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Camphill and the Future DISABILITY STUDIES | RELIGION M C KANAN THE CAMPHILL MOVEMENT, one of the world’s largest and most enduring networks of intentional communities, deserves both recognition and study. CAMPHILL A ND Founded in Scotland at the beginning of the Second World War, Camphill communities still thrive today, encompassing thousands of people living in more CAMPHILL than one hundred twenty schools, villages, and urban neighborhoods on four continents. Camphillers of all abilities share daily work, family life, and festive THE FUTURE celebrations with one another and their neighbors. Unlike movements that reject mainstream society, Camphill expressly seeks to be “a seed of social renewal” by evolving along with society to promote the full inclusion and empowerment of persons with disabilities, who comprise nearly half of their residents. In this Spirituality and Disability in an Evolving Communal Movement multifaceted exploration of Camphill, Dan McKanan traces the complexities of AND THE the movement’s history, envisions its possible future, and invites ongoing dia- logue between the fields of disability studies and communal studies. “Dan McKanan knows Camphill better than anyone else in the academic world FUTURE and has crafted an absorbing account of the movement as it faces challenges eighty years after its founding.” TIMOTHY MILLER, author of The Encyclopedic Guide to American Inten- tional Communities “This book serves as a living, working document for the Camphill movement. Spirituality and Disability Communal Movement in an Evolving McKanan shows that disability studies and communal studies have more to offer each other than we recognize.” ELIZABETH SANDERS, Managing Director, Camphill Academy “With good research and wonderful empathy, McKanan pinpoints not only Cam- phill’s societal significance but also how this eighty-year-old movement can still bring potent remediation for the values and social norms of today’s world.” RICHARD STEEL, CEO, Karl König Institute DAN MCKANAN is the Emerson Senior Lecturer at Harvard Divinity School. His research focuses on religion and social transformation, with special empha- sis on intentional communities, sustainable agriculture, and leftist activism. His most recent book is Eco-Alchemy: Anthroposophy and the History and Future of Environmentalism. UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS www.ucpress.edu A free open access ebook is available upon publication. Learn more at www.luminosoa.org. Cover design: Glynnis Koike. Cover illustration: Weaving by Bill Lewis of Camphill Village Kimberton Hills, Pennsylvania. Design created by Mary Fisher, Isabela Seabra, Saskia Gilfoy, Sue Wiecheld, Johannah Newman, Andrew Abromowitz, Marchen Ohi, Lynn Schatzburg, and Felicity Jeans. Photograph by Ethan Ingsley. Reprinted with permission of the artists. DAN MC KANAN Luminos is the Open Access monograph publishing program from UC Press. Luminos provides a framework for preserving and reinvigorating monograph publishing for the future and increases the reach and visibility of important scholarly work. Titles published in the UC Press Luminos model are published with the same high standards for selection, peer review, production, and marketing as those in our traditional program. www.luminosoa.org Camphill and the Future Camphill and the Future Spirituality and Disability in an Evolving Communal Movement Dan McKanan UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS University of California Press Oakland, California © 2020 by Dan McKanan This work is licensed under a Creative Commons [CC BY-NC-ND] license. To view a copy of the license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses. Suggested citation: McKanan, D. Camphill and the Future: Spirituality and Disability in an Evolving Communal Movement. Oakland: University of California Press, 2020. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1525/luminos.92 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: McKanan, Dan, author. Title: Camphill and the future : spirituality and disability in an evolving communal movement / Dan McKanan. Description: Oakland, California : University of California Press, [2020] | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: lccn 2020014490 (print) | lccn 2020014491 (ebook) | isbn 9780520344082 (paperback) | isbn 9780520975354 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Camphill Movement—History—20th century. | Camphill Movement—History—21st century. | People with mental disabilities—Religious aspects. | Anthroposophical therapy. Classification: LCC HV3004.M335 2020 (print) | LCC HV3004 (ebook) | DDC 362.3/8—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020014490 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020014491 29 28 27 26 25 24 23 22 21 20 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Contents