Biographical Note for Serena Anderlini-D'Onofrio, PhD - Fall 2011

 

Serena Anderlini-D’Onofrio

Believes that “a world where it is safe to love is a world where it is safe to 
live.”  She is a scholar, writer, activist, professor, and cultural theorist.  Her book of ecosexual theory, Gaia and the New Politics of Love is a 2010 Nautilus Winner in Cosmology and New Science.  She is editor of BiTopia (2011), Bisexuality and Queer Theory (2010), Plural Loves: Designs for Bi and Poly Living (2005), and Women and Bisexuality: A Global Perspective (2003).  Her memoir, Eros: A Journey of Multiple Loves, was a 2007 Lambda finalist.  These are Routledge books.  She is a professor of humanities at the University of Puerto Rico, Mayaguez.  In 2011 she keynoted at Ecosex Symposium II in San Francisco, with Annie Sprinkle and Beth Stephens, fellow avatars in the ecosexual movement.  She also taught the first multilingual course in Ecosexuality in Italy.  Her past keynotes include the World Polyamory Association Conference in California (2007 and 2010), Loving More in New York State (2007), and BiReCon in England (2010).  She speaks English, French, Italian, and Spanish.  She is the owner of 3WayKiss, a non-profit dedicated to education and research in the arts of love. 

Fan Page: facebook.com/GaiaBlessings

Blog : polyplanet.blogspot.com/

Webpage: www.serenagaia.com

Email: serena.anderlini@gmail.com

Author's Page: http://www.amazon.com/Serena-Anderlini-DOnofrio/e/B001JS1VKA

YouTube Channel: http://www.youtube.com/SerenaAnderlini

Ecosex Symposium II: www.sexecology.org

Letter on Behalf of Tracy Elise - Save the Temples and other Schools of Love

Hi dear Earthlings!

Tracy Elise

The spaces of sacred sexuality and of education in the arts of love are under threat.  The police has raided various temples and schools of love, with many practitioners still in jail.  Tracy Elise, founder of the Phoenix Goddess Temple, is one of them, with bail set at $ 1,000,000, as if she were a premeditated murderer.  How can we possibly accept this?  At a time of such rampant injustice and greed, when the people are outraged enough to occupy Wall Street, can we sit still while the judicial system takes it out on those who teach love?  In response to the situation, and on Tracy's invitation to send letters of support to her attorney, yours truly has drafted the following brief.  

You might feel so inspired too, and in that case, direct your brief to john@vigilaw.com. You can find out more details about Tracy's situation from herself, at http://templelife.tv/support/letter-from-tracy.html

Yours truly sends her warmest wishes to all those who love love enough to take the risk of teaching it.  

LETTER ON BEHALF OF TRACY ELISE

Dear John Vigileos:

I am a scholar in the Arts and Humanities who has focused on sexual fluidity and inclusive styles of love.  I owe my own education in the arts of love to the many temples and other spaces where sacred sexuality is practiced, and to the many schools of love where the arts of love are taught and the whole person is educated in the multiple ways to practice these arts.  Interpreting love as an art has roots in ancient cultural traditions, including Tantra in India, the ancient cult of the Goddess in the Mediterranean, and some Native American traditions.  I have taken many workshops and courses with practitioners of these arts and I believe that their educational value is of the highest quality.  Societies where people are educated in the arts of love are typically more loving, considerate, and peaceful than societies where no such teaching is available.  Whether this education is offered in a temple, in a school, in a cultural center, or any other such space devoted to this purpose, the content of the teaching is usually very valuable and formative of the whole being.  People who benefit from such trainings often become sources of love for others in their lives and communities as well.

I absolutely urge the courts to protect the temples as schools of love that meet significant educational needs in our society.  I look forward to a successful progress in this case toward the shared goal of setting a legal precedent in support of education in the arts of love.  Please let me know if I can answer any questions or be of further assistance to you.

Namaste,

Serena Anderlini-D'Onofrio, PhD

 

Author of Gaia and the New Politics of Love, North Atlantic Books, 2009 (a Nautilus Winner, also on Kindle)
and of Eros: A Journey of Multiple Loves, Routledge, 2006 (a Lambda finalist)
Co-Editor of BiTopia (2011), and Bisexuality and Queer Theory (2010)
Editor of Plural Loves (2010), and Women and Bisexuality (2003) Routledge, New York

Professor of Humanities
University of Puerto Rico, Mayaguez, PR 00681-9264 (USA)

Poly Planet GAIA Blog: http://polyplanet.blogspot.com/
Website: www.serenagaia.com
Become a Fan www.facebook.com/GaiaBlessings
Author's Page: http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B001JS1VKA
YouTube Uploaded Videos: http://www.youtube.com/SerenaAnderlini

4 of 12 | Monday is for Religion: The Art of Connecting What's Not Really Separate

Hi lovely Earthlings!

