Hey Snow! It’s Not You, It’s Us
From toxic street slush to plowed-in cars, winter can be frustrating. But it doesn’t have to be. A historian uncovers 19th-century lessons for working with—not against—the snow.
Category: Essays
Plantation Legacies
The Anthropocene gives a name to human-caused environmental change. The Plantationocene puts colonialism, capitalism, and enduring racial hierarchies at the center of the conversation and asks what past and future modes of resistance might emerge.
Embracing Identity in the Environmental Classroom
We form attachments to the places around us, and they shape our sense of who we are. An educator uses that environmental identity to spark action.
Surviving Carmageddon in Manila
To address the traffic crisis in the world’s fourth-largest city, officials seek to modernize urban transportation by phasing out the city’s iconic jeepney, a uniquely Filipino mode of transport repurposed from a bygone colonial era.
Where Have All the Fish Gone?
Subsidized fishing fleets are rapidly depleting fishing stocks and harming communities in the Central Pacific. It’s time island nations get a seat at the negotiating table on global trade and climate change.
Banking on Seeds for Our Future
The USDA’s National Plant Germplasm System is arguably the most important seed bank for our food supply. An agroecologist explains why it is in desperate need of attention.
Prisons for Sale, Histories Not Included
Environmentalists played a disturbing role in the Adirondacks’ prison-building boom. As the state now shutters many of those facilities, we’re at risk of forgetting that.
Water Justice vs. Western Development in Nepal
A development practitioner and anthropologist explores the promises and realities of water development projects in Kathmandu, Nepal, where luxury hotels have pools while poor city residents struggle to find clean water sources.
W. E. B. Du Bois and the American Environment
Du Bois, born 150 years ago, was one of the most important thinkers of the 20th century. But his environmental thought remains underappreciated.
The Science of Seasons on an Out-of-Sync Planet
Phenology, tracking the comings and goings of species each season, provides insight into the disruptions caused by human-induced climate change.
