The Eleventh Smoke Farm Symposium

Each summer since 2009, scientists, scholars, artists, activists, philosophers, journalists, research physicians, and other thinkers have gathered at Smoke Farm for the Symposium—a day of lectures and conversation that finishes with a large communal dinner by an accomplished local chef.

Past speakers have included MacArthur Genius and Soros Foundation fellows, members of the Black Panther Party and George Jackson Brigade, a NASA scientist and astrobiologist, an architect who designs ecologically sustainable cities for the Chinese government, a founder of Occupy Wall Street, and a photographer who studies what prisons and suburbs look like from the sky.

The events begins at 11 a.m. on Sat, Sept. 21 and ends with a big, communal dinner by chef Monica Dimas (Little Neon Taco, Sunset Fried Chicken, Tortas Condesa).

Guests are welcome to camp on Saturday night—and go for a swim in the Stillaguamish River.

This year’s Smoke Farm Symposium speakers are:

* Adrienne Fairhall, co-director of the University of Washington's Institute of Neuroengineering and Computational Neuroscience Center gives a crash course on dopamine: what you know, what neuroscientists think they know, and what actually seems to be the case.

* Writer, filmmaker, and thinker Charles Mudede (The Stranger, The New York Times, Cinema Scope, C Theory; films: Police Beat, Zoo) on "Life After Economic Catastrophe." He spent some time in Detroit's art scene and found it thriving, despite capital flight, high unemployment, and bottomed-out property values: "How is this possible? How can a place like this be anything but miserable? But such is not the case. My talk will concern this process and what it can tell us about the possibilities of a post-capitalist city."

* Author, editor, and Evergreen State College teacher Miranda Mellis (The Spokes, None of This Is Real, The Quarry, The Revisionist, The Encyclopedia Project, and Demystifications, forthcoming from Solid Objects) reads from new fiction titled “The Receptive”: "Receptivity as the contemplatives’ technique for being-time is central, as is receptivity as a tonic disposition for the co-existence of members of pluralistic 'democracies of incommensurables' as Jean-Luc Nancy puts it. She explores the ethical and political promise of receptivity as an ontology, healing art, discipline, affect, and formal and ritualized practice."

* Fulbright fellow Mary Weir, who has worked to bring education inside federal and state prisons, as well as local jails, on Danish “open” prisons. Are they really a form of “humane” incarceration? What would that even mean?

* Retired clinical psychologist Clark Martin (who spoke at a previous Symposium about his participation in psilocybin research at Johns Hopkins University) on his new project: “High-functioning Asperger’s: A Poorly Understood Condition with Some Hypotheses from the Inside Out—a Memoir.”

And returning chef Monica Dimas of Milkwood & Co. (an umbrella for her restaurants Neon Taco, Tortas Condesa, Sunset Fried Chicken Sandwiches, Westman’s Bagel & Coffee, and more) will oversee the weekend’s menu.

The Symposium is co-organized by Stuart Smithers (chair of the religion department at University of Puget Sound) and Brendan Kiley (reporter at the Seattle Times), plus a community of stalwart volunteers.

Smoke Farm is a nonprofit-run organization. It relies on your generosity to keep up its work—but, as always, nobody will be turned away for lack of funds.

We look forward to seeing you there.