SIGN UP!  BE LESS THAN YOU CAN BE! – AT 12:52 P.M. ET:  There are times when an academic opportunity presents yourself, and you must respond!  Get this one, from Campus Reform: 

The Portland State University Women’s Studies department will offer a course next semester exploring “ecological feminist spirituality” and the potential for an “ecological revolution.”

“Ecofeminist Spirituality” is a senior-level course taught by Dr. Frodo Okulam, and primarily aims to explore “different forms of ecofeminist spirituality” including “feminist biblical interpretation” as well as “goddesses and spirituality.”

"The insight of Ecofeminism is that the oppression of women and the exploitation of the earth are related."

“The insight of Ecofeminism is that the oppression of women and the exploitation of the earth are related,” Okulam told Campus Reform, adding that “in its least radical form…it would use existing laws to reform our relationship with nature.”

But Okulam also teaches students about other variations of ecofeminism. In a handout she often provides to students, for instance, she explains that there are Socialist Ecofeminism, Radical Ecofeminism, and Spiritual Ecofeminist schools of thought.

The most radical of these, she says, is Socialist Ecofeminism, which “would end the domination of women and nature inherent in the capitalist economy’s exploitation of both” and “transform the structure of power itself.”

Spiritual Ecofeminists would seek “a balance within our ways of knowing, so that neither mind nor body are seen as opposed to one another,” she added. “They do not argue for the primacy of women over men, but against practice of…hierarchical power itself.”

Though Okulam said that next semester’s syllabus isn’t yet ready, a copy of the previous syllabus indicates that the class is a cross between environmental science, biblical studies, and feminist theory.

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July 8,  2018