Sydney Environment Institute

Hosted by the Faculty of Arts Collaborative Research Group Concepts and Theories of ‘Life’.

Ecological Crisis and Creative Understanding

Planetary life is now in a ‘critical condition’ – an emergency that encompasses the biophysical environment as much as the cultural and social foundations of human knowledge and practice. The challenge of the global ecological crisis, or life in the Anthropocene, calls for an expanded vision of the human-environment relationship. Seeking collaboration beyond the academy and disciplinary boundaries, this symposium brings together philosophers, historians, anthropologists, biologists, artists and poets whose work critically and creatively engages with the systems of representation and the institutional structures through which contemporary societies understand life and its limits.

Confirmed speakers: Linda Connor, Thom van Dooren, Ute Eickelkamp, Luke Fischer, Monica Gagliano, Prudence Gibson, Sebastian Job, Harriet Johnson, Janet Laurence, Jadran Mimica, Peter Minter, Cat Moir, Libby Robin, Deborah Bird Rose and Dieter Sturma.

Concluding event: Voicing the Earth, a poetry reading and music recital.
Poets: Judith Beveridge, Michelle Cahill, David Malouf and Peter Minter.

Conveners:
Ute Eickelkamp, Department of Anthropology
Luke Fischer, Department of Philosophy
Harriet Johnson, Departments of Philosophy and Government and International Relations