iHuman/Making Climate Social, University of Sheffield
September 18 2019
Speakers include: Jenny Pickerill, Eva Giraud, Graeme Hayes, Anna Pigott, Steven Camiss, Warren Pearce
Deadline for abstracts: September 2 2019
Fully referenced, PDF version of call
You say nothing in life is black or white. But that is a lie. A very dangerous lie. Either we prevent 1.5C of warming or we don’t. Either we avoid setting off that irreversible chain reaction beyond human control or we don’t. Either we choose to go on as a civilisation or we don’t. That is as black or white as it gets. There are no grey areas when it comes to survival.
2019 has seen the ‘social life of climate change’ transform in the UK and beyond following the IPCC’s SR15 report and the emergence of new climate activist movements, most prominently Extinction Rebellion (XR) and #FridaysForFuture. UK newspaper coverage of climate change has reached its highest point for 20 years, public concern has reached record levels, and the UK and Scottish Parliaments have both declared climate emergencies.
Taken together, there appears to be a growing social consensus around the need for more urgent ‘climate action’, powered by the most prominent activist campaigns for over a decade and a broader shift wherein activist concerns formerly seen as ‘radical’ or ‘marginal’ have gained popular attention.
These new climate movements have called us to ‘listen to science’, warned of impending societal collapse and even human extinction. Building on the legacies of previous social movements, the new climate movements have effectively combined action in both digital and urban spaces, and been broadly welcomed as the dawning of a new age of youth activism, bringing about a new regenerative culture of “conversation, care and crew” and prompting renewed interest in deliberative climate democracy.
Fridays for Future, Demo in Aschaffenburg, 15.03.2019
Yet behind these headlines lie new controversies and shifting dynamics which demand urgent scholarly attention. XR’s arresting talk of extinctionand annihilation may depoliticise questions of power and justice, while #FridaysForFuture focus heavily on science potentially at the expense of the political questions at the heart of climate action. While these dynamics are familiar, there are signs that some in the new climate movements are moving away from ‘mainstream’ climate science as too slow-moving and conservative in its projections. Related attempts to frame 2030 as a deadline for climate action have prompted pushback from the scientific community.
Alongside these knowledge controversies, XR has been accused of ‘methodological whiteness’, both through problematic tactics on the ground and reversing previous hard work to end the silencing of people of colour within environmental movements. Perhaps most fundamentally, there are open questions over the values and future imaginaries that underpin the new climate movements: is there a vision beyond the XR banner unveiled on Westminster Bridge that read “Climate Change: We’re Fucked”?
We warmly invite papers, presentations and reflections from a wide range of theoretical and disciplinary perspectives, with the aim to start establishing a multi-layered analysis of the contemporary climate moment.
Please email abstracts of no more than 200 words to warren.pearce@sheffield.ac.uk — deadline, September 2nd. Limited funds are available to cover travel costs, and accommodation if required. Please enquire in advance if you need support.
Topics and perspectives include, but are not limited to: Activist social media strategies; (In)visible climate politics in activism; Science, knowledges and activism; Emotion and affect in climate activism; New climate movements in historical context; Policies and targets in activist discourse; Biodiversity as an activist issue; Intersectionality and climate change; Care and solidarity in climate activism; Purposes and audiences for activist communication; Consensus-building vs radicalism; Imagined futures in climate-changed worlds; Shifting temporalities of climate change.
