Mugs and Minds: Local Environmentalism

The Gunn Memorial Library has teamed up with Minor Memorial Library in Roxbury and Burnham Library in Bridgewater to bring you a collaborative discussion series called Mugs & Minds in which members of each community come together to discuss pertinent topics of interest. Join Gunn Memorial Library onsite as we welcome Brian Hagenbuch, Executive Director of Steep Rock Association to lead a discussion on Environmentalism in our community. Using the work of Aldo Leopold’s The Land Ethic, we will engage in a writing, reading, and discussion exercise exploring the themes in Leopold’s work. The Land Ethic is an essay that calls for moral responsibility to the natural world. Leopold wants us simply to care; about people, about land, and about the connection between them. When people care about something or someone, their actions convey that care and invite the same in return. Click here to access The Land Ethic and the instructions to complete before the program. About the presenter: A good day for Brian Hagenbuch is a day in the woods. Raised on a multigenerational produce farm in Pennsylvania, he spent most of his childhood exploring fields and forests where he fell in love with the natural world and became passionate about environmental conservation. After 25 years in academic teaching and leadership, including serving as director of an institute for environmental and sustainability studies, the Steep Rock Association Executive Director role became a childhood dream come true. Brian has a background in place-based environmental education, conservation biology, and the impact of ecological disturbances on forest systems, He’s earned degrees in entomology from Penn State and the University of Florida as well as a PhD in environmental studies from Antioch University-New England. Brian’s favorite pastimes including hiking with his four-legged field assistant (Cody), bicycling backroads, kayaking quiet water, experimenting in the kitchen, and muddling through the Sunday NYT crossword puzzle.