Introduction

The College of Literature, Science, and the Arts and the School of Natural Resources and the Environment of the University of Michigan are jointly sponsoring a theme semester on the environment to be held in the winter of 1998. Activities include a cluster of courses dealing with the natural environment and human relationships to it, an interdisciplinary faculty seminar, forums on environmental topics, lectures by distinguished visitors, special exhibits by libraries and museums, a film series, a career day featuring apprenticeships and jobs dealing with the environment, appearances by visiting writers, an exhibit by local artists whose work deals with the environment, the creation of a sculpture on campus by installation artist Patrick Dougherty, events associated with the celebration of Earth Day 1998, and a tour of the global change experiments at the University of Michigan Biological Station organized by the Alumni Association. You will find information about some of these events below. Other details, and announcements of additional events, will appear as they are confirmed.

Environmental issues of many kinds command wide attention now and will only increase in importance and urgency. Those responsible for planning the theme semester hope that it will stimulate productive dialogue on many of these issues and bring together members of the University and the surrounding community interested in exploring them. The Environmental Semester will provide opportunities for reassessing the progress of the last thirty years and for exploring new approaches and new perspectives appropriate to the next set of challenges, including the need to develop more sustainable lifestyles and to find relationships to the natural world that can be healing both for the environment and for those who participate in them. We invite you to join us in rethinking, and reimagining, our relationships to the natural world and the places in which we live.