Critical Social Inquiry 0253 - Living with Climate Change: vulnerability, denial, and resilience in a global world

While climate change affects all life on the planet, historically vulnerable and marginalized communities across the world are consistently at the greatest risk of devastation. As calls for climate justice multiply, the urgency of writing, speaking, and creating wisely about climate is clear. Grounded in ethnography about diverse communities' experiences and responses to climate change while drawing on film, literature, and the visual arts, this course asks: How do marginalized communities across the world respond to climate inequalities? What is the relationship between capitalism and the climate? How does thinking the Anthropocene, Capitalocene, or the posthuman affect our views of planetary issues? How does 'climate denial' emerge, and what do 'climate justice' and resilience look like? While we will regularly practice writing and research, major assignments include: a family or community weather history and an independent project in a form of students' choice.

Environments and Change : Students should expect to spend 8 hours weekly on work and preparation outside of class time. *Lloréns, Hilda. 2021. Making Livable Worlds: Afro-Puerto Rican Women Building Environmental Justice. University of Washington Press. *Marino, Elizabeth. 2015. Fierce Climate, Sacred Ground: An Ethnography of Climate Change in Shishmaref, Alaska. University of Alaska Press. *Eds. Stensrud, Astrid and Thomas Hylland Eriksen. Climate, Capitalism and Communities: An Anthropology of Environmental Overheating. Pluto Press *Bryant-Tokalau, Jenny. 2018. Indigenous Pacific Approaches to Climate Change: Pacific Island Countries (Palgrave Studies in Disaster Anthropology). Palgrave. *Sakakibara, Chie. 2020. Whale Snow: Iñupiat, Climate Change, and Multispecies Resilience in Arctic Alaska (First Peoples: New Directions in Indigenous Studies). University of Arizona Press. *Norgaard, Kari Marie. 2011. Living in Denial: Climate Change, Emotions, and Everyday Life. MIT Press. *Ed. Stillitoe, Paul. 2021. The Anthroposcene of Weather and Climate: Ethnographic Contributions to the Climate Change Debate. Berghann Books. *Crate, Susan Alexandra. 2021. Once Upon the Permafrost: Knowing Culture and Climate Change in Siberia (Critical Green Engagements: Investigating the Green Economy and Its Alternatives). University of Arizona. *Kenner, Alison. 2018. Breathtaking Asthma Care in a Time of Climate Change. University of Minnesota Press. *Livingston, Julie. 2018. Self-Devouring Growth: A Planetary Parable as Told from Southern Africa (Critical Global Health: Evidence, Efficacy, Ethnography). Duke University Press. *Nakate, Vanessa. 2021. A Bigger Picture: My Fight to Bring a New African Voice to the Climate Crisis. Clarion-Mariner. E-book. *Ghosh, Amitav. 2021. Nutmeg's Curse: Parables for a Planet in Crisis. Paperback to be released October 2022 (will be scheduled in class for November 2022). Journal Articles to follow.