Exploring Spirituality in Nature Writing: A Writing Workshop Series in Creative Nonfiction
Registration is required and limited to 12 participants.
This workshop series meets on four consecutive Wednesdays: September 9, 16, 23, and 30, from 4-6 pm. Because each session builds on the previous one, participants are expected to attend all four sessions.
Please register to attend in person.
When William Ellery Channing claimed in an 1828 sermon that “we are brought into harmony with the creation” in proportion to our pursuit of our own “likeness to God,” he could not have known that his theology would help inspire a literary tradition that continues to explore spiritual growth through encounters with the natural world. American nature writing developed some of its strongest roots in the ideas of Channing and the American Transcendentalists he influenced. Emerson explored selfhood and spirituality through nature, famously writing of standing in the woods and sensing that he was “part and parcel of God.” Thoreau likewise wrote of the spiritual expansiveness he experienced through his connection with the…
Programming Series: Transcendentalism. Contact: Laurie D. Sedgwick, CSWR Events Coordinator
ldsedgwick@hds.harvard.edu.
Wednesday, September 9, 2026, 4:00 PM – 6:00 PM.
Conference Room, Center for the Study of World Religions, 42 Francis Ave. Cambridge, MA.
For more info visit cswr.hds.harvard.edu. Exploring Spirituality in Nature Writing: A Writing Workshop Series in Creative Nonfiction
Registration is required and limited to 12 participants.
This workshop series meets on four consecutive Wednesdays: September 9, 16, 23, and 30, from 4-6 pm. Because each session builds on the previous one, participants are expected to attend all four sessions.
Please register to attend in person.
When William Ellery Channing claimed in an 1828 sermon that “we are brought into harmony with the creation” in proportion to our pursuit of our own “likeness to God,” he could not have known that his theology would help inspire a literary tradition that continues to explore spiritual growth through encounters with the natural world. American nature writing developed some of its strongest roots in the ideas of Channing and the American Transcendentalists he influenced. Emerson explored selfhood and spirituality through nature, famously writing of standing in the woods and sensing that he was “part and parcel of God.” Thoreau likewise wrote of the spiritual expansiveness he experienced through his connection with the…
Programming Series: Transcendentalism. Contact: Laurie D. Sedgwick, CSWR Events Coordinator
ldsedgwick@hds.harvard.edu.
Wednesday, September 16, 2026, 4:00 PM – 6:00 PM.
Conference Room, Center for the Study of World Religions, 42 Francis Ave. Cambridge, MA.
For more info visit cswr.hds.harvard.edu. Exploring Spirituality in Nature Writing: A Writing Workshop Series in Creative Nonfiction
Registration is required and limited to 12 participants.
This workshop series meets on four consecutive Wednesdays: September 9, 16, 23, and 30, from 4-6 pm. Because each session builds on the previous one, participants are expected to attend all four sessions.
Please register to attend in person.
When William Ellery Channing claimed in an 1828 sermon that “we are brought into harmony with the creation” in proportion to our pursuit of our own “likeness to God,” he could not have known that his theology would help inspire a literary tradition that continues to explore spiritual growth through encounters with the natural world. American nature writing developed some of its strongest roots in the ideas of Channing and the American Transcendentalists he influenced. Emerson explored selfhood and spirituality through nature, famously writing of standing in the woods and sensing that he was “part and parcel of God.” Thoreau likewise wrote of the spiritual expansiveness he experienced through his connection with the…
Programming Series: Transcendentalism. Contact: Laurie D. Sedgwick, CSWR Events Coordinator
ldsedgwick@hds.harvard.edu.
Wednesday, September 23, 2026, 4:00 PM – 6:00 PM.
Conference Room, Center for the Study of World Religions, 42 Francis Ave. Cambridge, MA.
For more info visit cswr.hds.harvard.edu. Exploring Spirituality in Nature Writing: A Writing Workshop Series in Creative Nonfiction
Registration is required and limited to 12 participants.
This workshop series meets on four consecutive Wednesdays: September 9, 16, 23, and 30, from 4-6 pm. Because each session builds on the previous one, participants are expected to attend all four sessions.
Please register to attend in person.
When William Ellery Channing claimed in an 1828 sermon that “we are brought into harmony with the creation” in proportion to our pursuit of our own “likeness to God,” he could not have known that his theology would help inspire a literary tradition that continues to explore spiritual growth through encounters with the natural world. American nature writing developed some of its strongest roots in the ideas of Channing and the American Transcendentalists he influenced. Emerson explored selfhood and spirituality through nature, famously writing of standing in the woods and sensing that he was “part and parcel of God.” Thoreau likewise wrote of the spiritual expansiveness he experienced through his connection with the…
Programming Series: Transcendentalism. Contact: Laurie D. Sedgwick, CSWR Events Coordinator
ldsedgwick@hds.harvard.edu.
Wednesday, September 30, 2026, 4:00 PM – 6:00 PM.
Conference Room, Center for the Study of World Religions, 42 Francis Ave. Cambridge, MA.
