What Is the Worldview Literacy Project?
What is the Worldview Literacy Project?
The Worldview Literacy Project (WLP) is a nonprofit educational initiative of Kindred World that offers a 90‑day, self‑directed or community learning guide to help people recognize and shift their underlying worldview toward an Indigenous, nature‑centered, kinship orientation in order to rebalance life on Earth.
Use the Worldview Chart by Four Arrows to notice how beliefs show up in everyday systems (education, economics, religion, science, media, parenting, childhood). You can also complete a survey designed to gather stories and insights about worldview shifts.
Worldview Literacy is a Doorway to Choosing a Nature-Conscious Way of Living
WLP builds on Indigenous/Kinship Worldview scholarship revealing “two essential worldviews: one where Nature is conscious and one where it is not,” positioning worldview literacy as a doorway to choosing a nature‑conscious way of living.
With Worldview Literacy we discover how our dominant, Western, human‑separatist worldview is a driver of climate disruption, pandemics, social degradation, mental illness, and untilmately, human extinction. Worldview Literacy presents the Indigenous, nature‑based, kinship worldview as the antidote and “most urgent course of action” for rebalancing planetary life.
WLP’s educational purpose is integrative, both inner and outer: cultivating self‑directed neuroplasticity and reflection at the personal level, while nurturing a broader cultural shift towards relational, sacred, earth‑honoring lifeways.
How Worldview Literacy Is Nested In Kindred World’s Ecology of Initiatives and Projects
Within Kindred World’s ecosystem of initiatives, the WLP functions as the explicit “worldview” education arm that ties together Evolved Nest science, kinship worldview work, and storytelling. Kindred Magazine is our alternative media and storytelling hub.
Kindred World’s mission is “welcoming a wisdom-based, wellness-informed world,” and worldview literacy has been at the core of its work since at least 2010, when founder, Lisa Reagan, trained as a Worldview Literacy Facilitator at the Institute of Noetic Sciences, IONS. Today, Kindred’s worldview literacy resources feature the Worldview Chart by meta-cognition and Indigenous/Kinship Worldview scholar, Four Arrows and the book, Restoring the Kinship Worldview by Four Arrows and Darcia Narvaez.
At the meta‑level, WLP is one initiative within a nested structure:
· Kindred World as the nonprofit umbrella
· Kindred Magazine as a narrative and communications hub
· Evolved Nest Initiative is the home of the species-normal science of the communal evolved developmental niche, pioneered by Darcia Narvaez, PhD.
· Nested World Initiative, where Nesting Ambassadors are trained, certified, and file field notes on how their cultural transformation work is impacting their families, communities, professional fields, and inner work.
· Worldview Literacy Project, this site, provides resources and materials for exploring Four Arrows’ Worldview Chart and worldview shifting strategies.
You can also discover and watch the Evolved Nest’s trilogy of films here.
· Breaking the Cycle
· The Evolved Nest: Nature’s Way of Raising Children
· Reimagining Humanity
Get Involved
· Subscribe to our newsletters
· Join our online Mighty Networks platform at Kindred Community
· Join our monthly live Nested World discussions.
Learn more about Kindred World's vision for a Wisdom-based, Wellness-informed Worldview.
About Four Arrows
Four Arrows (Wahinkpe Topa) aka Dr. Don Trent Jacobs is the author of 23 books and numerous chapters, articles, peer-reviewed papers, and keynotes. Four Arrows is internationally known for his work in cognitive anthropology (worldview studies), education, critical theory, and wellness. He was the subject of a book by R.M. Fisher entitled Fearless Engagement of Four Arrows: A True Story of an Indigenous Based Social Transformer.
AERO elected him as one of 27 visionaries for their text, Turning Points, and he is recipient of a number of recognitions for his activism, including the Martin-Springer Institute's Moral Courage Award.
In 2018, The Chicago Wisdom Project, selected Four Arrows's book, Teaching Truly A Curriculum to Indigenize Mainstream Education, as one of the top twenty education books of all time along side such distinguished authors as Neil Postman, Paulo Freire, John Dewey, and others.
