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Community Corner

Southwest Citizen: Eric Utne

Longtime Linden Hills resident Eric Utne talks about his new book and work in social entrepreneurship.

Most people think of The Utne Reader magazine when they hear Eric Utne’s name. But since selling the magazine in 2006, Utne has been keeping plenty busy wearing his many other creative and innovative hats.

“I’m mostly a writer and editor now,” Utne said. “I write a column on the back page of the Utne Reader called Forward. I’m also a senior fellow at the University of Minnesota in the Center for Spirituality and Healing. I’ve developed a series of courses with my colleague John Miller called ‘Whole Systems Healing’, which explores the social and environmental aspects of individual and community health and well-being. I’m also developing curriculum around social entrepreneurship. Plus I serve on several boards, including the Nobel Peace prize forum,” Utne said.

Utne attended college at the U of M and originally trained in architecture. After college he went on to study Chinese medicine. He found his way to journalism initially from the business side of things when he sold ads for the East West Journal in Boston. That got him in the door and he eventually started writing for them. 

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“I never really thought of myself as a journalist until more recently,” Utne said. “I was more interested in ideas that can make a difference.”

Utne has also applied for a Bush Fellowship, and said he would like to do a conference about “Healing Journalism.”

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“There’s a pun intended there,” Utne said. “The question is, can journalism be healing, and can journalism be healed? Can it be a force for healing our divided society, but also can the very practice or profession be made more holistic or constructive? I really hope to get practicing journalists and journalism teachers talking about the concept,” Utne said.

Eric Utne founded the Utne Reader in 1984. He said he was always an eclectic reader of magazines, and interested in them because they are windows into the arena or discipline they cover. After realizing he couldn’t keep up with all of the compelling stories he wanted to read, he thought there must be others out there like him who would find a digest format of articles appealing. Originally, he thought it was something he’d do from the kitchen table.

“I quoted Ben Franklin in my first editor’s note,” Utne said. “He had published the first magazine in America exactly 250 years before, which eventually became Poor Richard’s Almanac. Franklin said, ‘I’d be deceiving you if I told you I’m publishing this magazine for the public good. I’m doing it because my wife is forcing me to make my work profitable.’ So I pretty much said the same thing; that I was attempting to make some profit from my addiction to magazines.”

With various fits and starts, the Utne Reader grew to over 300,000 paid circulations. The magazine also jumped on board the salon movement when it took off, and eventually had nearly 20,000 participants meeting all over the country in living rooms to discuss to what they were reading and share ideas. They called the initiative the Neighborhood Salon Association.

“I thought, why not introduce our readers to each other?" Utne said. "People were grateful for that, and just the fact that they had the magazine in common was enough to get it going."

Utne said the salon forums revealed that people had a tremendous desire for community. He said that’s what a good magazine can do; facilitate discussion and bring people together.

Utne is also a longtime proponent of Waldorf education, a worldwide education movement that began in 1919 in Germany. All four of his children were Waldorf educated, and he himself taught at City of Lakes Waldorf School in Minneapolis for two years. He says the arts-infused programming and social structure of Waldorf are key components of its mission: “Education from the inside out.”

“Visual arts, music, movement and theater are all part of the curriculum, but it’s also math, science, English and history done through the arts,” Utne said. “It’s unusual among what else is being offered these days. It’s based on social and emotional learning.”

Utne’s late sister was a leading authority on social and emotional learning. Her research, which came out of the writings of Daniel Goleman, found that social and emotional intelligence and empathy significantly boost academic performance in every school social context; from inner-city schools to high-achieving public and private schools.

Social and emotional learning, combined with arts, nature, and appreciation of beauty is central to the Waldorf education approach.

“Working as a class teacher at City of Lakes Waldorf School was the most rewarding work I’ve ever done,” Utne said.

As for Utne’s latest endeavor, he’s about to finish up a book, and a book deal is in the works. 

“I’ve been working on editing the writings and correspondence of my step-grandmother, Brenda Ueland,” Utne said. “She was a Minneapolis feminist and writer who died in 1985 at age 93. She wrote the book, ‘If You Want to Write,’ which Carl Sandberg called the best book on writing ever written. Her voice just leaps off the page. In 1929 she had a brief love affair with Fridtjof Nansen, a Norwegian polar explorer, adventurer, athlete and Nobel Peace Prize winner. They had a year-long correspondence and that’s what I’ve been editing,” Utne said. “I’m about to go to Oslo, Norway to finalize the book deal. I’ve been very intensively involved with it the last few months.”

So why does Utne choose to live in Minneapolis?

“I was born and raised in Saint Paul. I lived out east in my 20s and 30s and thought I’d never come back,” Utne said. But my ex-wife and I came to visit my family when the lilacs were in bloom and she was smitten. My four sons all love Minneapolis as well and though they all live elsewhere, I expect they’ll choose to raise their families here, if and when that time comes.” Utne said.

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