URBNANCE
Urban human-nature resonance for sustainability transformation
Introduction to the URBNANCE-Blog
This blog by the URBNANCE Leibniz-Junior Research Group addresses various actors interested in resonating human-nature connections in cities and beyond. The blog deals with current scientific, societal, and political debates about the social-ecological crisis and its implications for (re-)connecting cities and urban dwellers with nonhuman nature. Furthermore, on this blog, we explore ideas and personal experiences to strengthen our external and internal connections with nonhuman nature in our daily lives. In this regard, we reflect on various relations we hold with nonhuman nature and how we do (not) consider her unavailability, dignity, sentience, intelligence, autonomy, and intrinsic value. We reflect on past, current, and potential future events in our modern lifeworld that disturb the normalization of unsustainable habits and mindsets. In particular, we are interested in responses that strengthen a human-nature partnership so that all living beings can flourish.
Maybe you would like to tell us if and why our posts touched you, or you even have the impulse to share your personal experiences with external or internal transformations towards a resonating human-nature relationship as well? You are welcome to respond to our posts or contribute to the blog with your essay in collaboration with us.
Categories: Resonance values | Food | Psychology | Politics and society | Art | Own research | City | Human-nature partnership
Febrary 2024
by Philip Harms and Maeve Hofer
Introduction
What defines a good partnership? In a positive partnership, we are committed to each other, support each other and give each other attention ...
January 2024
by Susanne Müller
Introduction
Current debates in sustainability science are ...
December 2023
by Maike Hering
I've spent the last five days on a ferry journey through the Amazon rainforest eagerly awaiting the right moment to begin writing this essay ...
October 2023
by Martina Artmann
Who hasn't experienced this?
It's a balmy summer evening, you happen to meet a few old friends and get lost in exciting conversation until the wee hours of the morning. ...
June 2023
by Susanne Müller
A personal expression of my individual human-nature-resonance
Patagonia – a place for resonant relationships?
June 2023
by Maike Hering
How it comes to an essay about resonance in Chilean Patagonia
I started working as a research assistant for the URBNANCE project in Dresden in August 2022 and only a few days after the beginning ...
Humbleness towards the Unverfügbarkeit of sleep -
About cycles, sleep rituals and Mother Earth
May 2023
by Susanne Müller
Surely it happens not only to me again and again that I lie in bed in the evening and think "Wow, beds are definitely amongst the best inventions in the world"...
February 2023
by Susanne Müller
Humans never cease to impress me with their intelligence in developing engineering skills with millimeter precision, which then creates telephone lines across continents and oceans ...
Lending nature our voice - role play in search of partnerships with nature
November 2022
by Philip Harms
Today, crises and interwoven dystopian visions of the future often dominate the news. In this essay, we turn the page and share ideas for a positive future!
Admittedly, futures can be many ...
Moving from crisis to resonance: A summer cinema
October 2022
by Philip Harms, Susanne Müller, Mabel Killinger and Martina Artmann
Films tell stories, they touch and move their audience. In this vein, the summer cinema offered the opportunity to experience nature, care about her, and be touched by her beauty ...
The need for self-efficacy in times of powerlessness.
Caring for nature in the city.
September 2022
by Mabel Killinger
At the beginning of August I was confronted with a small piece of paper at the door of my apartment building: "Dear Neighbors, The young trees on the Johannstadt Elbwiesen still urgently need our help. ...
The unavailability of the own voice.
What does Amos really want to "say"?
July 2022
by Mabel Killinger
To engage in a resonant relation with another entity may it be another human being, an animal or an object, Rosa points out that oneself has to acknowledge, see and most of all listen to the opposites own voice. Thereby, said voice also holds unavailability as another prerequisite of ...
June 2022
by Susanne Müller
Hardly any other German writer is able to touch his readers through his writings as much as Hermann Hesse (1877-1962), winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature. Whether through his strongly autobiographical works ...
First insights on human-food relations through the interaction with urban dwellers in Dresden
May 2022
by Mabel Killinger
Have you ever taken the time to think about the relation you hold with the food you eat every day, with the food nature is providing us human beings, the food which is grown for us by other members of society? ...
May 2022
by Martina Artmann
Talking with the deer and rabbits
Cooking with the moon and the stars
Flowing in being, vibrating with the divine feminine
Infinite power and wisdom in our veins
The sparkle in my eyes shows of eternity
We are born in the light and by the fire ...
Responsive relationships: The treasure of vulnerability
April 2022
by Susanne Müller
Responsive relationships – like the sociologist Hartmut Rosa describes them in his resonance theory published in 2016 – may exist in every context and between different creatures. Whilst an accelerating and more-and-more demanding economic system is claimed ...
January 2022
by Susanne Müller
A human being has a soul. Does every being have a soul? What about a dog? Isn’t a dog a being in whom a soul lives? And what about a horse that according to studies seeks a deep and intense contact towards human beings, comparable to a mother’s loving contact to human beings, comparable to a mother’s loving contact for her newborn child? ...
Christmas ‒ eating in the spirit of the feast of love?
December 2021
by Martina Artmann and Mabel Killinger
In a few days is Christmas and if the current COVID-19 pandemic situation allows, families come together to celebrate the festival of love. Christmas is also the feast of stuffed bellies when tables are richly set with hearty dishes and sweet Christmas cookies. ...
Nurturing our relation with nature and ourselves in the dark season
December 2021
by Martina Artmann
With the last months of the year, the days get shorter, darker, and cooler again here in Germany. This time of the year might feel for many of us like having the demand for more quietness, sleep, and introspective while in summer we are more active and playful ...