Community — The Unbroken Circle

Richard Adams, Watership Down
     Avon, 1976          ISBN 0380002930
      Aphenomenal worldwide bestselling novel, this timeless classic is one of the great books about community. Set in England's Downs, a once idyllic rural landscape, this stirring tale of adventure, courage and survival follows a band of very special creatures on their flight from the intrusion of man and the certain destruction of their home. Led by a stouthearted pair of brothers, they journey forth from their native Sandleford Warren through the harrowing trials posed by predators and adversaries, to a mysterious promised land and a more perfect society.

Christina Baldwin, Calling the Circle: The First and Future Culture
     Bantam Doubleday Dell, 1998          ISBN 0553379003
      Calling The Circle is one of the key resources for the rapidly growing "circle" movement, in which participants gather in a circle, and speak and listen from the heart. Christina Baldwin's extensively revised edition will attract a broad audience, from women's spirituality groups to corporate development teams.

Robert Bellah, et.al., Habits of the Heart: Individualism and Commitment in American Life
     University of California Press, 1996          ISBN 9780520205680
      The authors' antidote to the American sickness — a quest for democratic community that draws on our diverse civic and religious traditions--has contributed to a vigorous scholarly and popular debate. Attention has been focused on forms of social organization, be it civil society, democratic communitarianism, or associative democracy, that can humanize the market and the administrative state. In their new Introduction the authors relate the argument of their book both to the current realities of American society and to the growing debate about the country's future. With this new edition one of the most influential books of recent times takes on a new immediacy.

James Howard Kunstler, Home from Nowhere: Remaking Our Everyday World for the 21st Century
     Free Press, 1998          ISBN 0684837374
      In his landmark book, The Geography of Nowhere, James Howard Kunstler visited the "tragic sprawlscape of cartoon architecture, junked cities, and ravaged countryside" America had become and declared that the deteriorating environment was not merely a symptom of a troubled culture, but one of the primary causes of our discontent.
     In Home from Nowhere Kunstler not only shows that the original American Dream — the desire for peaceful, pleasant places in which to work and live — still has a strong hold on our imaginations, but also offers innovative, eminently practical ways to make that dream a reality. Citing examples from around the country, he calls for the restoration of traditional architecture, the introduction of enduring design principles in urban planning, and the development of public spaces that acknowledge our need to interact comfortable with one another.

Ray Oldenburg, The Great Good Place: Cafes, Coffee Shops, Bookstores, Bars, Hair Salons, and Other Hangouts at the Heart of a Community
     Marlowe & Company, 1999          ISBN 1569246815
      Oldenburg is an urban sociologist from Florida who writes about the importance of informal public gathering places. In his book The Great Good Place, Oldenburg demonstrates why these gathering places are essential to community and public life. He argues that bars, coffee shops, general stores, and other "third places" (in contrast to the first and second places of home and work), are central to local democracy and community vitality. By exploring how these places work and what roles they serve, Oldenburg offers placemaking tools and insight for individuals and communities everywhere.

Margaret Wheatley, Turning to One Another: Simple Conversations to Restore Hope to the Future
     Berrett-Koehler Pub, 2002          ISBN 1576751457
      This book — devoted entirely to centrality of conversation in healing everything from personal relationships to organizational dysfunction to world discord — flows so broadly and easily across the borders of genre or topic it's almost as though Margaret Wheatley intuited when writing it how the need for its message would soon skyrocket.

Practicalities

Dan Chiras and Dave Wann, Superbia!: 31 Ways to Create Sustainable Neighborhoods
     New Society Publishers, 2003          ISBN 0865714908
      Most suburban neighborhoods are car-dependent, land-hungry, and strictly residential. Isolated from schools, workplaces and civic centers, typically they lack convenient links to parks and mass transportation and discourage casual encounters among residents. These same challenges provide numerous opportunities for positive change! People can reinvent their neighborhoods based on economic, environmental, and social values. Superbia! provides a checklist of Easy, Bolder, and Boldest Steps that can lead to safer, friendlier, livelier, healthier, more productive, diverse and vibrant neighborhoods.

