A gift for navigating our present: Academic faculty recommend new and old books, films, and exhibits that critically reflect on environmental futures and futurity.
Laleh Ahmad speaks with Ramachandra Guha on his new book, Speaking with Nature (2024). They discuss the history of environmentalism in India and how it differs from the West, especially through key thinkers’ intertwining of social justice and nature.
In this exhibit, Christopher Conz and Christina Balch use archival materials and art to humanize the stories of migrant mining workers of southern Africa and reflect on the environments in which they live, work, die, and resist.
Benjamin Chin-Hung Kao looks beyond the often-cutesy appearance of bears in Japanese popular culture to discover their role in the country’s violent colonial history and present.
God, pet, and research subject, axolotls transgress Western dualisms. Alex Ventimilla explores what these creatures tell us about science, companionship, and life in the Anthropocene.
In this special episode, Edge Effects and the SustainUW Podcast team collaborate to discuss the history of Earth Day in the United States, bring a glimpse of Earth Fest celebrations on UW-Madison’s campus, and underline the importance of embracing environmental protection beyond just April 22.
Genevieve Pfeiffer explores human-caribou entanglements and how Indigenous relationships with them could guide future conservation efforts—avoiding past disasters like the James Bay Project.
In this series keynote, professor emerita and historian Harriet Ritvo sets the stage for further investigation of “companion species.” She introduces the varied threads of animal companionship—from influence and impact to proximal, favored reciprocity.
Katherine Gregory explores how Cauleen Smith’s short film REMOTE VIEWINGÂ (2011) excavates buried histories of racial violence and challenges audiences to rethink who has the right to shape the land.
Using the case of Claremont Road, Savannah Pearson speculates why tunneling activism is a popular form of protest in England historically used to fit against government harm to environmental and human systems.
