Our Planet, Our Stories: Ecopoetics

GrubStreet’s Our Planet, Our Stories series focuses on the climate crisis, and aims to help writers find creative ways to engage with this urgent global issue. At the end of the series, all participants will be invited to submit writing to an anthology that GrubStreet will put out in the spring of 2024. This is the second installation of GrubStreet's annual Our Times, Our Stories series, which offers a variety of free and reduced-cost classes focused on a pressing contemporary issue, with a free print and digital anthology of student writing collected nd distributed at the end of the series. To donate to the series, please visit our donation page. 

Our Planet, Our Stories: Ecopoetics

In this four-hour seminar, we will do a deep dive into the art of writing ecopoetry. Author and educator Craig Santos Perez defines ecopoetry as “poetry about ecology, ecosystems, environmental injustice, animals, agriculture, climate change, water, and even food.” While not unrelated to nature poetry, there is a distinction in which ecopoetry is understood to have the purpose of inspiring us towards action. Ecopoetics provides a space for addressing systems of oppression, as well as reclaiming and healing our relationship to nature. It is an opportunity to decenter the human narrative in cultivating a world where justice and harmony reign.

How can we get in right relationship with the earth through our writing? What responsibility to the environment do we hold as artists? What role(s) can poets play in addressing climate change? We will engage and discuss research, essays, poetry and other media from activists, educators, and artists like Alexis Pauline Gumbs, Joy Harjo, and Askia Toure to study the ways they've addressed these topics in their work. We will also have the opportunity to respond to writing prompts that generate new ideas for our writing, as well as share our writing for on-the-spot feedback in small groups.

Other Classes in the Our Planet, Our Stories Series

Class Format

This class will take place using Zoom videoconferencing. About 15 minutes before your class is scheduled to begin, you'll receive an email from your instructor with a link to join the class meeting!