Blog
Welcome to the new Yale Forum Blog!
We will be sharing a variety of original content including interviews, reviews, reports from the field, new and enhanced resources on the Forum website, content from our new video podcast series, FORE Spotlights, and much more.
Check back every Tuesday and Thursday for new content.
This year, Orion Magazine is celebrating 40 years of bringing rich and meaningful environmental writing to our world. Their celebration will consist of an online event, a silent auction, and a book contest from Ecco/Harper Collins.
The online event is free and open to all and will take place on June 14 at 6pm EST. You can register for it here. According to the event site, the online event will consist of appearances by Margaret Atwood, Rebecca Solnit, Vanessa Nakate, Jane Goodall, Camille T. Dungy, Jeff...
This week, Spotlights features a clip from our episode with Rev. Dr. Christopher Carter, Assistant Professor of Theology and Religious Studies at the University of San Diego and a commissioned Elder within the United Methodist Church. In this clip, he discusses his notion of black veganism, particularly in light of his new book, The Spirit of Soul Food: Race, Faith, & Food Justice (University of Illinois Press, 2021).
Details for the full episode can be found here.
You can watch the clip below or listen...
In honor of the Vernal Equinox this coming Sunday, we'd like to share two Chinese poems, one an ancient Tang poem and a more recent offering from the 20th century, expressing the tenderness of spring.
Spring Dawn
Meng Haoran 689/91-740, trans. Shawn Powrie
Sleeping in on a spring morn — sensing not the dawn,
Everywhere is heard the tweeting of the bird,
Come night and the wind-rain sound,
Unknown how many petals fell to...
This week’s episode of spotlights features Rev. Dr. Christopher Carter, an Assistant Professor of Theology and Religious Studies at the University of San Diego and a commissioned Elder within the United Methodist Church. Reflecting on his new book, The Spirit of Soul Food: Race, Faith, & Food Justice (University of Illinois Press, 2021), he discusses the profound importance of subverting industrial agriculture and creating food sovereign communities. He talks about soul food, the history of agriculture in the United States,...
In February, we shared news of the Faith and Climate Change event happening in Charleston, North Carolina, hosted by the Charleston Interreligious Council. That event took place last week, and three of the presentations that occurred during the event were recorded, and are now available to stream:
Keynote Speech: “The Integration of Ecospirituality and Ecojustice”
Mary Evelyn Tucker & John Grim, Yale University
...
This is a clip from our episode featuring Aaron Weiss, PhD, Adjunct Professor of Philosophy and Religion at the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco, CA. He discusses the portability of Buddhism across cultures, as it has moved across landscapes and communities since its inception in ancient India. Important questions of cultural diffusion and cultural appropriation comes up along the way.
Details for the full episode are here.
You can watch the episode below or listen to it here.
...
In honor of International Women's Day next week, we wanted to highlight some newly available resources in the area of ecofeminism and ecowomanism.
First, we wanted to let everyone know that we've added a new playlist to the Forum YouTube channel: Ecofeminism & Ecowomanism. This playlist contains videos of Vandana Shiva, Melanie Harris, Rosemary Ruether, and many more. We frequently add new content to our playlists, so check back periodocally for additional offerings. ...
This week's episode of Spotlights is a clip from our interview with Norman Wirzba, PhD, the Gilbert T. Rowe Distinguished Professor of Theology at Duke University, and Senior Fellow at Duke's Kenan Institute for Ethics. He reflects on the problematic assumptions of transhumanism and the importance of discerning the appropriate limits of technological and economic development. It is a timely topic, as this year (2022) marks the 50th anniversary of The Limits to Growth (1972), a report commissioned by the Club...
The 5th Annual James Sawers Jr. Interfaith Speaker Series will be held on March 3-5, 2022, and the keynote speakers this year are Mary Evelyn Tucker and John Grim. The events will be held in-person at the College of Charleston (various locations) and the Unitarian Church in Charleston (4 Archdale St.). But these events will also be accessible online via Zoom. It is free and open to all.
On March 3...
This week’s episode of Spotlights features Madeline Stevens, a graduate student in the Environmental Studies program at the University of Montana. She talks about the interdisciplinary work being done in her program as well as her personal and professional engagement with the intersection of religion and the environment, including the thesis she is completing on the relationship between faith and environmental education. We talk about the relationship between science and religion, Evangelical Christianity, curriculum development, personal transformation,...