Slow Movement
Encyclopedia
The Slow Movement advocates a cultural shift toward slowing down life's pace. It began with Carlo Petrini
Carlo Petrini
Carlo Petrini , born in the province of Cuneo in the commune of Bra in Italy, is the founder of the International Slow Food Movement...

's protest against the opening of a McDonald's
McDonald's
McDonald's Corporation is the world's largest chain of hamburger fast food restaurants, serving around 64 million customers daily in 119 countries. Headquartered in the United States, the company began in 1940 as a barbecue restaurant operated by the eponymous Richard and Maurice McDonald; in 1948...

 restaurant in Piazza di Spagna, Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

 in 1986 that sparked the creation of the Slow Food
Slow Food
Slow Food is an international movement founded by Carlo Petrini in 1986. Promoted as an alternative to fast food, it strives to preserve traditional and regional cuisine and encourages farming of plants, seeds and livestock characteristic of the local ecosystem. It was the first established part of...

 organization. Over time, this developed into a subculture in other areas, such as Cittaslow (Slow Cities)
Cittaslow
Cittaslow is a movement founded in Italy in October 1999. The inspiration of Cittaslow was the Slow Food organization. Cittaslow's goals include improving the quality of life in towns by slowing down its overall pace, especially in a city's use of spaces and the flow of life and traffic through them...

, Slow living
Slow living
Slow Living is the choice to live consciously with the goal of enhancing personal, community and environmental well being. Slow Living recognizes the role that time plays in shaping the quality of our lives. By slowing down we make time to savor our experiences and to connect more fully with others...

, Slow Travel, and Slow Design
Slow design
Slow Design is a branch of the Slow Movement, which began with the concept of Slow Food, a term coined in contrast to fast food. As with every branch of the Slow Movement, the overarching goal of Slow Design is to promote well being for individuals, society, and the natural environment...

.

Geir Berthelsen
Geir Berthelsen
Geir Berthelsen is the founder of the think-tank The World Institute of Slowness.Geir Berthelsen has been working with change management and problem solving around the globe for small and large corporation for the last 15 years...

 and his creation of The World Institute of Slowness presented a vision in 1999 for an entire 'Slow Planet' and a need to teach the world the way of Slow.

Professor Guttorm Fløistad summarizes the philosophy
Philosophy
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...

, stating:


The only thing for certain is that everything changes. The rate of change increases. If you want to hang on you better speed up. That is the message of today. It could however be useful to remind everyone that our basic needs never change. The need to be seen and appreciated! It is the need to belong. The need for nearness and care, and for a little love! This is given only through slowness in human relations. In order to master changes, we have to recover slowness, reflection and togetherness. There we will find real renewal.


The Slow Movement is not organized and controlled by a single organization. A fundamental characteristic of the Slow Movement is that it is propounded, and its momentum maintained, by individuals that constitute the expanding global community of Slow. Although it has existed in some form since the Industrial Revolution
Industrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution was a period from the 18th to the 19th century where major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, transportation, and technology had a profound effect on the social, economic and cultural conditions of the times...

its popularity has grown considerably since the rise of Slow Food
Slow Food
Slow Food is an international movement founded by Carlo Petrini in 1986. Promoted as an alternative to fast food, it strives to preserve traditional and regional cuisine and encourages farming of plants, seeds and livestock characteristic of the local ecosystem. It was the first established part of...

 and Cittaslow
Cittaslow
Cittaslow is a movement founded in Italy in October 1999. The inspiration of Cittaslow was the Slow Food organization. Cittaslow's goals include improving the quality of life in towns by slowing down its overall pace, especially in a city's use of spaces and the flow of life and traffic through them...

 in Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

, with Slow initiatives spreading as far as Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

 and Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

.

Slow Food

Opposed to the culture of fast food
Fast food
Fast food is the term given to food that can be prepared and served very quickly. While any meal with low preparation time can be considered to be fast food, typically the term refers to food sold in a restaurant or store with preheated or precooked ingredients, and served to the customer in a...

, the sub-movement known as Slow Food
Slow Food
Slow Food is an international movement founded by Carlo Petrini in 1986. Promoted as an alternative to fast food, it strives to preserve traditional and regional cuisine and encourages farming of plants, seeds and livestock characteristic of the local ecosystem. It was the first established part of...

 seeks to encourage the enjoyment of regional produce
Local food
Local food or the local food movement is a "collaborative effort to build more locally based, self-reliant food economies - one in which sustainable food production, processing, distribution, and consumption is integrated to enhance the economic, environmental and social health of a particular...

, traditional foods, which are often grown organically
Organic food
Organic foods are foods that are produced using methods that do not involve modern synthetic inputs such as synthetic pesticides and chemical fertilizers, do not contain genetically modified organisms, and are not processed using irradiation, industrial solvents, or chemical food additives.For the...

 and to enjoy these foods in the company of others. It aims to defend agricultural biodiversity.

