world today.
RSVP to the New School at thenewschool@commonweal.org.
Please carpool! Check our rideshare page to offer or search for a ride to the event (password: thenewschool). |
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TNS End of Life Conversations Series
Co-presented by The New School and The Coastal Health Alliance
 Sunday, May 1, 2pm-4pm
Frank Ostaseski
Being a Compassionate Companion
Caring for people who are dying can be an intense, intimate, and deeply alive experience. It often challenges our most basic beliefs. It is a journey of continuous discovery, requiring courage and flexibility. We learn to open, take risks, and forgive constantly. Taken as a practice of awareness, it can reveal both our deep clinging and our capacity to embrace another person's suffering as our own. This conversation will aim at supporting professionals or those caring for family members or friends facing life-threatening illness.
In 1987, Frank Ostaseski helped form the Zen Hospice Project, the first Buddhist hospice in America. In 2004, he created Metta Institute to broaden this work and seed the culture with innovative approaches to end-of-life care that reaffirm the spiritual dimensions of dying. A primary project of Metta Institute is the End-of-Life Care Practitioner Program that Frank leads with faculty members Ram Dass, Rachel Naomi Remen, MD, and many others.
RSVP to the New School at thenewschool@commonweal.org.
Please carpool! Check our rideshare page to offer or search for a ride to the event (password: thenewschool). |
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No degrees, grades, or homework - we're a new kind of school, a community of inquiry exploring topics in health, the arts and sciences, the environment, and the inner life.
The New School at Commonweal presents conversations, book readings, performances, and other events with thought and action leaders who are changing our world. The events, almost 100 over the past four years, are recorded and then offered as podcasts on iTunes and our website. Most of our events are offered free of charge as gifts to the Commonweal community - and you are part of it - giving forward into a circle of generosity.
Kyra Epstein
The New School Coordinator
TheNewSchool@Commonweal.org
www.The-New-School.org
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