Changing Climate

Conference “Cultural Dimensions of Climate Change and the Environment in North America”

This post comes to you from Cultura21

The Conference will take place at the  Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities (KWI) in Essen, Germany (June 28-29 , 2012)

Climate change is an inherently global problem. However, climate change impacts as well as mitigation efforts are always perceived and dealt with locally and in a culture-specific way. Global warming interacts in multiple ways with North American ecological and social systems. On the one hand, the U.S. and Canada belong to the world’s largest per capita emitters of greenhouse gases. On the other hand, the Arctic north of the continent as well as the Deep South is already heavily affected by a changing climate. Despite the US’s and recently also Canada’s rejection of international binding climate targets, on the local and regional level, some of the world’s most ambitious climate initiatives can be found in North America.

Striking about the symbolic representation of climate change in the USA is a relatively huge cultural variety. While in Europe climate change deniers are largely marginalized and without influence on mainstream politics, American views on climate change and the environment become increasingly polarized according to political beliefs. And whereas the U.S. hosts some of the world’s leading climate science institutions, religious explanations of why global warming is or is not happening, repeatedly have found supporters in media and politics, too.

How can these contradictions be explained? The participants will deal with these questions in the course of the conference that focuses on the human dimensions and cultural representations of climate change and the environment in North America.

You can read the program here.

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The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

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– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
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This post comes to you from Ashden Directory

In Nottingham, there’s a three-day celebration of the apple.In Edinburgh, David Abram, author of The Spell of the Sensuous, and Being Animal: An Earthy Cosmology,  gives a public talk.

In London, Arcola’s Green Sundays return with a focus on recycling and upcycling.

In the bookshops, David Rothenberg’s Survival of the Beautiful investigates why nature is beautiful and how it has influenced science, Brendon Larson explores how metaphors entangle scientific facts with social values and Mojisola Adebayo’s Plays One includes ‘Moj of the Antarctic: An African Odyssey’.

There’s a new funding stream for public art by Creative Scotland, and a call for runners to participate in NVA’s Speed of Light at the Edinburgh Festival.

On the international scene, Conversation between Trees  uses sensors and mobile phones in the forest canopies in Brazil and the UK to communicate the light and colour of the trees and the changing climate around them.

Closer to home, Culture and Climate Change: Recordings is available as an online pdf and publication.

 

“ashdenizen blog and twitter are consistently among the best sources for information and reflection on developments in the field of arts and climate change in the UK” (2020 Network)

ashdenizen is edited by Robert Butler, and is the blog associated with the Ashden Directory, a website focusing on environment and performance.
The Ashden Directory is edited by Robert Butler and Wallace Heim, with associate editor Kellie Gutman. The Directory includes features, interviews, news, a timeline and a database of ecologically – themed productions since 1893 in the United Kingdom. Our own projects include ‘New Metaphors for Sustainability’, ‘Flowers Onstage’ and ‘Six ways to look at climate change and theatre’.

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