Diana Leafe Christian, Creating a Life Together: Practical Tools to Grow an Intentional Community
     New Society Publishers, 2002          ISBN 0865714711
      The only resource available that provides step-by-step practical information distilled from numerous firsthand sources on how to establish an intentional community. It deals in depth with structural, interpersonal and leadership issues, decision-making methods, vision statements, and the development of a legal structure, as well as profiling well-established model communities. This exhaustive guide includes excellent sample documents among its wealth of resources. Diana Leafe Christian was for 14 years the editor of Communities magazine and has contributed to Body & Soul, Yoga Journal, and Shaman's Drum, among others. She is a popular public speaker and workshop leader on forming intentional communities, and has been interviewed about the subject on NPR. She is a member of an intentional community in North Carolina.

Diana Leafe Christian, Finding Community: How to Join an Ecovillage or Intentional Community
     New Society Publishers, 2007          ISBN 0865715785
      Finding community is as critical as obtaining food and shelter, since the need to belong is what makes us human. The isolation and loneliness of modern life have led many people to search for deeper connection, which has resulted in a renewed interest in intentional communities. These intentional communities and ecovillages are an appealing choice for like-minded people who seek to create a family-oriented and ecologically sustainable lifestyle — a lifestyle they are unlikely to find anywhere else. However, the notion of an intentional community can still be a tremendous leap for some — deterred perhaps by a misguided vision of eking out a hardscrabble existence with little reward. In fact, successful ecovillages thrive because of the combined skills and resources of their members.
     In Finding Community, Christian, for 14 years the editor of Communities magazine and author of Creating a Life Together "presents a thorough overview of ecovillages and intentional communities and offers solid advice on how to research thoroughly, visit thoughtfully, evaluate intelligently and join gracefully. Open-hearted and hard-headed in equal measure—and with a delicious sense of humor — Diana Leafe Christian takes the reader on a comprehensive tour of the world of ecovillages and intentional communities. This is the volume for those exploring the options and willing to learn from those who have already trodden the path. There could be no better guide on the path of exploring this lifestyle.“ — Jonathan Dawson.

Charles Durrett, Senior Cohousing: A Community Approach to Independent Living
     Ten Speed Press, 2005          ISBN 0945929307
      Several years after introducing cohousing to the United States, architect Charles Durrett returned to Denmark to explore a new trend that had developed there: cohousing for elders. Twenty of the last 25 cohousing neighborhoods built in Denmark had been elder specific. Seniors, housing professionals, designers and anyone seeking housing alternatives for elders will profit from the book's contents. Included are specific cohousing projects and the phase by phase methodology for creating senior cohousing.
     While group process decisions in elder cohousing are similar to those of multi-generational projects, elder cohousing decisions also include such issues as illness, dying, and how they will care for one another over time.
     See Review by Lisa Anthony

Kathryn McCamant and Charles Durrett, Cohousing: A Contemporary Approach to Housing Ourselves
     Ten Speed Press, 1993          ISBN 0807020052
     

Liz Walker, Ecovillage at Ithaca: Pioneering a Sustainable Culture
     New Society Publishers, 2005          ISBN 0865715246
      This book tells the story of life at EcoVillage at Ithaca, a groundbreaking experiment in sustainable development and community living located in Upstate New York. The Village is comprised of an intentional community and a non-profit organization. Their goal is to explore and model innovative approaches to ecological and social sustainability, and their unique village includes cohousing neighborhoods, organic agriculture, an education center, and natural areas that preserve and restoring over 80% of the land as green space. Liz Walker co-founded and has directed EcoVillage at Ithaca since its inception in 1991, and has lived there with her family since the first buildings were completed. She has worked on all aspects of the community’s development, and has written and lectured widely on the topic.
     See Review by Diana Leafe Christian