PROPOSAL FOR ONLINE COURSE IN PARTNERSHIP

Course Title: Gaia, Eros, and Arcology

Description of Course:

We cannot build a utopian society without a new relationship with Gaia, the Planet Earth. In order to have this essential balance between humanity and the planet, building a foundation of partnership is necessary so that the feminine side of human nature can influence world affairs in positive directions. This course will explore how to create a partnership society as well as look for reasons why it has been so difficult in the past to create a world based on love. Finally, we will visualize life in an arcology—the fusion of ecology and architecture—as a way to eliminate many of our pressing global/local problems facing humanity in the 21st Century.

Course Objectives:

1. To obtain this goal we will look at ways of thinking about the planet that liberate the human consciousness versus those that isolate and alienate the human spirit. Looking at the ancient mythos that civilization was founded upon helps to understand the reason for our present unbalanced social and cosmological relationships.

2. We will discuss the importance of co-creating civilization based on partnership, not domination and authoritarianism, by asking the question: how do we create a partnership society that liberates our genius, talents, and skills so that we can begin to construct a better reality that is ecological sustainable as well as one which brings awe, beauty, and wonder back into our lives?

3. Vital to answering this question, we will look at the way the extant environment has shaped our past, how patriarchal religions have shaped the topography, and how a feminist vision of social and physical architecture could shape our future in positive ways by building a new architectural design. Students should come away from the course with an understanding of archetypes in art and architecture and new forms of city designs that could create a peace-loving world on this planet and beyond.

Book Recommendations (3-5) [name, author, publisher, date of publication]:

Conscious Evolution, by Barbara Marx Hubbard, New World Library Publishers, 1998.

The Reinvention of Work by Matthew Fox, Harper Collins Publishers, 1994.

The Symbiotic Planet by Lynn Margulis, Basic Books Publishers, 1998.

The Urban Ideal by Paolo Soleri,: Berkeley Hills Books Publishers, 2001.

The Chalice and the Blade: Our History, Our Future, by Eisler, Riane, HarperCollins Publishers, 1987.

Lessons (10 lessons with 3 topics each):

1) Introduction: The Purpose of Education in the 21st Century.
Topic A. Our current megacrisis
Topic B. Transforming the global shopping mall
Topic C. A Neutopian (a good society) alternative

2) Neutopia: A Feminist Theory of Architecture
Topic A. Division of Space
Topic B. Women’s Role in History
Topic C. Women and the Architectural Profession

3) Architectural Archetypes
Topic A. The Earliest Dwellings
Topic B. Archetypal Theory
Topic C. Megalithic Architecture

4) The Failure of Modern Architecture and the Vision of Ecocities
Topic A. The Rule of Symmetry and Slavery of Market Forces
Topic B. Ecocities and Arcologies
Topic C. The Need for a Lovolution (non-violent world transformation)

5) How Children Visualize Home: The Study of an Archetype
Topic A. The Native Americas and the American Dream House
Topic B. Children’s Drawing Patterns and Universal Symbolic Language
Topic C. Logos, Mythos, Archetypes, and Art

6) The Function of Evolutionary Love
Topic A. The Ways of Aphrodite and Eros
Topic B. Poetry as Evolutionary Leader
Topic C. From Homo Sapiens to Gaia Sapiens: Forming a One World Mind

7) Archetypes in Feminist Spirituality: Virgin Mother and the Divine Crone
Topic A. Divine Role of the Crone
Topic B. The Relationship Between the Hera and the Hero
Topic C. Mother Mary and Mary Magdalene

8) World-Arranging Beauty
Topic A. Hierarchical Estate Model, Communal Village Model, and the Holarchy
Topic B. Parapsychology and the Healing Powers of Gaia
Topic C. The Love Magicians and the End of History and War

9) The Information Lovolution
Topic A. Cyberspace and Education
Topic B. Neutopian Transversity: From Civilization to Soulization
Topic C. The Creation of Gaian Rituals

10) The Trouble with Autocratic Architecture:
A Cocreative Look at Paolo Soleri’s Arcosanti Project
Topic A. Social Architecture as Part of the Arcosanti Project
Topic B. The Politics of Arcology
Topic C. Sexual architecture within an Arcology

Biography:

Libby Hubbard received her doctorate from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in Future Studies. Subsequently, she moved to Arcosanti, Arizona to work with Paolo Soleri in developing his Paradox Project, a project with the goal of bringing together cyberspace and his theory of arcology (ecological architecture). Since leaving Arcosanti, she has been studying computer graphics and web design. Dr. Hubbard has presented her ideas on partnership, Gaia, and arcology at many international conferences.

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