“Greenways: The Interconnected Pathways of Communication and the Environmentâ€
A NEXUS Interdisciplinary Conference
University of Tennessee-Knoxville
Thursday, March 6- Saturday, March 8, 2013
Plenary Speakers: Sandra Alcosser (San Diego State University), Mark Pedelty (University of Minnesota), and Jennifer Peeples (Utah State University)
Following the natural contours of the landscape, greenways are man-made paths that work to link human communities to the surrounding environment. In the same way, this conference seeks to promote connectivity between various disciplines and their approaches to the environment. Recent conversations about environmental issues illustrate society’s rising concerns for the future of humanity and the planet. Communication about such issues takes many forms: public debates, government policies, scientific research, film and media, poetry and prose, and classroom education. Such a wide range of communicative mediums demonstrates the truly interdisciplinary nature of research seeking to generate social and environmental change. Moreover, if we expand our conceptualization of the environment then we can begin to talk more fluidly across disciplines to understand how multiple environments impact communication practices.
This conference aims to bring together scholars, creative writers, and educators from a broad range of disciplines in order to provide a space to share the myriad ways that humans communicate about an endangered environment and recommend avenues for future research. This conference also seeks to expand the ways in which scholars link discussions about communication and the environment such that the natural world becomes one environment among many which shapes our ideas about communication.
As an interdisciplinary conference, we welcome submissions from all relevant fields and disciplines. Abstracts (250-300 words) are invited on a broad range of topics including, but not limited to, the following:
Environment and narrative
“Natural†and “unnatural†narratives
Animal studies
Role of the environment in identity formation
Influence of cultural environments on communicative practices
Dissemination of environmental narratives
Ecodiscourses, such as ecocriticism, ecofeminism, ecotourism ecomusicology, ecocomposition
Regional narratives and the environment
Race and the environment
Environmental law
Food justice and food sustainability
Contemporary environmental issues, to include but not limited to climate change, hydraulic fracturing, mountaintop removal, Keystone XL
Creative submissions of all genres and media will also be considered
Individual papers or panel proposals will be considered. This interdisciplinary conference allows for many more spaces for discussion than described. Please consider submitting proposals which many not fit neatly into the ones listed above.
Please submit abstracts to utnexus2014@gmail.com by December 31, 2013.
95%, that’s the figure scientists involved in the latest United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) are using to express their degree of certainty that human activities are contributing to an “unequivocal” rise in global temperatures, according to reporting by the BBC.
Today, Working Group I of the IPCC (based in Stockholm, Sweden) released its Fifth Assessment Report (the first was released in 1990) on the current state of scientific knowledge relevant to climate change. Working Groups II and III (based in Tokyo and Berlin) will release their assessment reports in 2014.
Key statements in the report Summary for Policy Makers include the following:
For more information, here is a link to the IPCC homepage.
The 2013 Eco Film Festival got underway Sept. 24 in Taipei City, spotlighting ROC government efforts to raise public awareness of Taiwan’s ecological diversity and promote environmental conservation.
Organized by the Council of Agriculture, the festival features 30 locally made documentaries spanning an array of subjects such as aquatic ecology, animal habitats, forest ecosystems and wild species. A total of 17 were made under the auspices of COA and nine are newly released.
“The films incorporate the long-term observations of their directors and document Taiwan’s special landscapes and rich biodiversity, as well as the commitment of locals to environmental protection,†said Lee Tao-sheng, director-general of the COA Forestry Bureau, at the festival’s opening ceremony.
“Such works are precious and we hope they help audiences better understand Taiwan’s ecosystem and encourage them to participate in related conservation work.â€
Also attending the launch were COA Deputy Minister Chen Wen-te, nine documentary directors and members of the academic, business and publishing sectors.
“Taiwan has a diversified ecosystem, with more than 46,000 species of flora and fauna. But part is being affected by economic development, which is why the Forestry Bureau started supporting the production of related documentaries,†Chen said.
According to Lee, each documentary demonstrates the filmmaker’s affection for Taiwan and will touch the hearts of viewers.
An outstanding example is the opening film “Beemania: Bees and Wasps of Taiwan,†an unprecedented production capturing the lives of these insects in Taiwan. Sponsored by the COA, the documentary was shot over two years by director Lee Wei-jie.
