Glover Danny - The revolution where you live: stories from a 12,000-mile journey through a new America

More Praise for The Revolution Where You Live

What the world needs today is a modern Odysseusone who speaks with the power and love of the feminine, listens from the heart, and acts from compassion. Sarah van Gelder is that hero, a woman who understands that the monsters blocking our paths are our own creations, that the way out of chaos is through soul-felt, community-centered involvement. The Revolution Where You Live is a song of modern redemption.

John Perkins, New York Times bestselling author of The New Confessions of an Economic Hit Man

What a journey! Sarah van Gelder uncovers the real revolution unfolding across America: leaderless and leader-full, up against it and angry, but still willing to hope. A passionate, powerful account!

Bill McKibben, author of Deep Economy and The End of Nature and cofounder of 350.org

Journalist Sarah van Gelder says we can build the political revolution Bernie Sanders talks about from the bottom up, away from the iron grip of Wall Street and wealthy corporate interests. Thats a future we can all believe in.

RoseAnn DeMoro, Executive Director, National Nurses United, and National Vice President, AFL-CIO

Slow food is a local, healthy homemade meal, prepared with a lot of love. Sister Sarah has a similar talent as she shares with us her snail ride across Turtle Islandnot as a fable but as independent media evidence that decolonization and the Great Turning are here. We the people love this place!

Pancho Ramos-Stierle, full-time ServiceSpace volunteer, Oakland, and undocumented and unafraid activist and meditator

This book will keep you warm even as it keeps you riveted, and it will inspire you to see your part in the solutions that our world so desperately needs.

Brendan Martin, founder and Director, The Working World

Buckminster Fuller reminded us that we are facing a civilizational choice between utopia and oblivion. In this intrepid account, Sarah van Gelder renders the realistic utopia possible and reminds us that it is being born, right now, in the heart of the old empire.

Alnoor Ladha, Executive Director, The Rules, and Board Member, Greenpeace International USA

Like the inspiring efforts that she chronicles, Sarah van Gelders writing is ordinary and extraordinary. In sharp contrast to mass media blather and clichs of condescension, this book offers hope grounded in real human experience.

Norman Solomon, Executive Director, Institute for Public Accuracy, and author of War Made Easy

People are hungry for solutions, and those that unfold in these beautifully told stories offer hope and ways to build bridges of justice and understanding.

LeeAnn Hall, CoExecutive Director, Peoples Action

This is a wonderful bookwarm, human, direct, meaningfuland it is one that will help you understand why building a new America from the ground up must begin with community.

Gar Alperovitz, author of What Then Must We Do?

In this good book, Sarah van Gelder documents her reprise of Alexis de Tocquevilles 1831 travels in search of democracy. It is a book of answers: homegrown, walking-distance, smart, and heartfelt.

Peter Block, author of Community

Our survival depends today on rediscovering hope as a social force. This is what Sarah van Gelder does in this amazing book, where she shares sources of hope that she collected with love and wisdom.

Gustavo Esteva, writer, speaker, and founder of Universidad de la Tierra

Bravo! Through masterful storytelling, Sarah van Gelder shares a critical insightthat when we connect to the place where we live and work in community, we have the power to overcome the complex challenges of our time.

Judy Wicks, cofounder of Business Alliance for Local Living Economies and author of Good Morning, Beautiful Business

Sarah van Gelders genius, in the spirit of Wendell Berry, is to celebrate the women, men, and children who cultivate love for their places in all their diversity. This book inspires us to regenerate our connections with each other and to the ecology of our place on earth.

Madhu S. Prakash, author and Professor of Education, Penn State College of Education

The Revolution Where You Live

Stories from a 12,000-Mile Journey through a New America

Sarah van Gelder

Foreword by Danny Glover

The Revolution Where You Live

Copyright 2017 by Sarah van Gelder

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed Attention: Permissions Coordinator, at the address below.

Ordering information for print editions

Quantity sales. Special discounts are available on quantity purchases by corporations, associations, and others. For details, contact the Special Sales Department at the Berrett-Koehler address above.

Individual sales. Berrett-Koehler publications are available through most bookstores. They can also be ordered directly from Berrett-Koehler: Tel: (800) 929-2929; Fax: (802) 864-7626; www.bkconnection.com Orders for college textbook/course adoption use. Please contact Berrett-Koehler: Tel: (800) 929-2929; Fax: (802) 864-7626.

Orders by U.S. trade bookstores and wholesalers. Please contact Ingram Publisher Services, Tel: (800) 509-4887; Fax: (800) 838-1149; E-mail: for details about electronic ordering.

Berrett-Koehler and the BK logo are registered trademarks of Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc.

First Edition
Paperback print edition ISBN 978-1-62656-765-8
PDF e-book ISBN 978-1-62656-766-5
IDPF e-book ISBN 978-1-62656-767-2

2016-1

Front cover, top (left to right): detail from mural at Growing Power Chicago; George Price, permaculture farmer and professor; detail from mural in Newark, New Jersey; Jewell Praying Wolf James, carver, Lummi Tribe. Photo of author on cover by Paul Dunn. All other cover and interior photos by Sarah van Gelder unless otherwise noted. Maps by Evan Winslow Smith. Produced by Wilsted & Taylor Publishing Services. Copyediting by Melody Lacina. Design and composition by Nancy Koerner.

To my partner, Dee Axelrod,
who supported my wild idea
of a four-and-a-half-month solo road trip,
then gave me writing solitude
when I needed it and feedback on the ideas
and writing when I needed that
and if that wasnt enough,
she agreed to marry me