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Download Full Text (724 KB)
ISBN
978-0993068874
Target Grades
Middle School
Publication Date
2023
Publisher
Green Teen Team
Number of Pages
222
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Summary
Dreamersis a philosophical adventure novel for ages 12 and beyond, told through the eyes of four pre-adolescent children of varying ethnic and racial backgrounds living in a small town in the American Southwest, who embark together on a school inquiry project centered on the phenomenon of dreaming. Not only do they record and share their dreams with each other, they inquire together into the role and status of dreaming in cultures past and present, the interpretation of dreams, the scientific analysis of dreaming, and the role of dreams in mythology and religion. The dramatic events of the novel are interspersed with discussions around concepts in philosophy of nature, and evoke the perennial re-articulation of vitalism, hylozoism and panpsychism in the philosophical tradition, and the queering of the distinction between the organic and the inorganic, the human and the non-human implicit in a post-human, relational ontology. See the online instructional manual at: https://sites.google.com/view/dreamers-david-kennedy/home
Excerpt
Sometimes it feels like everything is slowing down, even though it looks the same on the outside. Then everything starts to feel like it’s alive. The trees, the plants and bushes with leaves and branches, the little solitary flowers and the bright red berries—it feels like they are breathing too, and they are flesh like our flesh, not so different as all that. And maybe that they are aware of us the same way we are aware of them. Not like seeing us with eyes or anything, but in other ways, like we’re in the same energy space, and we are affecting each other. It only happens with me once in a while, like it did this time on that path. Usually it doesn’t last very long because I start thinking about it and my brain is going so much faster than everything else that I can’t feel it any more, because it’s going much slower. But when it’s happening even the stones are alive, shining and shimmering in their hardness, and the dirt like fur. And animals—the jays and crows and squirrels and insects, everything that moves around like us, that goes faster—they are just like us, going places with plans and directions and problems to solve and things they have to get done..
I tried to describe it one time—we were at the cave--and Neda said, “It sounds like a dream.”
“But maybe it’s real,” Cynda said. “I mean maybe that’s more real.”
“How can something be more real?” Kio said. “Either it’s real or it’s not. Things can’t be more or less real.”
“But plants,” Neda said. “The thing about plants is that they can’t move. They’re rooted to the spot.”
“Yeah,” Kio said. “Plugged into their food source. They’re like people on life-support in the hospital. I don’t see how they could think or even feel anything.”
“No wait,” Neda said. “It’s not that they can’t move, it’s that they don’t need to move. Besides, they move by throwing seeds for other plants like them to grow. And they need water, and light, and minerals and stuff from the dirt. And if you need stuff, you must want stuff. That’s energy.”
“But how is that moving—throwing seeds for new plants?” Kio said.
“Well it’s not the one plant moving but it’s the species moving. Like us—we’re seeds thrown by our parents to make more creatures like us.”
“Absolutely,” Cynda said. “I absolutely think that plants have desire, because they need stuff. They have to solve problems just like us.”
“But,” Kio said, “you desire something that’s not there—that’s why you desire it. And plants have everything right there where they’re rooted. They don’t have to reach out for anything, the way animals do. They are completely a part of everything around them. They can’t tell the difference between themselves and everything else. They don’t feel anything because they don’t need to feel anything.”
“No,” Neda said, “I don’t agree! Plants are in an environment just like us. They have to survive just like us. I’ll bet they know very well what other kinds of plants are around them, and how to fight a predator, and what plants they have to compete with, and all that.”
Kio kind of snorted. “And how do they know all that, and do all that?”
“Chemicals,” she answered. “Chemical signals. Smells that say “come here’ or “go away’.”
“You think a plant doesn’t feel it when you touch it?” I said.
There were little patches of moss—fuzzy turquoise green--on the flat rock where we sat facing the huge sky. I reached next to me and stroked a patch lightly with my index finger, like stroking a little animal. It felt soft and wiry at the same time, and it kind of tickled my finger. “You don’t think it feels this?” I said.
“Of course it does,” Neda said. “It’s alive isn’t it? Everything that’s alive has an inside! Everything wants to live, to keep on existing doesn’t it? Even rocks.” She reached out and stroked and patted the reddish rock in front of her with the palm of her hand. “I say this world is one big animal!” We all laughed, and even though Neda really meant it, she laughed too. . . .
Keywords
dreams and dreaming; philosophical fiction; philosophy for children; philosophy of nature
Disciplines
Education | Philosophy
Recommended Citation
Kennedy, David (2023) Dreamers: Adventures in dreams and dreams of adventures ... Green Teen Team.