The movement claims 83,000 members in 50 countries, which are organized into 800 Convivia or local chapters. Sometimes operating under a logo of a snail, the collective philosophy is to preserve and support traditional ways of life. Today, 42 states in the U.S. have their own convivium.

In 2004, representatives from food communities in more than 150 countries met in Turin under the umbrella of the Terra Madre
Terra Madre
Terra Madre is a network of food communities, each committed to producing quality food in a responsible, sustainable way. Terra Madre also refers to a major bi-annual conference held in Torino, Italy intended to foster discussion and introduce innovative concepts in the field of food, gastronomy,...

 (Mother Earth) network.

Slow Gardening

For more details on this topic, see Slow Gardening
Slow Gardening
Slow gardening is a philosophical approach to gardening which encourages participants to savor everything they do, using all the senses, through all seasons, regardless of garden type of style...

.

Slow Gardening
Slow Gardening
Slow gardening is a philosophical approach to gardening which encourages participants to savor everything they do, using all the senses, through all seasons, regardless of garden type of style...

 is a movement that helps gardeners savor what they grow using all their senses through all the seasons. It is not about being lazy; rather it is aimed at getting more out of what they do.

Slow Money

Slow Money
Slow Money
Slow Money is a movement to organize investors and donors to steer new sources of capital to small food enterprises, organic farms, and local food systems. Slow Money takes its name from the Slow Food movement. Slow Money aims to develop the relationship between capital markets and place,...

 is a movement to organize investors and donors to steer new sources of capital to small food enterprises, organic farms, and local food systems. Slow Money takes its name from the Slow Food
Slow Food
Slow Food is an international movement founded by Carlo Petrini in 1986. Promoted as an alternative to fast food, it strives to preserve traditional and regional cuisine and encourages farming of plants, seeds and livestock characteristic of the local ecosystem. It was the first established part of...

 movement. Slow Money aims to develop the relationship between capital markets and place, including social and soil fertility. Slow Money is supporting the grass-roots mobilization through network building, convening, publishing, and incubating intermediary strategies and structures of funding.

Cittaslow

The goals of the Cittaslow
Cittaslow
Cittaslow is a movement founded in Italy in October 1999. The inspiration of Cittaslow was the Slow Food organization. Cittaslow's goals include improving the quality of life in towns by slowing down its overall pace, especially in a city's use of spaces and the flow of life and traffic through them...

 movement is to resist the homogenization and globalization
Globalization
Globalization refers to the increasingly global relationships of culture, people and economic activity. Most often, it refers to economics: the global distribution of the production of goods and services, through reduction of barriers to international trade such as tariffs, export fees, and import...

 of towns and cities and seeks to improve the quality and enjoyment of living by encouraging happiness and self-determination.

Slow Parenting

Slow parenting
Slow parenting
Slow parenting is a parenting style in which few activities are organised for children. Instead, they are allowed to explore the world at their own pace...

 encourages parents to plan less for their children, instead allowing them to enjoy their childhood and explore the world at their own pace. It is a response to hyper-parenting and helicopter parent
Helicopter parent
Helicopter parent is a colloquial, early 21st-century term for a parent who pays extremely close attention to his or her child's or children's experiences and problems, particularly at educational institutions. The term was originally coined by Foster W. Cline, M.D. and Jim Fay in their 1990 book...

ing, the widespread trend for parents to schedule activities and classes after school every day and every weekend, to solve problems on behalf of the children, and to buy services from commercial suppliers rather than letting nature take its course. It was described most specifically by Carl Honoré
Carl Honoré
Carl Honoré is a Canadian journalist who wrote the internationally best-selling book In Praise of Slowness: How A Worldwide Movement Is Challenging the Cult of Speed about the Slow Movement....

 in "Under Pressure: Rescuing Our Children From The Culture Of Hyper-Parenting".

Slow Travel

Slow Travel is an evolving movement that has taken its inspiration from nineteenth-century European travel writers, such as Théophile Gautier
Théophile Gautier
Pierre Jules Théophile Gautier was a French poet, dramatist, novelist, journalist, art critic and literary critic....

, who reacted against the cult of speed, prompting some modern analysts to ask "If we have slow food and slow cities, then why not slow travel?". Other literary and exploration traditions, from early Arab travellers to late nineteenth-century Yiddish writers, have also identified with slow travel, usually marking its connection with community as its most distinctive feature.

Advocates of slow travel argue that all too often the potential pleasure of the journey is lost by too eager anticipation of arrival. Slow travel, it is asserted, is a state of mind which allows travellers to engage more fully with communities along their route, often favouring visits to spots enjoyed by local residents rather than merely following guidebooks. As such, slow travel shares some common values with ecotourism
Ecotourism
Ecotourism is a form of tourism visiting fragile, pristine, and usually protected areas, intended as a low impact and often small scale alternative to standard commercial tourism...

