Environmental policy expert Julian Agyeman delivers his keynote MLK Day address in the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College Chapel. (Photographs by Phyllis Graber Jensen)

“Environmental quality and human equality are inextricably linked,” environmental policy expert Julian Agyeman stated in his keynote address for ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½’ Martin Luther King Jr. Day observances Jan. 16.

“True environmental well-being will only exist when there is human well-being.”

Environmental justice, a human-centered approach to environmentalism, was the theme of 2012 King Day activities at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½. The ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ organizers proceeded upon the premise that, had he lived, civil-rights icon King’s attention to environmental justice wouldn’t have stopped with the Memphis sanitation workers and their demands for equality.

ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ and Morehouse debaters trade arguments before a packed Olin Arts Center Concert Hall audience.

As Agyeman and others made clear, environmental justice is no synonym for sustainability. Instead, it posits that true sustainability isn’t possible without human equality. The concept unified several days’ worth of events at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, including a Friday evening performance by environmental justice activist Marc Bamuthi Joseph, a weekend environmental film festival, and on Monday, in addition to Agyeman’s keynote, a full slate of workshops exploring the concept.

The theme may have gotten its most spirited treatment Monday afternoon during the annual Rev. Benjamin Elijah Mays ’20 Debate, in which debaters from ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ and Morehouse College, in a machine-gun battle of rhetoric before a packed Olin Concert Hall, explored the compatibility of environmental sustainability and social justice.

More about King Weekend events at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½:
Performances by Marc Bamuthi Joseph
The King Memorial Service
Video: Agyeman delivers King Memorial Service Homily
MLK Slide Show on Flickr

Interim President Nancy Cable, Dean of the Faculty Pamela Baker ’70 and King Day Committee chair Charles Nero, professor of rhetoric and African American studies, also spoke during Monday morning’s keynote gathering in a filled-to-capacity College Chapel.

Cable introduced Agyeman, professor and chair of urban and environmental policy and planning at Tufts University, as “one of the world’s leading voices for environmental stewardship and justice.”

Agyeman started out by distinguishing between the sustainability and the environmental-justice movements. He characterized the former as focused on threats to the natural world, largely white and middle-class, deliberative and exclusive, in fact if not by design, because its privileging of expertise.

From left, Assistant Professor of African American and American Cultural Studies Myron Beasley and Professor of Spanish Balthazar Fra-Molinero discuss the MLK Day program while awaiting the keynote address.

Focusing on threats to human health and dignity, the latter is multicultural, disadvantaged, inclusive — and angry, as the poorest people continue to bear the brunt of environmental degradation.

The speaker plotted out a middle course between the two. The concept of “just sustainability,” which Agyeman originated with Robert D. Bullard and Bob Evans, calls for the establishment of a better quality of life for all, in a just and equitable manner, and respecting the limits of the ecosystems that support us.

He offered six examples of approaches to just sustainability:

• Urban design that fosters meaningful interaction between diverse cultural groups, as exemplified by the cities of London and Toronto. The field of urban planning, Agyeman said, does not now emphasize “cultural competence” — the understanding of diversity — in its education and practice. If our planners are not culturally competent, he asked, what hope is there for the creation of effectively intercultural cities?
• Enforceable levels of resource consumption that ensure a fair share for all — the tenet most likely to raise an outcry in the U.S., whose citizens represent only 4 percent of the world’s population but consume 25 percent of the world’s resources. “This is the most dangerous statistic on Earth,” said Agyeman. Unfair now, this disproportion will become a recipe for disaster as nations like China and India seek to emulate American standards of living.
• Basing the measurement of progress on factors like happiness and well-being, rather than economic metrics like gross national product. At the moment, he said, “we don’t measure what matters.”
• Promoting food justice and supporting urban agriculture.
• The sharing and co-production of resources and systems. Agyeman pointed to Zipcar, Wikipedia and other 21st-century phenomena as examples of facility and service models based on cooperation, collaboration and utility, which make efficient use of resources, rather than individual possession and entrepreneurship. “What we’re seeing is the beginning of a paradigm shift,” he said.
• Finally, “spatial justice,” which embraces such concepts as the equitable distribution of livable lands and the democratization of the streetscape.

“There’s always a social-justice element to sustainability questions,” Agyeman concluded. “To me, sustainable development and just sustainability mean using our unlimited mental resources, not our limited environmental resources.”

Baker used her time at the podium to review the promise and reality of ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ egalitarianism, and outlined current initiatives in the vital work of improving diversity and access at the college. In outlining the history of ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½’ King Day observances, Nero offered a shout-out to Sankofa, the student group whose Monday evening performance would be a highlight of the day.

Sankofa director Bethel Kifle ’14 acknowledges appreciation from the Schaeffer Theatre audience and production’s cast at the end of the evening’s performance.

And in her welcome to the throng, which included ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ President-elect Clayton Spencer, Interim President Cable evoked the African philosophical concept of “ubuntu,” which she described as “the shared essence of our humanity,” or, in a translation by Liberian peace activist Leymah Gbowee, “I am what I am because of who we all are.”

Cable said, “We aren’t truly ourselves unless we are related to others.”

Session I Workshops
2:30 p.m.-3:30 p.m.

