Continuing education by the community, for the community.
Seeing a need to respond to the needs of a community constantly fluctuating and striving to cope with blinding and often confusing transition, Simon Fraser University’s Continuing Studies Department created the Philosophers’ Café.
Meeting together throughout the lower mainland, the regular café gatherings are open to the public with no pre-registration. The environment is attractive to a diverse crowd of formal academics and academics of the heart. Each session is moderated by a pre-selected individual hailing from one of many universities or colleges. Topics have ranged from sex talk to poverty, politics to poetry, never shy on exploring the issues that strike us all at one time or another.
The goal is simply to bring people together for one common purpose: To learn. It is a creative and innovative way to discover meaning in a manner that seems to always leave behind the byproducts of camaraderie, unity and enlightenment.
Comfortable in casual surroundings, lifelong learners teach each other through the every day discussions about real life experiences. The Globe & Mail said “The Philosophers’ Café might be the most successful continuing education program in the country” (October 27, 2003)
In a time when many are struggling to belong in our community in a meaningful way, the Philosophers’ Café series provides a unique circuit to build interpersonal connection.
The next False Creek Community Centre edition of the Philosophers’ Café is on December 6th at 7 pm. The topic is “The Art of Dying.”
Philosophers’ Café
False Creek Community Centre, 1318 Cartwright St, Granville Island
Everyone welcome. No pre-registration required. Admission $5.
The Art of Dying Constantly relegated to a taboo status, the encounter of personal death is possibly the single most pressing and crucial moment of our existence. Can we face it straightforwardly? Joyfully? How? Further, how does society with its current values and customs help (or hinder) us to die peacefully?
Moderator: Miguel Rodriguez is a writer and poet from Spain, currently residing in Vancouver with his partner and daughter, where they coordinate and live at a settlement house for refugee claimants. He has written numerous essays (long and short, but not very good ones he says) on many different topics, including Eastern and Western philosophy, religion, art and literature, politics, economics and science. He publishes periodically in a variety of journals and magazines.
Every year after Halloween, the majority of jack-o-lanterns end up in the garbage and it’s a frightening waste. This year, Thrifty Foods is encouraging residents to keep their pumpkins out of the trash and to join them at the Pumpkin Smash. Help save valuable landfill space, and give your pumpkin a proper burial in our compost bin. Lawrence Guichon from Port Guichon Farms is providing the bin and will be doing all the composting. There will also be a BBQ by donation with net proceeds going to children’s charities.
