Reaching Into the Universe Dedicated to creating an enlightened world: spiritually fulfilling, physically healthy, socially just, and environmentally sustainable.

Event: Conversation with Chris Rainier

A friend remembered my post about language preservation & sustainability and pointed me to this upcoming lecture at the California Academy of Sciences:

Chris Rainier
In Conversation With Mary Ellen Hannibal
Enduring Voices – All Roads Photography
Documentary Photographer – National Geographic

Wednesday April 6th 2011, Herbst Theatre

Rainer is the photographer for National Geographic's Enduring Voices project, a multi-year effort that strives to research and revitalize the world’s most endangered languages. Every fourteen days... a language goes extinct on Earth and with it humanity loses all of the oral knowledge of the local people and their environmental history to include ethnobotany, biodiversity and their relationships to the land which sprang from centuries old indigenous traditions. Much of what humans know about nature is encoded only in oral languages. Indigenous groups that have interacted closely with the natural world for thousands of years often have profound insights into local lands, plants, animals, and ecosystems—many of which are still undocumented by science. Studying indigenous languages therefore benefits environmental understanding and conservation efforts.

Tickets are $20.

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