Newsletter

  • Fox Owns Herself

    If you’re new here, welcome to On the Commons! Here, we explore questions as varied (but related) as: What is the difference between attention that fractures us and attention that restores? What role have three 15th-century papal bulls… Read more

  • The deep ethics of optimism

    Swan Lake, Montana, nearing sunset, through the smoky haze of a nearby prescribed burn. In 2016, a month or two before that year’s U.S. presidential election, I was at a two-week interdisciplinary artist’s residency at… Read more

  • Moral codes that withstand the wreckage of history

    At the age of nineteen my grandfather, Jacob Davidovich Malchik, flipped an electric switch, saw a working light bulb for the first time, and knew his future waited somewhere outside his muddy Ukrainian village. In… Read more

  • Nothing in Excess

    I recently spoke with a class at Michigan State University about walking, health, and cultural views of wellness. As happens during most of my talks with college students, at least one came prepared with a… Read more

  • Dis/connection

    The bacon was frying slowly and the water wouldn’t boil. I was poking at both over the camp stove, rain beating the tarp overhead, when my sister asked me something. “I was just thinking,” I… Read more

  • True Believers and Mass Movements

    Welcome! For those new here, On the Commons explores the ancient roots and ongoing consequences of private property and commodification—from the Doctrine of Discovery to ancient enclosures of the commons, and more—along with love for this world and… Read more

  • A world without barbed wire

    Welcome, commons-ers! For those new here, On the Commons explores the ancient roots and ongoing consequences of private property and commodification—from the Doctrine of Discovery to ancient enclosures of the commons, and more—along with love for this world… Read more

  • Wander, Lost

    Welcome! For those new here, On the Commons explores the deep roots and ongoing consequences of private property and commodification—from the Doctrine of Discovery to ancient enclosures of the commons, and more—along with love for this world and… Read more

  • To walk a prayer to the world

    Imagine yourself in a cabin, curled up on a beaten couch in the corner of the small room shared by a couple of bunk beds, a table, a counter and stove, and you. It’s night… Read more

  • What gets delivered with the compost

    Welcome! For those new here, On the Commons explores the deep roots and ongoing consequences of private property and commodification—from the Doctrine of Discovery to ancient enclosures of the commons, and more—along with love for this world and… Read more

Welcome to On the Commons!

This is a mirror of the newsletter I write on Substack, On the Commons. Same writing, different platform!

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