permaculture

[Graham <grahamburnett@blueyonder.co.uk>]

Thanks for your reply Heather, as well as the personal reply you sent.
I'm sorry that you recieved violent and angry responses to your book, I
hope you don't consider the comments in my review in this way.
Anyway I've attached a link to an article I've written which perhaps
gives a counter-view to the 'permaculture money question'...
http://www.gb0063551.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/money/index.htm

Its good to see the debate raised, although I'm rather lacking in time
and energy at the moment to contribute more fully and actively at this
time - at present I'm busy trying to co-coordinate a permaculture open
day at a community centre in Walthamstow (a very disadvantaged and
multi-ethnic working class area in East London) for which I'm very
unlikely to get paid, as well as a permaculture intro weekend in Holland
park (a very affluent and white middle class area in West London) for
which I DO expect to be paid! 

You mentioned in your personal reply that you "don't think trying to
bring in a living wage as a permaculture instructor is such a
sustainable tactic", I'd say the exact opposite, or at least that trying
to make permaculture teaching PART of a polycultural income is in fact
the only way that most of us CAN be sustainable if we aren't going to
crash and burn very quickly!

I remember a debate on another permaculture list where somebody had
argued that 'all permaculture courses should be free', my response was
that there is no such thing as a 'free' permaculture course, somebody
somewhere is always paying, even if its not the students, it will either
be funded by somebody else (grants the Shell Greenwash fund? tax
payers?) or by the teachers/organisers themselves who will be paying in
terms of their own time/energy/work which is not sustainable in the long
term. 

I've also taught on a 'free' permaculture course that was ostensibly
aimed mainly at working class, non-white women in South london a few
years ago. In fact the course attracted in lots of white, middle class
folks who had found out about the 'free' course and who had a very
diletante attitude, dipping in and out of sessions, turning up late, not
doing the bits of the course they found 'boring' and so on. Some of
these people were far better off financially than I was, and I ended up
feeling quite resentful that I was in fact traveling into London every
week and giving up my time and energy for no return.

Nowadays I prefer to work in set-ups where there is flexibility as
regards payment, that way the better off can subsidise the less well
off, the course costs are met (eg, hiring spaces and rooms, paying for
guest speakers, printing costs, paying for an admin worker, etc, etc),
teachers are paid a reasonable (NOT exhorbitant) rate for their work,
the students get a good deal and are appreciative of what is put in
(rather than having the dilletante attitude I mentioned above), its a
win-win situation all round!

Cheers, Graham

On Sun, 2006-12-24 at 10:49 -0800, Heather Coburn Flores wrote:
> Hi folks. I have been getting an interesting diversity of responses to my 
> commecnts on permaculture in my new book, Food Not Lawns (chelsea green 
> 2006). If you haven't seen it, check out my website at 
> www.foodnotlawns.com/. The book is getting many and excellent reviews, but 
> a few people, fo rwhom i have the utmost respect, are very upset about a 
> few paragraphs in the first chapter, in which I choose to drop the term 
> permaculture from the rest of the text and attempt to explain why. Several 
> people posted angry and malicious messages here, and several others came 
> quickly to my defense. Thank you all for your spirited and heartfelt 
> exchange!
>    
>   Let me say that because of the violent and angry nature of some of the 
> more extreme responses, I will probably change the wording for the next 
> printing. my feelings have not changed, but I wish to clarify my intentions.
>    

-- 
Graham Burnett

Integrated Design for Local Environmental Resources

www.spiralseed.co.uk