IMO, we need a new word: The Anthroposcene. Defined as: the space (scene) where everyone who uses the word Anthropocene unself-consciously (without finger-wavy ‘air quotes’) gathers to exchange book recommendations, memes, attention, credibility etc. And where everyone who has just woken up – thanks perhaps to the IPCC’s 1.5 degrees report – to the fierce... Continue Reading →
So, sitting with two very clever friends this morning, spit-balling ideas of where the whole Extinction Rebelliion thing might go, this came up: It's possible that Extinction Rebellion, if it keeps the same set of repertoires (blocking roads, disrupting meetings etc), may end up not moving beyond the students and retired who seem (I have... Continue Reading →
Okay, no names, but for god's sake, people who are giving talks on important subjects, often from a position of knowing a lot and/or having moral high ground: THINK WHO YOU ARE TALKING TO. Do NOT give your bog-standard intro-to-issue-x to a self-selected audience that has come out on a cold wet night/travelled to the... Continue Reading →
Dear ‘new’ climate activist, Thanks for your efforts so far and "welcome" (or of course “welcome back”). You find the “climate movement” in the UK in a pretty dismal state, to be honest. There’s a fierce battle going on about fracking, but elsewhere the Tory government has been able to get away with stripping support... Continue Reading →
Went to a reading group. The article under discussion was Jason “Capitalism in the Web of Life” Moore's 2014 article on the End of Cheap Nature.. It got a bit of a kicking from a couple of people (me, I thought it was okay). The convenor of the group introduced the paper and pointed out... Continue Reading →
I don’t know how much rethinking economics is actually going on (I have my suspicions, but no hard data). I do have a good idea of how much rethinking politics/academia/civilsocietying is going on, and it’s not much at all/zero. The latest piece of hard data came tonight, at the University of Manchester. The debate/discussion was... Continue Reading →
Last semester, I had the good fortune to be the Teaching Assistant on fascinating third year/Masters course called Wildlife in the Age of Humans. Taught by Dr Aurora Fredriksen and Prof Noel Castree, it's a thorough exploration of issues of conservation (of what, by who, for what?), (de)-extinction and so much more. This semester, same... Continue Reading →
Like any teenager of a certain cohort or three, I read The Catcher in the Rye. At one point its protagonist, Holden Caulfield observes: “I used to think she was quite intelligent, in my stupidity. The reason I did was because she knew quite a lot about the theatre and plays and literature and all... Continue Reading →
A species corsuscating on thin ice, Snap, crackle, pop. Faster faster (or else), kill (the) pussycat. How I wonder what you’re at. Kill them all Let the gods we kept creating in our own image sort them out. A fetish for fish, a fetish For bondage, human bondage. Ah, a sondage would show -has... Continue Reading →
After last night’s keynote, tonight it was the turn of Professor Ingolfur Blühdorn, Institute for Social Change and Sustainability, WU Vienna to deliver a talk. His title was “The Resilience of Unsustainability: Cultural Backlash, Authoritarian Reflex and the Great Regression,” which is academic-speak for “Dudes, lemme say, we’re, like, totes fubarred” This blog post gives... Continue Reading →
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