“We hope the film helps viewers better understand the diversity of bee species and their behaviors, as well as exploring the role human beings play in balancing the ecosystem,†the director said.
The festival, which runs until Nov. 30, offers 1,200 screenings at COA district offices and 57 other venues in 19 cities and counties nationwide. (RC-JSM)
We’ve reposted a number of very profound TED talks here at Ecomedia Studies over the past couple of years, including USC research Johanna Blakely’s thought-provoking discussion on the impact of Food, Inc. on viewers.
However, several of my friends and colleagues have recently begun sharing a powerful condemnation of TED by Mike Adams and the team at the non-profit website NaturalNews.com. The story, “TED Aligns with Monsanto,” claims:
“Allow me to be the first to announce that TED is dead. Why? Because the group that organizes so-called “TED talks” has been thoroughly hijacked by corporate junk science and now openly rejects any talks about GMOs, food as medicine, or even the subject of how food can help prevent behavioral disorders in children. All these areas of discussion are now red-flagged from being presented on any TED stage.
“This is openly admitted by TEDx itself in a little-known letter publicly published on December 7, 2012. Click here to view the letter.”
While the letter appears to address the issue of faulty science more generally, some environmentalists like Adams call particular attention to the  section of the letter on GMO foods. That section of the letter focuses primarily on what agree is a false causal link between vaccines and autism and the promise made by some TED speakers that foods can be used to treat autism. However, the language about GMOs in particular is very vague and open to interpretation. The section does list anti-GMO foodists as bad science but does not elaborate. Is Adams reading too much into the issue or has TED somehow fallen sway to powerful corporate interests?
Given TED’s highly visible role in the media and among students and scholars these day’s we’ll be watching this development closely.
Comments and suggestions for further reading are highly encouraged.
In the small West Virgina town of Sheperdstown, former oil and gas company geologist John Amos is using the same technologies used to find and extract natural resources to document the impact of that extraction on the environment.
SkyTruth, founded by Amos, is a nonprofit organization using remote sensing and digital mapping to create stunning images that expose the landscape disruption and habitat degradation caused by mining, oil and gas drilling, deforestation, fishing and other human activities.
Recently the Washington Post put together an interesting article and video on the organization that is well worth sharing here.
The video is below and here’s a link to the full article.
Dr. Sarah Wald, an assistant professor at the University of Louisville, is encouraging folks to organize one or more Ecomedia Studies panels for the Louisville Conference on Literature and Culture since 1900.
Click on the above link to the conference website for full details.
The 42nd annual Louisville Conference on Literature & Culture since 1900 will be held at the University of Louisville, February 20-22, 2014. Critical papers may be submitted on any topic that addresses literary works published since 1900, and/or their relationship with other Arts and disciplines (film, journalism, opera, music, pop culture, painting, architecture, law, etc).
Work by creative writers is also welcome.
Submissions may be in English, French, German, Italian or Spanish. Submissions will be accepted if received by 11:59 P.M. EST October 1, 2013.
Over the past couple of weeks videos of Syrian civilians suffering the effects of a chemical weapons attack have been circulating widely on the internet and on television. Although Syrian President Bashar al Assad has denied Syrian military involvement in the attack, most recently in an interview with Charlie Rose of CBS and PBS, tonight US President Barack Obama will address the nation from the Oval Office to argue that Assad’s regime is responsible for the attack and that the US must take military action to prevent further use of chemical weapons. Meanwhile, Russia has offered to oversee the handover of Syria’s stockpiles of chemical weapons, a plan which apparently has backing from the United Nations.
While the story has dominated news headlines and talk shows, I have heard no discussion of the ecological and environmental justice aspects of this very important event. Modern chemical warfare requires access to the natural resources and scientific knowledge to create deadly chemical reactions, the resources and know-how to manufacture and deploy precision guided rockets, and sufficient control over media resources to frame the debate over the uses of such weapons. In short, such warfare depends on the ability of human beings to manipulate the natural environment in increasingly sophisticated ways. The use of both conventional weapons in Syria, which used by government forces, opposition rebels, foreign fighters, and terrorist groups to kill more than 100,000 civilians, and the recent chemical attacks that killed more than 1000 civilians include aspects of both social and environmental injustice.
