Join our online workshop: Radical Epistemologies and Future Natures
An online workshop for the POLLEN22 conference this week
Dear Future Natures subscribers,
In this first brief update we’re sharing news of an exciting event that’s happening online this week.
Our online workshop with the POLLEN22 conference, Radical Epistemologies and Future Natures, goes live from today - 26 July. The workshop topics include commoning and enclosures, ‘weird ecologies’, and beyond-human ecologies.
The sessions are ‘asynchronous’, meaning people can view the pre-recorded talks at any time. There is space for comments and discussion on each page. Discussion is particularly encouraged during the first week (26-31 July 2022), but the material will stay online and accessible afterwards.
The sessions are ordered as follows:
· Commoning, Enclosure and Future Natures (Tuesday 26 July)
· Natures out of Place I – Ecologies and materialities of ‘the weird’ (Wednesday 27 July)
· Natures out of Place II – Beyond-Human Ecologies (Thursday 28 July).
You don’t need a conference ticket to view the videos, which are open access. However, in order to comment, you’ll be asked to create a profile, and there is an option to donate if you can afford it. Donations will help with the costs of running the conference (POLLEN22 is this year’s conference of the Political Ecology Network, also known as POLLEN).
Workshop line up
Here’s what to expect from each session.
1. Commoning, Enclosure and Future Natures
Keynote: Commoning and Enclosure, by Massimo De Angelis.
Introduction to the Future Natures Centre, by Amber Huff.
Lightning talks on the commons, by participants in the Future Natures network.
2. Natures out of Place I – Ecologies and materialities of ‘the weird’
Session organizers: Dr Amber Huff, Institute of Development Studies UK, and Dr Adrian Nel, University of Kwazulu-Natal
Presentations and presenters:
Keeping the spectre of waste alive
Lisa Doeland, Radboud University Nijmegen and University of AmsterdamMosquito time: Human-insect porosity within english urban wetlands
Mary Geary, University of BrightonTaming and living of ‘weird ecologies’: notes from the floodplains of Assam, India
Sampurna Das, the University of DelhiTowards Weird Geographies And Ecologies: Vandermeer, Miéville, And Chernobyl
Jonathon Turnbull, University Of Cambridge; Ben Platt, University Of Cambridge; Adam Searle, Université De Liège
Session abstract: Bringing political ecology’s long-standing concerns with the politics of human-nature relations into dialogue with insights from cultural and critical geography, cultural anthropology, the environmental humanities, geocriticism and genre fiction, this session responds to calls for a departure from primarily reactive analysis and critique, to develop new, experimental, proactive, playful and speculative approaches and analyses in political ecology (Harris, 2021; Braun, 2015).
We ask: what is the potential of ‘the Weird’ and adjacent notions like the eerie, the uncanny, and the haunted (VanderMeer and VanderMeer, 2011; Fisher, 2016; Fisher, 2012) for developing grounded and radically ‘alternative epistemic entryways’ that can help us assess, historicize, recast and subvert dominant, flattening framings and ‘anthropocene’ politics of ecology, crisis, control and enclosure (Hosbey and Roane, 2021), whilst at the same time working for more convivial relations and abundant futures (Büscher and Fletcher, 2019; DeVore et al., 2019; Collard et al., 2015)?
Contributions to this session explore and develop these themes as they intersect with ecologies of place and with long-standing and emerging concerns in political and other ecologies that are sensitive to history, relationality and power.
3. Natures out of Place II – Beyond-Human Ecologies
Presentations and presenters:
Situating The Monkey In The Urban Socio-spatial Fabric Of Delhi’s Neighbourhood
Ms Aditi Dhillon, School Of Human Ecology, Ambedkar University Delhi, Dr Suresh Babu, School Of Human Ecology, Ambedkar University DelhiThe More-than-human Histories Of A Dying Lake. The Uru-qotzuñi And Lake Poopó, Bolivia
Dr Hanne Cottyn, University Of York, UKGoing Beyond The Rational, Or: How Visceral Methods Can Enhance Research Outcomes
Dr Robert Hafner, University Of Innsbruck, Austria; Dr Felix Dorn, University Of Innsbruck, Austria; Anna-maria Brunner, University Of Innsbruck, Austria; Dr Christina Plank, University Of Natural Resources And Life Sciences, AustriaUn-naming and Wild Dogs
Rosa Deen, University of KentArt and Ecology
Heather Sanchez
To view the talks and join in the discussion, visit the POLLEN22 website.