🌱Fieldnotes in Ecocultural Communication
Natasha Myers on the Planthropocene + sea turtles and Hawaiian monk seal conservation + Varshini Prakash on how to imagine climate justice + more!
Hi everyone, a little later than usual, but welcome back to Wild Ones, a bi-weekly digest by me, Gavin Lamb, about ideas, research, and tools in environmental communication. If you’re new, welcome! You can read more about why I started Wild Ones here. Sign up here to get these digests in your inbox:
📚 What I’m reading
How to grow liveable worlds: Ten (not-so-easy) steps for life in the Planthroposcene
by Natasha Myers, Associate Professor in the Department of Anthropology at York University, Toronto.
“Step 7: Vegetalise your sensorium
“…In order to awaken the latent plant in you, you will need to get interested in the things that plants care about. Though plants don’t have eyes, ears, noses or mouths, don’t be fooled — they can see, hear, smell, taste and feel. Let their planty sensitivities inflect your own. Tune into the different ways they do time, learn to follow their tempos and rhythms…”
🔊 What I’m listening to
For the Wild Podcast: Interview with Dr. Natasha Myers on Growing the Planthroposcene.
👀 What I’m watching
🔍 Eco-Communication Tool I’m exploring
Real-Time Tracking of Hawaiian Monk Seals, 2020
“This dataset includes Argos satellite telemetry and/or GPS satellite locations for Hawaiian monk seals throughout their range including the main Hawaiian Islands (Kauai, Niihau, Oahu, Molokai, Maui, Lanai, Kohoolawe, Hawaii) and the six major breeding sites in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands (French Frigate Shoals, Laysan Island, Lisianski Island, Pearl and Hermes Reef, Midway Atoll, Kure Atoll). Seals are instrumented for a number of purposes, including research, monitoring, and management issues.”
💬 Quote(s) I’m thinking about
“Climate change was manufactured in a crucible of inequality, for it is a product of the industrial and the fossil-fuel eras, historical forces powered by exploitation, colonialism, and nearly limitless instrumental use of ‘nature’”
Chirs. J Cuomo, Professor of Philosophy and Women's Studies at the University of Georgia
A lot of people perceive the climate fight as: The timeline is terrifying. But I think we should see it as, This timeline is hastening our move towards justice.
– Varshini Prakash, Co-founder and Exec. Director of the Sunrise Movement
“It’s Thanksgiving Day 2030. The US has reduced carbon emissions by more than 50% in a decade. Public land is returning to Indigenous stewardship. Our neighborhoods are healing from centuries of racial marginalization and violence. We are in the middle of a Just Transition.
Imagine where you might be on this day, what you’re doing, who you’re with. What are you most thankful for?”
Thanks so much as always for your interest in my work, and if you found this useful, or have suggestions to make this digest better, I'd love to hear from you. Leave a comment to let me know what you think about this digest:)