In a larger geopolitical context, very little discussion of the links between oil, water, and other natural resources and the situation in Syria have been made. According to non-profit organizations like The Water Project and reports by the UN and news outlets in the Middle East like The National (based in the United Arab Emirates), Syria has been suffering from a severe water shortage for the past several years, which has exacerbated the ongoing struggle by opposition forces to wrest control of the government from al Assad. While the issue of oil loomed large in discussions of the Iraq invasion in 2003, very little mention has been made of oil in current coverage of the Syrian situation. Russia, which has blocked the UN from taking action in Syria and which has now offered to mediate the handover of Syrian chemical weapons stockpiles, has a long established economic relationship with Syria that revolves almost exclusively around oil and weapons. Garry Kasparov, a longtime opponent of Russian President Vladamir Putin, has recently claimed in an interview with Al-Arabiya that Putin’s staunch defense of Syria has much to do with Russia’s close ties to the Syrian industry. In 2012, both Russia and China blocked the UN from issuing economic sanctions against Syria. That same year, Assad’s regime, struggling to maintain control over Syria, struck a deal that was very favorable to Russia. According to Reuters, Syria agreed to send more than 100,000 barrels of crude oil per day to Russia in return from much needed refined oil products such as gasoline.
There’s obviously more to say, but perhaps these brief comments will be useful in framing President Obama’s speech this evening and all of the recent media coverage of the Syrian crisis through an ecocritical lens. For me this ecocritical perspective is useful for putting the debate of the use of US military force in a larger context. It also has me thinking it is time to take another look at writer/director Stephen Gaghan’s 2005 film Syriana. In an interview with the Washington Post at the time of the film’s release, Gaghan’s said something that offered a great perspective on the Iraq war and which definitely applies to the Syrian conflict: “War and, apparently, hurricanes are very good for the oil business. But I’ve got to believe at a certain point, as a nation, we’re going to go in a different direction toward an increased sense of personal responsibility, a lowering of each individual’s carbon footprint and a real collaborative effort to help sustain our planet.”
Cathy Fitzgerald, a New Zealand artist living in Ireland since 1996, is a practice-thesis PhD candidate in Visual Culture at the National College of Art & Design, Dublin, Ireland and a contributor to ecomediastudies.org. Cathy was commissioned to write the following article on the film element of her transdisciplinary eco art doctoral work by Dr. Cat Lupton for the Earthlines review (the network of the Earthlines magazine). Cathy’s current transdisciplinary eco art inquiry* is focused around her involvement with transforming Hollywood, the small forest where she lives in South-East Ireland, from clear-fell conifer plantation to a mixed species continuous cover forest. In this post, reblogged from the Earthlines review, she talks about the film-making element of her creative practice. For more about Cathy’s work, see www.ecoartfilm.com
The new ‘neighbours’ – tiny Ash trees amongst the conifers in Hollywood (still from The Hollywood Diaries 2008-12 experimental film by Cathy Fitzgerald)
‘As I see it, the fundamental job of an ecocinema is not to produce pro-environmental narratives shot in a conventional Hollywood manner (that is, in a manner that implicitly promotes consumption) or even in a conventional documentary manner (although, of course, documentaries can alert us to environmental issues). The job of ecocinema is to provide new kinds of film experience that demonstrate an alternative to conventional media-spectatorship and help to nurture a more environmentally progressive mindset.’   Scott MacDonald ‘The ecocinema experience’ in Ecocinema Theory and Practice (2012)
The tiny two and a half acre forest in which I live in South-East Ireland is beautiful. It’s a forest undergoing change; it is being transformed from a monoculture conifer plantation to a permanent mixed species, mixed age forest using “Close-to-Nature†continuous cover forestry methods that are new to Ireland and Great Britain. This entails the forest being selectively thinned by professional foresters every three years to allow native trees to regenerate in the shelter of the 30 year old conifers. Over time the forest (we’ve named it ‘Hollywood’) will become increasingly beautiful and resilient; it will be increasingly biodiverse and any timbers taken from it will be increasingly valuable over the long term.
I often think of Hollywood as ‘the little wood that could’, as this small forest is providing valuable knowledge in several areas. 
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