Yours truly is back with another piece of the Chief's Lament.  This time the wisdom is even deeper.  Animals are our siblings, Chief Seattle claims, and when we destroy their habitat, we destroy them, our turn is next.  Since these wise words were pronounced a century and a half ago, we've explored space, we've landed on the Moon.  In that search for other planets who might be hospitable to our species, we've only found out one thing for sure.  If we ever find another astral body willing to have us over, we humans will have to migrate along with all the other species.  Why?  Because no species can live alone: we're all connected!  "Animals are our bothers" as Chief Seattle puts it.  He already knew what took so much effort for us to discover.  Oh well . . .

"The Land Is Sacred to Us"

Chief Seattle's Lament, Cont'd

So we will consider your offer to buy our land. If we decide to accept, I will make one condition: The white man must treat the beasts of this land as his brothers.

3 of 12 | Monday is for Religion: The Art of Connecting What's Not Really Separate

Hi again lovely Earthlings!

Wish yours truly a Happy Birthday for this is the right day!  She is getting wiser and happier every year, and more adept in the arts of love.

When you think of religion, what comes to your mind?  When we desacralize nature, we imagine things as separate, each one a cute toy we can play with.  If the toy breaks we get a new one and throw the old one away.  Chief Seattle berates himself.  "I am the savage" he says.  "I don't understand."  How ironic!  Now that we've used up everything nature had to offer, the fun is over.  "Who was the savage then?" Chief Seattle would ask today.  When we do religion we sacralize nature again.  We revere and respect all its elements in an aura of ecosexual love.  Chief Seattle shows the way. 

"The Land Is Sacred to Us"

Chief Seattle's Lament, Cont'd

I do not know. Our ways are different from your ways. The sight of your cities pains the eyes of the red man. But perhaps it is because the red man is a savage and does not understand.

2 of 12 | Monday is for Religion: The Art of Connecting What's Not Really Separate

Hi again lovely Earthlings!

Have you been thinking about religion?  Religion has a bad name today.  It's the excuse for wars.  But has it always been so?  The Civil Rights movement was inspired by religion.  And it was a social space where people of different races met, worked together, fell in love.  What other antidote is there to racism than the commingling of all shades so that difference does not matter?

More to the point, in the supposed land of religious freedom, those with belief systems that sacralized nature were not considered religious at all.  They were considered "heathens," something in between a savage and an atheist.  Their belief system was against nature and had to be extirpated at the cost of eliminating its people as well.  So the genocide of Native American civilizations had to be almost successful before progressive monotheists became respectful of their belief systems, and sometimes fell in love with them.

Annie Sprinkle and Beth Stephens

But who was savage?  Who betrayed nature and got a license to kill her?  The earth remembers, Seattle says.  Animals, plants, rocks, are our family.  The lament resonates with Annie Sprinkle and Beth Stephens's ecosexual weddings, designed to marry the natural elements and make them part of the fold. 

Listen to Chief Seattle as he predicts what will happen:

"The Land Is Sacred to Us"

Chief Seattle's Lament, Cont'd 

Every part of this earth is sacred to my people. Every shining pine needle, every sandy shore, every mist in the dark woods, every clearing, and humming insect is holy in the memory and experience of my people. The sap which courses through the trees carries the memories of the red man.

A Letter about Myself - What Is Success and How Is it Measured?

Hi lovely Earthlings!

Last spring yours truly took a human potential course called Personal Passion Formula.  It's a way to push oneself to play out of the box and redesign one's life to suit new interests and inspirations.  

Students had to evaluate their current level of success and determine the values based on which success was measured for themselves.  

These are always somewhat sensitive moments and the value of these trainings is mainly introspective.  They force one to look within more closely. 

1 of 12 | Monday is for Religion: The Art of Connecting What's Not Really Separate

Hi lovely Earthlings!

Yours truly is back and she feels this sudden shift toward religion.  What is religion?  "Re-" for doing again something that was done before.  "Ligion" for linking together.   So it could be the art of connecting what was not separate but appears to be so.  

For one who was raised atheist religion is not exactly an easy conversation.  As a kid, I often felt the "god" we rejected was an entity of its own.  We simply had to brave the desire to "believe" there was any power in that.  Living a sling shot from the Vatican, we had no choice.  It was either "religion," and that meant Roman Catholicism, or "atheism," and that meant pushing Catholicism away.  

It was only as a student in California many years later that I realized people had different religions.  They were ok with the religion of their neighbors.  Did not try to convert them!  Then, I thought, these deities are all inventions!  They really don't exist outside people's imagination.  There's nothing out there that will get mad at you if you're not afraid.  Oh!  What relaxation!