{"id":51807,"date":"2012-01-17T14:12:09","date_gmt":"2012-01-17T19:12:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/?p=51807"},"modified":"2024-07-08T15:31:30","modified_gmt":"2024-07-08T19:31:30","slug":"king-day12-keynote","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/2012\/01\/17\/king-day12-keynote\/","title":{"rendered":"King Day speaker proposes path to reconcile environmental sustainability, justice advocates"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Environmental policy expert Julian Agyeman delivers his keynote MLK Day address in the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College Chapel. (Photographs by Phyllis Graber Jensen)<\/p><\/div>\n

“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.<\/p>\n

“True environmental well-being will only exist when there is human well-being.”<\/p>\n

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.<\/p>\n

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ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ and Morehouse debaters trade arguments before a packed Olin Arts Center Concert Hall audience.<\/p><\/div>\n

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.<\/p>\n

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.<\/p>\n

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More about King Weekend events at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½:<\/strong>
\nPerformances by Marc Bamuthi Joseph<\/em><\/a>
\nThe King Memorial Service<\/em><\/a>
\nVideo: Agyeman delivers King Memorial Service Homily<\/a>
\nMLK Slide Show on Flickr<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

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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.<\/p>\n

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.”<\/p>\n

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.<\/p>\n

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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.<\/p><\/div>\n

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.<\/p>\n

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.<\/p>\n

He offered six examples of approaches to just sustainability:<\/p>\n