Chicken Tenders

How might we create a way of life that is really worth living?

A short film about chickens triangulating relationships between people.

Carbondale Spring is a people’s movement based in Carbondale, Illinois, that seeks to turn the fossil fuel economy that gave the city its name into an economy based on cooperation and care. Carbondale Spring proposes ways of reframing social and material relations within the city to support more healthful forms of existence that address our ecological crises. The chicken tenders network is one example of a new convivial infrastructure. Hatched in the depth of the quarantine, volunteers built and distributed a dozen chicken coops across the town. The chicks were brooded by a local farmer. Chicken coop recipients, aka chicken tenders, promise to care for their girls, and to get to know their neighbors by sharing the surplus eggs.