. Its advocates and devotees generally look for low-impact travel styles, even to the extent of eschewing flying.

Aspects of slow travel, including some of the principles detailed in the Manifesto for Slow Travel, are now increasingly featuring in travel writing. The magazine Hidden Europe, which published the Manifesto for Slow Travel, has particularly showcased slow travel, featuring articles that focus on unhurried, low-impact journeys and advocating a stronger engagement with communities that lie en route.

A new book series launched in May 2010 by Bradt Travel Guides
Bradt Travel Guides
Bradt Travel Guides is a publisher of travel guides founded by Hilary Bradt who was awarded an MBE in 2008 for services to the Tourist Industry and to Charity....

 explicitly espouses slow travel ideas with volumes that focus very much on local communities within a tightly defined area, often advocating the use of public transport along the way. Titles include Bus-Pass Britain, Slow Norfolk and Suffolk, Slow Devon and Exmoor, Slow Cotswolds, Slow North Yorkshire and Slow Sussex and South Downs National Park.

Slow Art

Slow Art is an emerging movement evolving out of a philosophy of art and life expounded by the artist Tim Slowinski. Later developments in Slow Art have been championed by such proponents as Michael Kimmelman, chief art critic and columnist for the New York Times. It advocates appreciating an art work in itself as opposed to a rapid, flitting witnessing of art common in a hectic societal setting. One of its central tenets is that people often seek out what they already know as opposed to allowing the artist to present a journey or piece in its entirety.

Another interpretation of Slow Art relates to creating art in a slow way. This practice is about being mindful of detail, valuing the history inherent in re-usable materials, putting time into creating small items. The practice encourages the maker to be naturally meditative as they create. "Slow" ends up being a way of being. An example of local makers creating in this way is highlighted by those involved with the inaugural Eastside Makers Market in Tasmania
Tasmania
Tasmania is an Australian island and state. It is south of the continent, separated by Bass Strait. The state includes the island of Tasmania—the 26th largest island in the world—and the surrounding islands. The state has a population of 507,626 , of whom almost half reside in the greater Hobart...

.

Slow Media

Slow Media is a movement aiming at sustainable and focused media production as well as media consumption. It formed in the context of a massive acceleration of news distribution ending in almost real-time digital media such as Twitter
Twitter
Twitter is an online social networking and microblogging service that enables its users to send and read text-based posts of up to 140 characters, informally known as "tweets".Twitter was created in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey and launched that July...

. Beginning 2010 many local Slow Media initiatives formed in the USA and Europe (Germany, France, Italy) leading to a high attention in mass-media. Others experiment with a reduction of their daily media intake and log their efforts online ("Slow Media Diet").

Slow Fashion

The term "Slow Fashion" was coined by Kate Fletcher in 2007 (Centre for Sustainable Fashion, UK). "Slow fashion is not a seasonal trend that comes and goes like animal print, but a sustainable fashion movement that is gaining momentum."

The Slow Fashion Movement is based on the same principals of the Slow Food Movement, as the alternative to mass produced clothing (AKA “Fast-Fashion
Fast fashion
Fast fashion is a contemporary term used by fashion retailers to acknowledge that designs move from catwalk to store in the fastest time to capture current trends in the market. This has developed from a product-driven concept based on a manufacturing model referred to as "quick response" developed...

”). Initially, The Slow Clothing Movement was intended to reject all mass produced clothing referring only to clothing made by hand, but has broadened to include many interpretations and is practiced in various ways.

Some examples of slow fashion practices include:
  • Opposing and boycotting mass produced fashion (AKA "Fast-Fashion
    Fast fashion
    Fast fashion is a contemporary term used by fashion retailers to acknowledge that designs move from catwalk to store in the fastest time to capture current trends in the market. This has developed from a product-driven concept based on a manufacturing model referred to as "quick response" developed...

    " or "McFashion").
  • Choosing artisan products to support smaller businesses, fair trade and locally-made clothes.
  • Buying secondhand or vintage clothing and donating unwanted garments.
  • Choosing clothing made with sustainable, ethically-made or recycled fabrics.
  • Choosing quality garments that will last longer, transcend trends (a "classic" style), and be repairable.
  • Doing it yourself - making, mending, customizing, altering, and up-cycling your own clothing.
  • Slowing the rate of fashion consumption: buying fewer clothes less often.


