Academics, Universities Come
to the Rescue of the Mountains

On April 23 and 24, nearly 40 people attended a symposium at the University of Pennsylvania organized by Mary Hufford, professor and director of the Center for Folklore and Ethnography. The university’s Institute for Environmental Studies co-sponsored the event, "Sustaining the Mountains: Ecological Citizenship for the 21st Century." A flier advertising the event read in part: "To get at the remaining coal reserves, the coal industry is taking down the Appalachian mountains through a method of strip mining known as ‘mountaintop removal and valley fill.’ Disappearing along with the mountains and valleys is a wealth of biocultural diversity and associated historical and ecological memory. Can the mountains and communities of Central Appalachia survive the national demand for coal-fired electricity?"