UMD is hosting “Anthroposcenes: Processing Hope & Despair in the Era of Climate Change” on Friday, March 30, 2018 from 10 a.m. - 3:30 p.m. in Griggs, 509 Niagara Court. The symposium is free and open to the public.
The Anthropocene is the current geologic age that has superseded the Holocene, as proposed by atmospheric chemist Paul Crutzen. “It represents a ‘rupture’ in earth systems triggered by the increasing human transformations of Earth’s land, ocean, atmosphere, and biota,” explains co-organizer Professor Randel Hanson. “ Present life on planet Earth is literally in uncharted territory, barreling toward unknown futures. How do we force this moment to its crisis and align our institutions to act accordingly?”
Faculty are planning short presentations on related to the topic, including:
Steve Sternberg (Chemical Engineering)
The Science of the Anthropocene
Michael Pfau (Communication)
Fear Appeals in Climate Change Fiction: Temporal Recursion
Chad Vollrath (Communication, UW Superior)
Ancestral Memories of the Sea and its Creatures: Deep Storytelling
Joshua Barnett (Communication)
Intimacy and Infinity: Between Ecology and Earth Systems
Aaron Boyson (Communication)
Taking the Temperature of the Information Environment
Karen Jeannette & Kathleen Williams (Horticulture; Geography)
Hope and Despair in the Anthropocene
Kathryn Milun (Anthropology)
Rethinking Energy Ownership in the Anthropocene: Grids, Commons, Trusts
Ryan Bergstrom (Geography)
Re-Envisioning Former Resource-Dependent Communities on the Iron Range
Randel Hanson (Environment & Sustainability)
Becoming Alien to this Place
Joseph Bauerkemper (American Indian Studies)
Treaty Futures
Darren Houser (Art & Design)
Exigent Iconoclasm: Visual Insurgency and Guerrilla Art
David Gore (Communication)
Laughing Through the Anthropocene
“We hope to highlight the urgency of responding substantively to the social ecological realities that are unfolding in the Anthropocene,” says Hanson. “We believe that institutions of higher education have a special obligation to lead the transformation of society fitting for the Anthropocene. As teachers and researchers, we seeks creative pathways and platforms for Generation Anthropocene to inherit and transform a planet in considerable need of wise, earnest and urgent action."
The symposium is presented by the UMD Department of Geography, Urban, Environment and Sustainability Studies, UMD Department of Communication, the UMD Department of Art and Design, and the Institute for Advanced Study at the University of Minnesota