Summary: Can we return to the primitive? Miles Olson on personal rewilding. Asoka Bandarage on "middle way" out of collapse. Organic grow and cook w. Barbara Damrosch of Four Season Farm. Replay of Radio Ecoshock 130612 1 hour Could you leave civilization and survive? Are we permanently plugged in? I'm Alex Smith Welcome to a mixed bag of greens this week. You'll hear Sri-Lankan-American author Ashoka Banadarage's solutions for collapse, and a classic conversation from the four seasons garden to your dinner table, with one of America's best known organic growers, Barbara Damrosch. But first we try to escape from the voices of society, with author and "professional dropout" Miles Olson, from the Mother Earth News Fair. Listen to/download this Radio Ecoshock Show in CD Quality (56 MB) or Lo-Fi 14 MB Or Listen on Soundcloud right now! MILES OLSON The following description is blatantly stolen from the Mother Earth News Fair blurb, for June 1st & 2nd in Pyallup, Washington. "How to Walk Away from Civilization Miles Olson is an author, teacher and "professional dropout" who has spent the past decade living in the woods of Vancouver Island. Workshop Description Ever wondered what it would be like to head to the hills and try to live off the fat of the land, outside the normal routine of modern life? Author Miles Olson shares his experiences, reflections and musings in rewilding, based on a decade of living intimately with the land and building a "feral homestead" on Vancouver Island. Other Workshops Fire by Friction How to Make a Folded Basket Speaker Bio Miles Olson is an author, teacher and 'professional dropout' who has spent the past decade living in the woods of Vancouver Island. His experiences have put him at the forefront of the rewilding movement and given him a unique perspective on the relationship between humans and wildness. As you'll discover in the interview, Miles struck a long-standing cord with me. As fate would have it, my family owned part of an island in Northern Ontario. I spent two months there, for my first 17 years, without electricity or really much connection to, or news from, the outside world. We seldom wore shoes, and spent a lot of time in the water, like amphibians. Then in the late 1970's, I went "back to the land" - again in a distant cabin with no electricity for 10 years. So I understood intuitively what Miles Olsen was telling us - about the voices of civilization we all carry in our heads, and what happens when those instructions and demands go silent. Nature awaits our consciousness, but it's not easy making the transition. If you do, it's just as hard to come "back". The traffic and structured chaos of cities can feel so un-natural. Miles chose to develop a homestead "squat" outside a town on Vancouver Island, with a few like-minded people. He didn't get the standard job and house. Yet somehow he wrote the book "Unlearn, Rewild: Earth Skills, Ideas and Inspiration for the Future Primitive" from New Society publishers. If Miles Olson writes as lucidly as he talks, this should be a worth-while book. I felt the spark from him, as we met for the first time on radio, at the Mother Earth News Fair. Listen to/download my interview with Miles Olson (24 minutes) in CD Quality or Lo-Fi ASOKA BANDARAGE You know our environment, species, climate and economy are flirting with collapse. It's global, and needs global eyes. Last week we played a reading by Asoka Bandarage. Now it's time to speak with her. Is it possible we could be organic, solar-powered humans, and still destroy the ecology of the world? Is there an inner destructive force we need to examine, and change, in order to evolve, or even to survive? Asoka Bandarage is the author of the new book, "Sustainability and Well-Being: The Middle Path to Environment, Society and the Economy" published by Palgrave MacMillan. Asoka Bandarage (Yale Ph.D.) is the author of numerous publications in the fields of global political economy, environment, population, women's