He was formerly with Fielding Graduate University for 24 years, Dean of Education at Oglala Lakota College and tenured Associate Professor at Northern Arizona University. With doctorates in health psychology and in Curriculum and Instruction (with a cognate in Indigenous Worldview) he has authored 23 books and numerous other publications relating to wellness, critical theory, education and Indigenous worldview. His publications have been praised by a number of notable thinkers, including John Pilger, Greg Cajete, Noam Chomsky, Thom Hartman, Henry Giroux, Sam Keen, Bruce Lipton, Dan Millman, Vine Deloris, Jr. and many others.
He is currently involved in helping create the first No Take Zone Marine Park on the Costalegre in Mexico. Four Arrow was first alternate for the 1996 Olympic Equestrian Endurance Team and placed 4th in the World Championship Old Time Piano Contest. He enjoys a number of ocean sports at his homes in Jalisco, Mexico and British Columbia, Canada with his photographer wife. He is a popular and thought-provoking keynoter and has presented on various topics in Australia, Canada, the U.S., Mexico, South Korea, and Japan and is on the Fulbright list of International Scholars.
Four Arrows is the director of the Worldview Literacy Project and a member of the board of directors for its parent nonprofit, Kindred World.
Endorsements
Four Arrows's work provides a path to the future, a path of peace, with signposts from Indigenous world views that recognize that we are interconnected and are all members of one Earth family. Our highest duty, our Dharma , is living in harmony with all our relations."
- Vandana Shiva, Physicist, recipient of the Alternative Nobel Peace Prize, the Right Livelihood Award, author of over 20 books,
"Outstanding scholarship...giant first steps toward the goal in the truthful and constructive understanding of Indigenous Worldview."
- Daniel R. Wildcat, Professor of American Indian Studies, Haskell Indian Nations University
On Four Arrows' book Teaching Truly:
"This enlightening book reminds us that the grim prognosis for life on this planet is the consequence of a few centuries of forgetting what traditional societies knew.. pay careful attention to their educational practices as brought to us in these thoughtful chapters."
—Noam Chomsky, Professor Emeritus at MIT
“Educators should be paying attention to what Four Arrows offers in this book.”
—Bill McKibben, distinguished scholar and founder of 360.org.
Contact :
Four Arrows
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About Darcia Narvaez
Darcia Narvaez is a Professor of Psychology Emerita at the University of Notre Dame. She is the founder of the public and professional educational outreach project, The Evolved Nest Initiative, whose nonprofit mission is to share her science research into developing appropriate baselines for lifelong human wellness by meeting the biological needs of infants. This baseline is imperative at this time as the United States ranks 41st out of 41 developed countries in public policies that support families.
In a 2020 analysis of top scientists, Narvaez emerged in the top 2% of scientists worldwide. Of the eight million scientists in the world, the analysis concerned those who had at least five articles published in scientific journals between 1996 and 2017-- over six million scientists. Individuals were ranked according to various criteria, including number of citations of their work.
Narvaez’s book, Neurobiology and the Development of Human Morality: Evolution, Culture and Wisdom, was chosen for the 2017 Expanded Reason Award from among more than 360 total entries from 170 universities and 30 countries. Narvaez received the prize, including a substantial monetary award, at the Pontifical Academy of Sciences in Vatican City on September 27, 2017. The book also received the William James Award from the American Psychological Association in 2015.
The Evolved Nest is a breakthrough concept that integrates findings across fields that bear on child development, child raising and adult behavior. The Evolved Nest promotes optimal health and wellbeing, cooperation, and receptive and sociomoral intelligences. Societal moves away from providing the Evolved Nest have contributed to the ill being and dysregulation we see in one another and society. Learn how to nest your children and re-nest yourself.
Narvaez’s prior careers include professional musician, classroom music teacher, business owner, seminarian and middle school Spanish teacher. Dr. Narvaez’s current research explores how early life experience influences societal culture, wellbeing and sociomoral character in children and adults. She integrates neurobiological, clinical, developmental and education sciences in her theories and research about human nature and human development. She publishes extensively on moral development, parenting and education. Recently she has been studying the Evolved Nest and how it influences wellbeing, sociality and morality.
On the Evolved Nest’s YouTube channel, you can view the many interdisciplinary conferences she hosted at the University of Notre Dame regarding early experience and human development. In 2016, she organized a conference on Sustainable Wisdom: Integrating Indigenous KnowHow for Global Flourishing, and whose essays were published in a book by the same name in 2019.