Acknowledgments vii Introduction 1 A Visit to Camphill 1 Camphill Worldwide 3 Camphill Past and Future 8 Camphill and the Scholars 14 Many Paths to the Future 18 1. Camphill Generations 25 The Founders 26 Those Who Came 35 The Boomers 41 A Missing Generation 58 The Fourth Generation 65 2. Camphill Constituencies 81 Students and Villagers 83 Lifesharing Coworkers 97 Young Coworkers 102 Employees 112 Parents 130 Board Members 133 vi Contents 3. Camphill Contexts 140 The Anthroposophical Movement 140 Other Communal Movements 161 Environmentalism 170 Social Care in an Age of Austerity 175 Disability Rights 187 Camphill Crises and Renewal 195 Conclusion 205 Notes 209 Index 231 Acknowledgments I have accumulated many debts in the twenty years I have spent studying Camphill. My greatest gratitude is for the people of Camphill Village Minnesota. They welcomed me in 1999 as a young professor who wasn’t quite sure if I was looking for a research topic or a garden to weed. Many people who befriended me that summer have since died, among them Jerry, Danny, Jan, Trudy, David, and Evelyn. I hope that a small measure of their kindness will live on in the pages of this book. The people who welcomed me to other Camphills are too numerous to name. My spouse, Tammy, and daughter, Oriana, accompanied me on long sojourns through Camphill places in Scotland, Ireland, England, Canada, and Norway. Hundreds of people cooked meals for us, prepared guest rooms, and allowed us to work alongside them in gardens, kitchens, and workshops. Others welcomed me to Camphill places near Lake Constance and in the Netherlands. Both I and my students have enjoyed the hospitality of Heartbeet Lifesharing, Camphill Copake, Triform Camphill Community, Camphill Ghent, Camphill Hudson, Camphill Special School (Beaver Run and Beaver Farm), Camphill Village Kimberton Hills, and Camphill Soltane on many occasions, most recently the festive gathering of the International Communal Studies Association at the New York communities in summer 2019. I am grateful to Harvard’s Center for the Study of World Religions for a grant that made some of these journeys possible, as well as to the Divinity School for supporting research leaves in the 2013–14 academic year and the spring of 2018. My understanding of Camphill and of intentional communities has been enriched by colleagues in both the academy and the community movement. I presented many sections of this book at meetings of the Communal Studies Asso- ciation, International Communal Studies Association, American Academy of vii viii Acknowledgments Religion, Unitarian Universalist Collegium, North American Religions Colloquium at Harvard, Camphill Research Symposium, Biodynamic Association, and the Anthroposophic Council for Inclusive Social Development, and I thank the many friends and colleagues who shared their experiences and insights with me. I am also grateful to Eric Schmidt of the University of California Press for his consistent championing of scholarship on anthroposophy, to my two anonymous peer review- ers, and to the Press’s dedicated editorial, production, and marketing professionals. Finally, I wish to thank every person who is quoted in this book, as well as the people whom I interviewed but did not quote. Each of you gave a piece of your own life to make this book possible. I hope my words are a fitting testament to the devotion and creativity that you have shared with Camphill. Introduction A VISIT TO CAMPHILL Each year I bring students from Harvard University to a Camphill community —usually, either Camphill Village USA in Copake, New York, or Heartbeet Lifesharing in Vermont. At Camphill my students encounter a social world that is different from their own. We travel from the busy streets of Cambridge to dirt roads and mountain valleys, where our passage may be blocked by a herd of cows making their leisurely way to the milking barn. Camphill houses have a unique architectural style, with few right angles and lots of whimsical art. Each house is home to as many as a dozen people—families with children, young volunteers, elders—and the houses are interspersed with craft workshops, chapels, perfor- mance halls, and gardens. People walk easily from home to work to church to artistic performances that sometimes feature world-class performers. Meals open with sung prayers that are familiar to the Camphillers and unknown to my stu- dents. The students must learn the subtle customs of Camphill—a napkin in a ring, for example, signals the usual place of one of the house’s residents, while a napkin folded flat signals a space available for a guest. They learn, sometimes with difficulty, that they should not leap up after a meal to help wash the dishes. Every task is already assigned to someone who performs it with pleasure and pride, and the visitor’s role is to wait for someone to offer tea
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