Last Tuesday I heard the Keynote Speaker for this year’s Humanities Symposium, James Howard Kunstler. He has written many books about cities and also had the privilege of interviewing Jane Jacobs, who is the author of this year’s Humanities Symposium book. Mr. Kunstler started off his talk telling us about how oil is a global as well as national problem and how we also need to start looking out for natural gas. The constant climate change does not help the situation. We are importing 2/3 of our oil, importing more and more each year and using less and less of our own. I found it quite fascinating America uses 7 billion barrels of oil each year. He stressed that we must start negotiating and compromising with ourselves and the countries around us.

Mr. Kunstler also spoke to us about how cities have to make arrangements for the change in economy we are going to face. He said the larger cities are going to be the cities that fall apart and the smaller more remote cities are the cities that are going to flourish. Coastal cities are also going to benefit from these changes. Cities are going to have to make arrangements for things such as retail commerce, trade, education, how they will make things, and food. Food is going to become a serious problem for us. We are going to have to downscale and rescale everything, we must contract and become more local. We will have to get used to worrying about where we are and staying rather than where we are traveling to. We must produce more food close to home and use less energy. Building design is going to become very important.

I also had the opportunity to watch the Sankofa African Dance Theatre perform last (Tuesday) night. Being a dancer myself I absolutely loved the experience. Their use of drums with the dancing was amazing. I find it fascinating the way African American Theatre dance is performed, the way they make use of every part of their body. I loved watching their performance, and was upset when it ended so quickly.

Whether we notice it or not, our emotions affect the emotions of others. I feel that the emotions in both of Walt Whitman’s poems reflects the emotion that was put in the African dancing. Walt Whitman’s poems are about the appreciation for life and the human body. “I Sing the Body Electric” in particular reflects an enormous appreciation for every part of the human body. African dancing is about using each part of the body and exaggerating the way that each part moves. African dancers have a huge appreciation for the body they have been given and use their talents to not only perform for others but to participate in ritualistic movements of their ancestors.

Another theme of Walt Whitman’s poems is an appreciation for life in general. We are all made uniquely and given talents to be used and shown to others. The Sankofa dancers spoke about their appreciation for life and how they show it through their dancing. I feel that Mr. Kunstler’s talk was the complete opposite. Instead of embracing life, the world, and what has happened to us he gave us thousands of things that are wrong with it and how we have to change each one. Instead of embracing what we have, he pointed out what we don’t have.

In John McCluckey’s “Lush Life” he tells us the story of a traveling band. Sankofa African Dance Theatre is a traveling group with dancers and drums, so instantly I realized a connection between the two. Earl (the leader of the band) and his band travel to many different cities and have the opportunity to touch many lives through their performing. I know from personal experience that the Sankofa African Dance Theatre touches lives in all the cities that they travel to in a positive way, like Earl and his band. Also from personal experience I know that Mr. Kunstler also touches the lives of those he speaks to. Depending on your personal opinions, you can take what he has to say as a positive situation or a negative situation, it is all about perspective.

The way we look at situations in life many times affects how other people view the situations. Each day we touch people’s lives, it may be directly or indirectly, and many times we may not even realize it. In Walt Whitman’s poems I felt a great sense of joy and appreciation for the human body and life, the same way I felt when I watched the Sankofa African Dance Theatre Performance. Earl and his band travel from city to city and touch many lives, the same way Sankofa African Dance Theatre and Mr. Kunstler did. Personal expression and emotion is many times expressed in ways that affect the people around us. From reading Walt Whitman’s poems and “Lush Life” and seeing the Sankofa African Dance Theatre perform as well as hearing Mr. Kunstler speak I know that first hand. It makes me stop and think about what I may be saying and/or doing that could affect other people’s thoughts or feelings. Hopefully they are as positive as what I felt during the Sankofa performance.