City dweller on a leaf
hi-a-tus: noun 2. a : an interruption in time or continuity : break; especially : a period when something (as a program or activity) is suspended or interrupted <after a 5-year hiatus from writing>
Yep, I've been on one of those -- a hiatus. The old Nature's Call blog sat idle for most of the past 18 months while I finished my master's degree in Ecological Teaching & Learning at Lesley University, Cambridge, Mass. The program has left me with an even stronger belief that it is way beyond time to create an ecologically literate citizenry, and it has brought me new knowledge and skills to share in pursuing this endeavor.
For example, I have re-discovered that I can draw, and also that most people can, if they take the time to sit and look -- really look -- at their subject. But that is fodder for a later post. Today, I launch the new name for this blog project: The Urban Naturalist.
Who or what is an urban naturalist? Well, I think we all should be. The Population Reference Bureau (prb.org) says that in 2008, 50 percent of the world's population lived in cities. That figure takes into account all countries, economically developed and not. The percentage of people living in cities rises to 74 percent when considering only people living in developed countries ( a term we will explore here at some future date).
Certainly, there are people in our country who work to live completely off the grid, but most of us rely on items that come from cities -- some of them cities halfway around the globe from us. Even people who live in seemingly rural areas and fancy themselves to be "country" folks depend on urban areas for goods and services (like medical care and schools).
Urban areas aren't the enemy. They are us. And that's OK -- natural, even. Naturalists study ecosystems, and urban areas are ecosystems too.
When we think of studying ecology, we think of birdies and bugs and flowers. But people also are included in ecosystems, as are the communities they build. The word "ecology" means the study ("ology') of home ("ecos"). So if you are a human living in the United States, and you want to be a naturalist who studies the ecology of your place, you're going to be an urban naturalist studying an urban ecology.
So let's move forward from this new definition of my blog and ourselves. Let us learn to see the ecosystems that sustain us and explore how healthy ecosystems work. Only then can we truly assess our relationship with the non-human aspects of our environment. It is time to leave the Industrial Age of our past and look toward the Ecological Age that is our future.
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