Return to Origin Newsletter: Earth Stories - December 2022
Almost a year to the day since Return to Origin’s Sustainable Together Project, the ‘Coming Home Project’ was born out of the same land and community. The reverberations of one of their themes, Khula Nam (“Grow with me”) was indeed the result of the original work of the community - a gift that keeps on giving. What was incredibly exciting was that our vision and dream of engaging the next generation was realised.
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Sustainable Together Programme
‘Sustainable Together’ is a regional project that focuses on sustainability and civil society initiatives that seek
to make an impactful contribution to improving (local) environments. The project aims to initiate and support
creative and community-based interventions related to ecology and sustainability issues and priorities
Read More...Return to Origin Newsletter: Earth Stories - August 2022
The story of the origin of the human relationship with fire is one which ignites mythological systems across all societies, and is a central concern of paleo-anthropology as key to the making of human culture. The theft of fire from the Gods for the benefit of humans is a recurring mythological theme across cultural contexts globally: from Prometheus in Ancient Greece to Maui in Polynesia.
Read More...Return to Origin Newsletter: Earth Stories - May 2022
We have updated our website to showcase our latest ventures, including our second exhibition at Amazwi South African Museum of Literature and our presentation at the Literature, Heritage and Ecology Conference 2022.
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Healing the Broken Links
When I asked a bushman a few years ago to tell me about his relationship to nature he looked puzzled “I don’t understand the question”, he said, ‘I am nature’. Making peace with Nature assumes we are at war with her. The genocide of consciousness brought about by colonialism, apartheid, and extractive practices were deliberate […]
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Exhibition as Storyteller
Angelique Michaels
04/05/2022
Candles flicker and coloured wax hardens in streaks across dark soil. Earth, scattered with seeds and adorned with flowers and fruit, tells a story of offering, honouring and abundance, of relationship to nature. In words encircling this earth-mound, the beginning of a Community Manifesto takes shape at the feet of anyone present to witness it.: […]
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Nature’s Mirror
Dominique Santos
04/05/2022
“Seeing the pictures like this, they’re waking up a hunger inside. You see, there is something inside, even way inside, down there, that is hungry for ways of the olden days. And seeing these pictures, it makes you remember where you come from.” Zanele spoke to the group as we gathered for a roundtable discussion […]
Read More...Return to Origin Newsletter: Earth Stories - December 2021
The Sustainable Together Exhibition and Celebration was opened on November 12th to a feast of images, voices, and visibility of the Ekhupumleni community’s rich heritage, of their connection to stories of healing, vivid memories of connection to the land and food, and sustainability that carried the origins and hidden histories of lineages and ancestors, of those who came before.
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Sustainable Together Exhibition
Our community curated exhibition celebrates the extraordinary grassroots work done to hold communities together during the Covid-19 lockdown and [...]
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Return to Origin Newsletter: Earth Stories - October 2021
In collaboration with Ingcungcu Community Development Projects, Kenton-on-Sea, Eastern Cape, South Africa, Return to Origin [...]
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