Deep Process: Cohousing and Deep Democracy
Lisa Poley
Cohousing communities are serving as ‘school houses’ for profoundly rich forms of democratic engagement with significant potential for fostering social change in the broader civic arena beyond their boundaries. This session will raise awareness of how living in cohousing may impact our civic and democratic skills and practices. Participants will learn how to help build the skills and capacities that increase our power and potential as citizens in a democracy. In this particularly dynamic election season, how is your community experiencing democracy beyond its boundaries?
Dr. Lisa Poley is a founding member of Shadowlake Village Cohousing in Blacksburg, Virginia and recently completed her doctoral research which focused on democratic and civic engagement and cohousing. She is currently a post-doctoral scholar at Virginia Tech teaching and researching in the areas of community development, democracy building and sustainability.
Related pages: Group Process
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One I hated to miss...
Maybe next year I'll find a way to be multiple places at once - or maybe we'll find more ways to capture and share more.
In 2006, Lisa shared some of her doctoral work via a poster in the exhibit area - I really appreciated it (as those who were at the 2008 Conference Plenary might expect given the Cohousing Census content). I highly value our attempts to add some "objective" information to help us understand more about who we are. It has the added benefit for the movement of providing validation and support for the value of the cohousing form of community building.
I'm seeing life at Songaia having profound affects on our residents and their interest/engagement in the democratic processes in our broader neighborhood, the workplace, and social change. Its an exciting thing to witness and be a part of.
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