Civity relationships are relationships of respect and empathy. Respect has always seemed straightforward to me. The root of the word – the Latin “spec” – means “to see”: To respect …
Category Archives: Blog
Reaching for Civity
Krista Tippett, host of NPR’s On Being, struggles with the word “civility.” In a recent Living the Questions segment, Tippett names the danger of using “civility” as a “passive-aggressive weapon” …
Civity Iceland: “Thingvellir” or the “Assembly Field”
Who would have thought that I would find reverberations of civity while sightseeing in Iceland? Last month,I attended a conference in Reykjavik and then had the opportunity to spend a …
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The Race Story and the Civity Story
Stories matter. Stories do work – they guide what we do. If our stories discount or degrade Others, then our actions exploit and marginalize. If our stories acknowledge the human …
It’s the Relationships! #WeaveThePeople
Photo Courtesy: Lena Yarinkura My Civity co-founder Malka Kopell and I had the opportunity last week to be part of the #WeaveThePpl gathering in Washington, DC. We joined with people …
Weaving a Civity Cloth
New York Times columnist David Brooks brings a compelling voice to the conversation about how Americans should be with each other. He has been bearing witness to the pain of …
Listening to Understand the “Who” as Well as the “What”
Larry Kramer, president of the Hewlett Foundation, recently asserted the value of “listening with empathy” in the nation’s current political and social climate of “polarization” and “tribalism.” It is essential, …
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“Civity” by Any Other Name…
The word “civity” is not new. The Oxford English Dictionary lists “civity” as an archaic, no-longer-used word for “city.” “Civity” calls us back to the essence of “city,” which originally …
Seeding Civity: An Update From Louisville
We asked Louisville community leaders to share examples of spaces in the Louisville community where they see Civity connections happening or potential for them to happen. Over the past year, …
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Seeing Beyond the Title: Supporting Civity Conversations at the Human Library
This summer, Civity worked closely with Derek Wolfgram and Jenny Barnes from the Redwood City Public Library to help bring to life the city’s first-ever Human Library event. The Human …
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