The Cost of Our Things: A Screening and Discussion of the film Blood in the Mobile
Convened by: Charles Nero, Elizabeth Eames, Stephanie Kelley-Romano
Anthropology, Rhetoric, African American Studies and American Cultural Studies
(This workshop meets across both Sessions I and II)
New Commons 221

Slow Melt: Environmental Injustice in the Vanishing Arctic
Convened by: Loring “Danny” Danforth, Aslaug Asgeirsdottir and Sonja Pieck
Anthropology, Politics and Environmental Studies
Pettengill G65

Ecological Citizenship and Global Justice
Convened by: Julie McCabe ’12 and Women and Gender Studies
Hedge 106

A Tribute to Wangari Maathai: African Environmentalist and Nobel Laureate
Sponsored by the Africana Club
Pettengill G21

“Love, Women and Flowers” or Work, Exploitation and Toxicity
Convened by: Faculty and students in the Spanish department
This workshop meets across both Sessions I and II.
Pettengill G52

Civil Disobedience and the New Environmental Movement
Meet filmmaker Josh Fox, director of the documentary Gasland, about the environmental damage caused by the natural-gas mining practice of hydraulic fracturing. (Gasland is being screened at 3 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 15, in Olin Concert Hall.)
Convened by: Environmental Studies House
Pettengill G10

Session II Workshops
3:45 p.m.–5 p.m.

Screening and Discussion of The Warriors of Qiugang: A Chinese Village Fights Back
Convened by: Xing Fan, Amanda Pierog ’15, Reilly Bergin-Pugh ’14, Leah Cole ’12, Grace Haessler ‘12, Asian Studies
Pettengill G21

Re-imagining Community: A Sub-National Approach to the Interconnected Work of Environmental and Gender Justice
Convened by: Douglas Kempner, Alanna Prince ’13 and Women and Gender Studies
Panelists: Ben Chin ’07, Nicola Wells, Nate Libby ’07, Craig Saddlemire ’07
Roger Williams 118

Soul Jazz and Soul Food: “Cookin’ ” Jazz in the 1950s and 1960s
Convened by: Tom Hayward and Dale E. Chapman
Hedge 106

Carbon Denial: What Is at Risk?
Convened by: Jane Costlow, John Smedley, Laura Sewall, Julie Rosenbach, Lynne Lewis, Aslaug Asgeirsdottir
Environmental Studies, Physics, Economics, Politics, Harward Center and the Office of the Environmental Coordinator
Pettengill G65

Professor Julian Agyeman. Photograph by Kelvin Ma, Tufts University.

Julian Agyeman, Ph.D., FRSA, a pioneering environmental justice and sustainability advocate, offers the keynote address during Martin Luther King Jr. Day observances at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College at 9:30 a.m. Monday, Jan. 16, in the College Chapel, 275 College St.

His keynote address at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ is titled The Dream Lives on: Towards a ‘Just’ Sustainability.

Martin Luther King Weekend events at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ also include a spoken-word piece by performer-activist Marc Bamuthi Joseph on Friday, Jan. 13, an environmental film festival during the weekend, and a performance by the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ student ensemble Sankofa during the evening of Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

See the schedule of Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Weekend events.

The theme for 2012 King Day programming at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ is Environmental Justice: Martin Luther King’s Unfinished Agenda. Events on Jan. 16 include a student debate and workshops that explore the Unfinished Agenda theme during the day, and a performance in the evening by the student ensemble . Related events take place Jan. 13-15.

More event information appears below. A complete schedule will be published in January. King Day events at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ are open to the public at no cost. For more information, please call 207-786-6400.

A college with a bold commitment to equality and social justice rooted in its very founding, prior to the Civil War, ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ has long been distinctive in its observances of the King holiday. Regular classes are canceled and the entire campus turns its attention to issues around civil rights, social justice and King’s legacy.

The 2012 King Day events extend an emphasis on environmental justice at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ during this academic year. For the King Day programming, “we chose this Unfinished Agenda theme because we believe that Dr. King would have been an advocate for environmental justice,” says Charles Nero, chair of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Planning Committee and professor of rhetoric and African American studies.

“The committee has worked really hard for almost a year to put this program together. We are especially happy that the workshops include much interdisciplinary effort.”

Professor and chair of urban and environmental policy and planning at Tufts University, Agyeman is known as the co-originator with Robert D. Bullard and Bob Evans of “just sustainabilities,” a concept espousing the need to ensure a better quality of life for all, now and into the future, in a just and equitable manner, while living within the limits of supporting ecosystems.

More about Julian Agyeman.

Agyeman speaks twice at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½. In addition to Monday’s keynote, he offers the homily for the college’s annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day Memorial Service of Worship at 7 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 15, in the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College Chapel, 275 College St. To learn more about this service, please call 207-786-8272.

Following the keynote, concurrent breakout sessions take place at 11 a.m. in rooms to be announced in Hedge Hall, 7 Andrews Road (Alumni Walk). Concurrent workshop sessions are scheduled for 2:30 and 3:45 p.m. in Pettengill Hall, 4 Andrews Road.

The breakout sessions and workshops have slightly different formats, Nero explains. “The breakouts provide an opportunity to reflect on the keynote address and to focus on and develop activist strategies based upon it.

“The workshops allow students, faculty, staff, alumni and community members to focus on more specific topics related to sustainability and justice.”