We face a serious global challenge with over half the world's population living in urban environments — mostly disconnected from the natural world. This represents a key element of the serious economic, social and environmental crises looming today. Osprey Orielle Lake, a lifelong advocate for the environment and cultural transformation, weaves together history, science, culture, governance, spirituality, and the arts to map out an integrated approach to working in partnership with nature while creating a more just and sustainable future. Lake argues that "a culture or civilization bereft of its connection to nature will not be sustainable — the decades since Rachel Carson wrote Silent Spring have clearly shown us this. We will need to reconnect with the rhythms of the natural world in contemporary society to generate inner and outer resilience, and to move through the uncertain times ahead."
Lake offers a frank inquiry into a variety of causes leading to our current global peril and also provides a deep well of hope and profound insight. Each chapter poetically emerges from a specific geographical region and, with the lively tone of place-based literature, creates a tapestry composed of personal experiences, nature writing, environmental awareness and cultural criticism. Incorporating historical and contemporary voices from many fields of endeavor, Lake encourages people to understand the legacy of information we already possess.
Uprisings delves into a new kinship with nature while acknowledging the treasures of urban life and the unique and valuable stake each person has in resolving critical and timely challenges. Whether you are a parent, an activist, a healthcare professional, a newcomer to recycling, a politician, a lover of nature writing, an historian, or searching for recovery from apathy or hopelessness, consider this book required reading!
Osprey Orielle Lake is the Founder and Executive Director of the Women's Earth and Climate Action Network (WECAN) International dedicated to accelerating a global women's climate justice movement. She works nationally and internationally with grassroots, frontline and Indigenous leaders and policy-makers to promote climate justice, resilient communities and a just transition to a decentralized, democratized energy future. She serves on the Global Alliance for the Rights of Nature Executive Committee, is the Co-Director of the Indigenous Women's Divestment Delegations, and actively leads WECAN's advocacy, policy and campaign work in areas such as Women for Forests, Divestment and Just Transition, Indigenous Rights, a Feminist Agenda for a Green New Deal, and UN Forums. Osprey is the author of the award-winning book, "Uprisings for the Earth: Reconnecting Culture with Nature".
"Uprisings for the Earth creates new, vibrant ground that holds within it keys to finding our way to a meaningful and vital relationship with the natural world in modern civilization. Osprey Orielle Lake's unique, personal, and inspiring perspective on current and historical events makes us proud to be human as we search for self-responsibility and renewal while defying apathy and cynicism. Her book presents a philosophy that is both rich in nature poetics and filled with good sense. Within compelling and dynamic verse, Lake makes a call to discover and uphold what she has named an 'Earth etiquette'. This is a call we need to answer, and Lake makes us thrilled to do it." - Riane Eisler, author The Chalice and The Blade and The Real Wealth of Nations
"Seeing both the peril and the promise of this moment in time, Osprey Orielle Lake brings us stories infused with her passion for life. Like winds off the mountains, they renew our energy and summon our will to rise up together for the sake of Earth." - Joanna Macy, author World as Lover, World as Self
"If you are searching for your 'ground of being' in these turbulent times, this is the book to read. Osprey Orielle Lake shares with us how to listen to the natural world in our midst and offers some penetrating philosophical nuggets, while tantalizing us occasionally with her poetic flare. The result is a healthy dose of wisdom and a dynamic process for renewing our cultural narrative in a time of societal and environmental change. Uprisings for the Earth is the kind of ecological literacy we need today." - Tony Clarke, co-author Blue Gold and author Tar Sands Showdown
"Uprisings for the Earth is a book for leaders and for those who feel the call to lead in this historic moment. The unity of Earth's biological functioning has been broken, and thus all intelligent humans are united in a search for planetary healing. What you will experience in Uprisings for the Earth you will experience nowhere else." - Brian Swimme, California Institute of Integral Studies, co-author The Universe Story with Thomas Berry
"This book gives us a deep understanding of how the current course we are on has led to our dire planetary predicament and what we can do to change it. As an artist and advocate for the Earth, using personal experience and reflection, Lake offers a refreshing perspective on our capacity for intimacy with rivers, forests, mountains, valleys and each other in a time of environmental crisis. This thoughtful book presents a necessary and urgent call to action, cogent advice for all those who wish to be engaged in healing a culture disconnected from nature and in caring for our future." - Susan Griffin, author Wrestling with the Angel of Democracy and Woman and Nature
"In these times of great economic, political and environmental dislocation, Osprey Orielle Lake's Uprisings for the Earth challenges us to rise to the call of history and recommit ourselves individually and collectively, to creating a safe and sustainable future and that we do it with joy and laughter and love and awe and celebration!" - Belvie Rooks, Growing a Global Heart