The Slow Fashion movement is a unified representation of all the "sustainable", "eco", "green", and "ethical" fashion movements. It encourages education about the garment industry's connection and impact on the environment and depleting resources, slowing of the supply chain to reduce the number of trends and seasons, to encourage quality production, and return greater value to garments removing the image of disposability of fashion. A key phrase repeatedly heard in reference to Slow Fashion is "quality over quantity". This phrase is used to summarize the basic principles of slowing down the rate of clothing consumption by choosing garments that last longer.

Slow Software Development

As part of the agile software development
Agile software development
Agile software development is a group of software development methodologies based on iterative and incremental development, where requirements and solutions evolve through collaboration between self-organizing, cross-functional teams...

 movement, groups of software developers around the world look for more predictive projects, and aiming at a more sustainable career and work-life balance. They propose some practices such as pair programming
Pair programming
Pair programming is an agile software development technique in which two programmers work together at one workstation. One, the driver, types in code while the other, the observer , reviews each line of code as it is typed in...

, code review
Code review
Code review is systematic examination of computer source code. It is intended to find and fix mistakes overlooked in the initial development phase, improving both the overall quality of software and the developers' skills...

s, and code refactorings that result in more reliable and robust software applications.

Slow Science

The Slow Science
Slow Science
Slow Science is part of the broader Slow Movement. It is based on the belief that science should be a slow, steady, methodical process, and that scientists should not be expected to provide "quick fixes" to society's problems...

 movement's objective is to enable scientists to take the time to think and read. The prevalent culture of science is publish or perish
Publish or perish
"Publish or perish" is a phrase coined to describe the pressure in academia to publish work constantly to further or sustain one's career.Frequent publication is one of the few methods at a scholar's disposal to demonstrate their academic capabilities, and the attention that successful publications...

, where scientists are judged to be better if they publish more papers in less time, and only the best scientists are able to maintain their careers. Those who practice and promote slow science suggest that "society should give scientists the time they need" .

Slow Goods

Slow Goods takes its core direction from various elements of the overall 'Slow Movement' and applying it to the concept, design and manufacturing of physical objects. It focuses on low production runs, the usage of craftspeople within the process and on-shore manufacturing. Proponents of this philosophy seek and collaborate with smaller, local supply and service partners. Slow Goods practitioners must have those tenets baked into their business model, it must be the top driver in the procurement of sustainable materials and manufacturing techniques. The rationale for this local engagement facilitates the assurance of quality, the revitalization of local manufacturing industries and reduces greatly the footprint related to the shipment of goods across regions of land and or water. Again, quality always supersedes quantity. The genesis of a product is becoming more of concern for consumers. Some companies have now woven this philosophy into their corporate structure. The source of a product and its parts has becoming increasingly more important.
This movement seeks to break current conventions of perpetuating the disposable nature of mass production. By using higher quality materials and craftsmanship, items attain a longer lifespan that harkens back to manufacturing golden era of the past.

See also

  • African time
    African time
    African time is a colloquial term used to describe a perceived cultural tendency, in most parts of Africa, toward a more relaxed attitude to time. This is sometimes used in a pejorative sense, about tardiness in appointments, meetings and events...

  • Carl Honoré
    Carl Honoré
    Carl Honoré is a Canadian journalist who wrote the internationally best-selling book In Praise of Slowness: How A Worldwide Movement Is Challenging the Cult of Speed about the Slow Movement....

  • In Praise of Slow
  • Simple living
    Simple living
    Simple living encompasses a number of different voluntary practices to simplify one's lifestyle. These may include reducing one's possessions or increasing self-sufficiency, for example. Simple living may be characterized by individuals being satisfied with what they need rather than want...

  • Slow architecture
    Slow architecture
    Slow Architecture is a term believed to have grown from the Slow Food movement of the mid 1980's. Slow Architecture is generally architecture that is created gradually and organically, as opposed to building it quickly for short term goals...

  • Slow design
    Slow design
    Slow Design is a branch of the Slow Movement, which began with the concept of Slow Food, a term coined in contrast to fast food. As with every branch of the Slow Movement, the overarching goal of Slow Design is to promote well being for individuals, society, and the natural environment...

  • Slow living
    Slow living
    Slow Living is the choice to live consciously with the goal of enhancing personal, community and environmental well being. Slow Living recognizes the role that time plays in shaping the quality of our lives. By slowing down we make time to savor our experiences and to connect more fully with others...

  • Slow reading
    Slow reading
    Slow reading is the intentional reduction in the speed of reading, carried out to increase comprehension or pleasure. The concept appears to have originated in the study of philosophy and literature as a technique to more fully comprehend and appreciate a complex text...

  • Slow Sex Movement
  • Slow Bicycle Movement
  • Slowth
  • Slowcore (music)
  • World Sauntering Day
    World Sauntering Day
    World Sauntering Day is an annual holiday celebrated on the 19th of June each year. The purpose is to remind us to take it easy, smell the roses, and enjoy life as opposed to rushing through it...

    (June 19)
The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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