Darcia Narvaez and Four Arrows.
Discover Books by Darcia Narvaez
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About Lisa Reagan
Founde4r and Chief Visionary Officer of Kindred World
Introduced as a “force of nature” by Cassandra Vieten, IONS president, at the first Mindful Motherhood Conference in NYC in 2011, Lisa Reagan’s passionate dedication to empower American activists, professionals, and families to envision and create a Wisdom-based, Wellness-informed Society has led to the founding of multiple inspired nonprofit initiatives and collaborations since her transformative motherhood initiation in 1997.
Lisa’s Mother-of-a-Quest began with co-founding a grassroots organization of Wayfinders, Trance-breakers, and New Cycle Makers fiercely intent on protecting American’s children with educational initiatives to counter the country’s freefall to the bottom of all developed nations’ wellness indicators. Today, Kindred World is an award-winning nonprofit whose vision and mission are more relevant and critical than ever.
Integrating a quarter century of cultural transformation insights into grounded Wayfinder Wisdom, Lisa currently shepherds Kindred World in carrying out its ongoing nonprofit work through multiple initiatives and partner collaborations, including:
The Evolved Nest, a virtual learning center featuring the award-winning science and research of Darcia Narvaez, PhD. Lisa and Darcia collaborate on the creation of virtual educational outreach projects of the Evolved Nest, including the short film, Breaking the Cycle, Mighty Networks discussion groups, as well as monthly live discussions. Darcia Narvaez is ranked among the top two percent of scientists worldwide. Her research into humanity’s Evolved Nest reveals our “evolutionary pathway to wellbeing”. Darcia currently serves as Kindred World’s president.
Kindred Media is an alternative media platform championing a New Story of the Human Family. Lisa serves as Kindred’s executive editor, working with contributors to create podcasts, interviews, special feature series, and the expansion of Kindred’s New Story Glossary (because a new story needs new language). Kindred’s innovative media platform allows the many Kindred World initiatives and partner collaborations to interact and integrate personal stories, shifting worldviews, and cultural transformation victories. Our challenge, to bring visibility and coherence to cultural transformation, is achieved through Kindred Media’s holistic storytelling strategies.
The Meet the Wayfinders Oral History Series was produced at the request of La Leche League International for their 65th Conference in 2021. This series integrates both Kindred’s many years of tracking unheralded victories of cultural transformation as well as introducing the concept of Kindred Activism, which explores both how the activists were successful in their quests and how their wayfinder advocacy can be duplicated.
Lisa continues to steward Kindred World’s original vision of a Wisdom-based, Wellness-informed Society as the award-winning nonprofit serves an international following, expands collaborations with partners, and welcomes new volunteers and board members. To discover the ecology of Kindred World’s initiatives, visit www.KindredWorld.org.
Read Lisa's full bio on Kindred.
Learn more about Kindred World and see its historic timeline of stewarding the Conscious Parenting Movement for over 25 years here.
Read, listen, and watch over two decades of Lisa Reagan's interviews and features on Kindred.
How Worldview Literacy Moves Us Toward Wholeness
Read the Letter from the Editor and Kindred World's Founder in the Summer Issue of Kindred Magazine
By Lisa Reagan
This summer, in an effort to bring more clarity and engagement with Kinship Worldview, Kindred World’s board members created the Worldview Literacy Project, featuring an updated and expanded Worldview Chart by Four Arrows. Because we are interested in gathering your experiences and insights – your stories – we provide resources for self-study and community learning as well as a quick SURVEY on the new website, www.WorldviewLiteracy.org.
Four Arrows, co-author with Darcia of the book Restoring the Kinship Worldview, will launch the Worldview Literacy Project in his opening of the Veterans For Peace Convention on August 16, 2024. VFP and Kindred World are proud to announce their nonprofit partnership, made possible with a grant from Fielding University. Learn more about the event and this project here.
Worldview literacy, aka Big Picture perceiving, or metacognition, seems more desirable these days as we are being forced to face planetary meta crises together and, as a result, begin to identify ourselves as one species, one human family. The language and insights from Kinship Worldview and the Evolved Nest support this emergence and its need for coherence.
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