Writing & Lecturing Topics
ALLEGORY IN LITERATURE, MUSIC, TELEVISION & FILM
Allegory is best described as the expansion of a metaphor. Just as the Grim Reaper represents death and Santa Claus represents selfless giving -- American comics, literature, music, television, electronic media, and film are rife with allegory that can have a profound subconscious, and even conscious, psycho-social impact.
Presently, I am writing about the allegory of American movie monsters. The book, You Are Your Monster, is anticipated to be published in the latter part of 2015.
COLLABORATIVE JUSTICE STUDIES
Collaborative Justice is the combination of Conflict Resolution and Restorative Justice practices into one unified artform to handle catabolic conflict.
Conflict Resolution, also known as Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR), is a generic term used to refer to any methodology that seeks to resolve disputes by way of negotiations, mediation, or other similar modality. Examples of ADR involves Expert Determination (i.e., Restaurant Impossible and Restaurant Stakeout), Mediation, and Arbitration to name a few.
Restorative Justice (RJ) is a generic term for conflict transformation practices that serve as a paradigm shift in how crime and social taboos are addressed and transformed in a positive manner. Circle Justice, Community Justice, Panels, etc. are all practices of RJ.
Collaborative Justice works to marry these different practices to build off of the strengths of the different practices while also negating their weaknesses in different situations. This ultimately creates a synergetic practice.
Ken Johnson has developed the Unbroken Circles SM program as well as the Shalom Initiative SM as America’s first viable series of Collaborative Justice programs for dealing with catabolic conflict in schools, businesses, government, communities, civic groups, and religious institutions. He is also the inventer of the Shalom-centric Holistic Intersocial Forgiveness Transformation (S.H.I.F.T.) Theory – a theory on understanding how forgiveness works and how best to address issues of crime and forgiveness. He has presently written a Collaborative Justice book on catabolic conflict in schools called Unbroken Circles SM for Schools: Restoring Schools One Conflict at a Time. The book is expected to be released Summer of 2014 by SYP Publishing.
OUTDOOR RECREATION CULTURE & ENHANCEMENT
Since the Native Americans first came to Turtle Island (a.k.a. North America) our culture and heritage has been tied to nature and a reliance on nature through fishing, hunting, spiritual cleansing, teaching, and much more. This nation’s first military used hunting rifles, rather than specialized munitions, to defend our country. During the late 1700s and early 1800s, deer hunting and hide trading proved as a source of currency for displaced Cherokees and other Native American tribes that were trying to assimilate into the White culture now in power. Later, squirrel hunters in Ohio kept the state safe during the Civil War (also known by Southerners as “The War of Northern Aggression”). Later, German and Japanese forces decided to scrub plans to invade mainland America when they realized that hunters represented a hidden army that was far larger and more well armed than America’s own regulated military. In the 1920s, deer populations were almost to the point of extinction causing America to relook at how hunting was handled in America. Today, there are more deer in American than there was in the 1600s with states, like Connecticut, actually allowing hunters to go into the suburbs with bows in order to control dangerously high herd populations. And, in the Gulf Coast regions of the Southeast United States, the recent BP oil spill caused billions of dollars in damages to fishing industries, beach-based resorts, and even inland ancillary businesses who rely off of the Gulf of Mexico’s bounty and tourist draw for their livelihoods.
Today, our nation is embroiled in a battle over how best to safeguard our natural resources while also handling issues of growth. On one side of the equation are the environmentalists who wish to preserve nature by eliminating man’s impact. As a result, billions of dollars of ad valorem taxes are now being lost by local governments each year as more and more real estate is being taken off of tax rolls and put into government and non-profit control. Many of these properties make it illegal for people to even be on the property without special permits and credentials. As for handling issues of diminishing game populations, environmentalists suggest putting bans on hunting and setting up preserves where human interactions are limited.
On the other end of the spectrum are the conservationists who seek to marry usage of natural resources without exploiting the resources. To solve for diminishing animal populations, conservationists usually suggest putting a special hunting season on the animal. This may sound counter-intuitive however this method of soundly managing natural resources has caused many animals to come back from the brink of extinction while raising much needed funds for their safekeeping. Alligators in Louisiana, Florida, and Texas are a prime example of how this concept works while areas with hunting bans on alligators, like in Alabama, are notoriously low. Black bear populations seem to also track hunting regulations as low black bear populations our found in states with bans on their hunting, like in Florida, and yet the populations have exploded where hunting is allowed. American wildlife conservation practices have been so successful that in Africa elephant populations are soaring where hunting is allowed.
Both sides love nature and yet have drastically different approaches.
CULTURAL GASTRONOMY STUDIES
Food is as much of an indicator of a culture as any other artifact. Most of American food is actually survival foods from other cultures. Early Cherokees boiled dumplings in fruit juices which later evolved into what Southerners call cobbler. Meager seafood hauls, some okra from runaway slaves, a little beaten sassafras from the Choctaws, and some French sensibilities resulted in what we know and love as gumbo. In California, a somewhat Mediterranean inspired cioppino resulted while in Pensacola gazpachi married hard tack with gazpacho soup to make a unique salad.
SOCIO-ECO-POLITICAL CULTURAL STUDIES
How did the Cajuns get to Louisiana and why did they go there? Why is it that moonshiners say that to love America you have to love moonshine? Do we still have tribes in America that the government still refuse to recognize? What is really the harm with gay marriage? How does Christianity affect America? Who are sovereign citizens?
Such questions all have answers that have a meaningful impact on our daily lives. History affects the present just like soil nourishes the fruit from a plant. Everything is connected socially, economically, and politically in this vast experiment in liberty and freedom.