For more info visit cswr.hds.harvard.edu. Living Transcendentalism: Phenomenological Ecology and Nature's Wholeness
Living Transcendentalism: Phenomenological Ecology and Nature’s Wholeness
Friday, October 2, 3:30–5:00 pm Opening Talk & Discussion: Imaginative Seeing in Goethe, Coleridge, and Emerson: Pathways to a Phenomenological Ecology
Saturday, October 3, 9:00 am–5:00 pm Workshop: Living Transcendentalism: Phenomenological Ecology and Participating in Nature’s Wholeness
Registration is required.
Please register to attend in person.
Registration Options
The Friday opening talk and discussion is open to all.
Registration for the Saturday workshop includes attendance at both the Friday opening talk and the Saturday workshop. Workshop participation is limited to 15 attendees.
In “Nature,” Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote that “it seems as if the day was not wholly profane in which we have given heed to some natural object.” In this day-long workshop, participants will devote sustained attention to plants, observing in careful detail how they reveal themselves to the senses and how they live within dynamic ecological…
Programming Series: Transcendentalism. Contact: Laurie D. Sedgwick, CSWR Events Coordinator
ldsedgwick@hds.harvard.edu.
Friday, October 2, 2026, 3:30 PM – 5:00 PM.
Common Room, CSWR, 42 Francis Ave. Cambridge, MA.
For more info visit cswr.hds.harvard.edu. Living Transcendentalism: Phenomenological Ecology and Nature's Wholeness
Living Transcendentalism: Phenomenological Ecology and Nature’s Wholeness
Friday, October 2, 3:30–5:00 pm Opening Talk & Discussion: Imaginative Seeing in Goethe, Coleridge, and Emerson: Pathways to a Phenomenological Ecology
Saturday, October 3, 9:00 am–5:00 pm Workshop: Living Transcendentalism: Phenomenological Ecology and Participating in Nature’s Wholeness
Registration is required.
Please register to attend in person.
Registration Options
The Friday opening talk and discussion is open to all.
Registration for the Saturday workshop includes attendance at both the Friday opening talk and the Saturday workshop. Workshop participation is limited to 15 attendees.
In “Nature,” Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote that “it seems as if the day was not wholly profane in which we have given heed to some natural object.” In this day-long workshop, participants will devote sustained attention to plants, observing in careful detail how they reveal themselves to the senses and how they live within dynamic ecological…
Programming Series: Transcendentalism. Contact: Laurie D. Sedgwick, CSWR Events Coordinator
ldsedgwick@hds.harvard.edu.
Saturday, October 3, 2026, 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM.
Common Room, CSWR, 42 Francis Ave. Cambridge, MA.
For more info visit cswr.hds.harvard.edu. In this Twilight: Tar Paintings in Conversation with American Transcendentalism by Christopher Volpe
Registration is required.
Please register to attend in person.
Please join us for the opening reception of Christopher Volpe's exhibition, In this Twilight: Tar Paintings in Conversation with American Transcendentalism.
Titled with a line from Whitman's Leaves of Grass, In this Twilight opens a space between longing for spiritual union with Nature and awareness of ecological decline. This body of work draws on the literature of American Transcendentalism to reflect on today's intertwined social and ecological crises not only as scientific or political challenges but also as the result of longstanding spiritual crises.
Each painting's title references the writings of Whitman, Emerson, Fuller, or Thoreau, while the imagery draws on the common flora and fauna of New England.
The primary medium is industrial coal tar, a byproduct of fossil fuel production. These paintings are made from one of the defining toxic byproducts of industrial civilization—the very material through which modern society has transformed…
Programming Series: Transcendentalism. Contact: Laurie D. Sedgwick, CSWR Event Coordinator
ldsedgwick@hds.harvard.edu.
Tuesday, October 13, 2026, 4:00 PM – 5:00 PM.
Common Room, CSWR, 42 Francis Ave. Cambridge, MA.
Stanley Cavell's Transcendental Etudes Conference
Registration is required.
Please register to attend in person.
Please register to attend on Zoom.
Organized to commemorate the centenary of philosopher Stanley Cavell's (1926–2018) birth, Stanley Cavell's Transcendental Etudes brings together leading scholars to explore the enduring significance of his thought for contemporary conversations in religion, ethics, and politics. While Cavell is widely recognized for his contributions to ordinary language philosophy, aesthetics, literary criticism, and political theory, the religious dimensions of his work have received comparatively less attention.
Presented as part of the Center for the Study of World Religions' Transcendentalism Initiative, the conference explores the dimensions of Cavell's thought that emerge through his sustained engagement with Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and the broader Transcendentalist tradition.
The conference will feature four keynote addresses and a concluding panel discussion examining the continued relevance of…
Programming Series: Transcendentalism. Contact: Laurie D. Sedgwick, CSWR Events Coordinator
ldsedgwick@hds.harvard.edu.
Thursday, October 22, 2026, 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM.
Braun Room, Swartz Hall
45 Francis Ave.
Cambridge, MA.