“Transportation” has started appearing this past week, the “Waterways” deadline has just passed, and so we’re asking you to consider our May topic for submission of poetry, images, and essays. The deadline for “My Economy” is April 4 and more details are below. Feel free to pass this info along to someone else if you think they’d be interested in the topic. You can send submissions through our online form and you can review our editorial guidelines here. Thank you for your consideration!
1.8: My Economy
Submission deadline: April 4
Publishing dates: May 2-20
The root of the word “economy” suggests “management of a household.” This angle of looking summons Wendell Berry, who says that economy as “the ways of human housekeeping, the ways by which the human household is situated and maintained within the household of nature” is inseparable from religion. In other words, the way we maintain our economies—household and beyond—reflects what we believe, and vice versa.
- How would you describe the economy of your current household, not just in terms of money, but everything that gets used up and produced, that is taken in and sent away? How does the economy of your current household compare to the one in which you grew up?
- What systems of exchange are present in your neighborhood or community apart from money?
- Have you ever bartered for something, bought something on land contract, or used a local currency? What was that experience like?
- If we are truly “caught in an inescapable network of mutuality” as MLK says, how does it re-frame your notion of MY economy?
- What images does economy as “management of a household” or “the ways of human housekeeping” conjure for you, in a way that is different from economics (“the study of money”)?
- If you were to completely re-imagine the economy of your household or neighborhood, what would it look like?
