What are plastics?
All plastics are composed of carbon atoms connected to one another in a chain-like structure, with mostly or exclusively hydrogen atoms attached to the carbon atoms. Gasoline, candle wax and plastics all have this same structure; gasoline has Continue reading
Plastiglomerate from Kamilo Beach displayed in the exhibition One Planet in Museon (The Hague, The Netherlands). Photo by Aaikevanoord.
Beginning last summer we started featuring a series of posts on the theme of perceiving the Anthropocene—so far, we have looked at objects or phenomena through which this colossal abstraction could be manifested to our senses. In one of my contributions I argued that a particularly good avatar of the Anthropocene is plastic. Plastic, I suggested, has an exemplary status in the Anthropocene as one of the most pervasive (and perhaps one of the more insidious) examples of the human transformation of nature. Continue reading
Are climate change and the Anthropocene inseparable? In the absence of human-made climate change, would we still be talking about and living in the Anthropocene? Anyone might be forgiven for thinking that Continue reading
In the spirit of shameless self-promotion I’m delighted to announce the release by Routledge of a new collection of essays, edited by Manuel Arias-Maldonado and myself, entitled Rethinking the Environment for the Anthropocene: Political Theory and Socionatural Relations in the New Geological Epoch. The book grew out of a workshop of environmental political theorists held in 2016. It brings together work by both established and emerging scholars–some of whom contributed initial versions of their ideas to this blog.
Click to download a flyer with the table of contents, and some endorsements. The flyer has a code you can use to purchase Rethinking the Environment Continue reading
Let us let the solstice spark respect for the wider structures in which we find ourselves, and inspire us to be more thoughtful about the structures we create to live our lives.
“This sprawling epic is as lively as a natural history museum diorama.” (Stephanie Zacharek, review of “10,000 BC”)
Perceiving means to become conscious of, to realize, to understand, to grasp. Natural history museums strive to enable the public to perceive, commonly in re-creations of past worlds. Who hasn’t gazed over a diorama of the Carboniferous Period, for example, Continue reading
What are we to make of the fact that humans are susceptible to conspiracy theories involving anthropogenic effects on the planet? Continue reading
We are unable to run the post we had scheduled for today, and I think it is important to explain why. Continue reading
Paris, Pont Alexandre III, January 18, 1910
In 1910 Paris suffered its second largest flood since 1658. Today the city is inundated by a public memory of that event of just over a century ago. Continue reading
Berlin, 2014. The Anthropocene Working Group (“AWG,” of which I am a member) was convening for the first time to deliberate the proposal to formalize a new geological time unit in Earth’s history. This was personal to me, because Continue reading
Ambergris found in New Zealand. Image from Ambergis NZ
I find examining human history more comforting than considering the ever-encroaching future promised (or threatened?) by talk of the Anthropocene. This preference informs my work as an artist: Continue reading
White clover growing in the lawn outside the New York Hall of Science, where the author and Environmental Performance Agency collaborators held the workshop “Plant Talk, Human Talk: An EPA Training for the Beginning of the World” (image by the Environmental Performance Agency)
In my post last week, I used a recent study on the urban evolution of white clover and its coverage in the popular press to start thinking about how traits described as “weedy” relate to Continue reading
Coyote in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco
This post was co-authored by Christian Hunold, Drexel University
and Teresa Lloro-Bidart, Cal Poly Pomona
Coyotes have incorporated themselves into nearly every major city in North America. Coyotes’ ability to thrive in cities testifies not only to the Anthropocene’s blurring of human-wildlife boundaries; it also undermines the idea that Continue reading
I try not to panic about the Anthropocene. Continue reading
Flood warning siren in Venice (from Sounds Like Noise)
Visiting Venice this summer suggested some intellectual bridges between cities (see our previous series on the Urban Anthropocene), and our new theme (Perceiving the Anthropocene). How do cities help us perceive the Anthropocene— Continue reading
