Georgetown Environmental History invites you to attend an upcoming lecture on the world after the Anthropocene by Professor Randall Amster, Co-Director of the Environmental Studies Program at Georgetown University.
 
Date: Thursday, November 7, 2019, 2:00-3:30 pm. 

Place: Intercultural Center (ICC) 662, Georgetown University, 3700 O St. NW Washington DC, 20057.

Title: The Anthropocene Might Already Be Over. What's Next?

Abstract: Contemporary societies have a tendency to name things based more on what’s been lost than what is actually transpiring in real time. Thus, a suburban development might be dubbed something bucolic-sounding like “Quail Meadows” after the quail have been chased off and the meadows turned into building pads. More to the point, the naming of historical epochs has always been done with the benefit of hindsight, and the perils of doing so contemporaneously can be read as a form of reification or a self-fulfilling prophecy. Still, there’s no doubt that the implication of the Anthropocene is evident: humans (though not all equally) have radically altered the basic ecological systems that make life possible on this planet for ourselves (and potentially many other species). The moniker may thus be a potent warning—or it could be a nascent epitaph if it goes unheeded. If it is indeed the case that the Anthropocene represents the seeds of our demise rather than a rapid reclaiming of our capacity to change course, then it begs the question of what’s next. In this workshop, we will explore some of the key alternative renderings of the Anthropocene, and collectively inquire as to what the next epoch might look like.

Georgetown Environmental History invites you to attend an upcoming lecture on whale culture and adaptation in the Bering Strait by Professor Bathsheba Demuth, an environmental historian at Brown University and author of the critically acclaimed book Floating Coast: An Environmental History of the Bering Strait.
 
Date: Thursday, October 10, 2019, 5:00-7:00 pm. 

Place: McShain Lounge, McCarthy Hall, Georgetown University, 3700 O St. NW Washington DC, 20057.

Title: The Ethical Choices of Whales: Bowheads, Hunters, and Mutual Adaptations in the Bering Strait, 1848-1968

Author biography: Professor Demuth specializes in the lands and seas of the Russian and North American Arctic. Her interests in northern environments and cultures began when she was 18 and moved to the village of Old Crow in the Yukon, where she spent several years training sled dogs. In the years since, she has visited and lived in Arctic communities across Eurasia and North America. Her writing has recently appeared in publications from the American Historical Review to the New Yorker. Professor Demuth’s first book, Floating Coast: An Environmental History of the Arctic is a New York Times editor's choice and considered by some to be among the most popular, important, and beautifully written manuscripts in environmental history to be published in the last decade. 

Georgetown Environmental History invites you to attend the next Environment and History Research Seminar (EaHRS) event, which features the work of Professor Abigail Agresta of George Washington University. Professor Agresta will be presenting research from her current book project about natural disaster response and Christian identity in late medieval Valencia.

Date: Monday, September 30, 2019, 2:00-3:30 pm. 

Place: Intercultural Center (ICC) 662, Georgetown University, 3700 O st. NW Washington DC, 20057.

Title: "Improvements, by God's Mercy:" Natural Disaster Response and Christian Identity in Late Medieval Valencia.

Abstract: In this talk Dr. Agresta will discuss her current book project, God, Humans, and Nature in Late Medieval Valencia. The book is an analysis of the relationship between God, human beings, and nature, as imagined by the Christian rulers of the religiously mixed city. Based on archival research on Valencia's municipal records from the fourteenth century to the early sixteenth, the book argues that the governing elite moved from a fairly technocratic approach to the environment in the fourteenth century to an overwhelmingly religious one by the mid-fifteenth. This shift away from infrastructure and toward ritual reflected the city's changing relationship with its own Christianity and its crusading past. Reversing the traditional narrative of technological progress, the book shows how religious concerns shaped the governance of the environment in a multi-faith context, with implications for the history of both religion and environment in the pre-modern period.

If you plan to attend and would like a copy of the pre-circulated chapter associated with this presentation, please email Natascha Otoya (nd515@georgetown.edu) or Dylan Proctor (dap129@georgetown.edu).

Georgetown Environmental History invites you to attend an interdisciplinary lecture on volcanic eruptions and climate history by leading dendro-climatologist Kevin Anchukaitis of the University of Arizona's Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research. 

Date: Tuesday, September 17, 2019, 12:30-2:00 pm.

Place: 239 Regents, Georgetown University, 3700 O st. NW Washington DC, 20057.

Title: Fimbulwinter, Yaxche, and Armageddon: Volcanic Impacts on Climate and Society

Abstract: Volcanic eruptions are the most important influence on the climate of the Common Era prior to the anthropogenic rise in atmospheric CO2. Large eruptions cause widespread cooling of surface temperatures and changes to the hydrological cycle, but substantial disagreements still exists between climate model simulations of these effects and paleoclimate reconstructions of Earth history.  In this talk I describe the physical mechanisms behind the climate influence of volcanic eruptions and how the timing and magnitude of their impacts can be studied using the annual rings of trees.  Tree-ring reconstructions of past temperature and rainfall reveal the spatial and temporal climate fingerprint of these eruptions, but also highlight disagreements and uncertainties especially for large eruptions in the 6th, 13th, and 15th century.  Finally, I review recent scholarship linking volcanic eruptions to societal change via climate disruptions and highlight the challenges and opportunities for collaboration between historians and paleoclimatologists.

Lunch will be included. If you plan to attend please email Professor Timothy Newfield (tpn11@georgetown.edu) or Professor Dagomar Degroot (dd865@georgetown.edu) so that they may include you in the lunch order.

​Several Georgetown University scholars will participate in the ICEHO’s 3rd World Congress of Environmental History, taking place next week (July 22-26, 2019) at the Federal University of Santa Catarina in Florianópolis, Brazil. See below for the details on the relevant panels and roundtables.
 
Monday July 22
 
2:00-3:30 pm, Doctoral candidate Matthew Johnson presents ‘‘Itaipu or Sete Quedas’: An Environmental History of the World’s Most Productive Hydroelectric Dam,’ on the panel ‘Energy and History: Wind, Water, and Oil,’ in the Centro de Filosofia e Ciências Humanas (CFN), Sala 323 do CFN.
 
Tuesday July 23
 
2:00-3:30 pm, Professor Dagomar Degroot chairs the panel ‘Historical Human and Cetacean Cultures,’ in the Centro de Filosofia e Ciências Humanas (CFH), Auditório do Bloco E.
 
Wednesday July 24
 
11:00 am-12:30 pm Doctoral student Natascha Otoya presents ‘The Development of Oil Geology in Brazil from a Postcolonial Perspective,’ in the panel ‘Peripheral Socio-Environmental Transformations,’ in the Centro de Filosofia e Ciências Humanas (CFH), Sala 323 do CFH.

Thursday July 25
 
2:00-3:30 pm, Doctoral candidate Douglas McRae presents ‘The Billings Reservoir: An Artificial Lake in the Anthropocene (São Paulo, 1925-1988),’ on the panel Water and Megacities in the 20th Century: Cases from the Americas, in the Centro de Cultura e Eventos, Sala Goiabeira.

Watermark is a feature documentary from multiple-award winning filmmaker Jennifer Baichwal and renowned photographer Edward Burtynsky. 

The film brings together diverse stories from around the globe about our relationship with water: how we are drawn to it, what we learn from it, how we use it and the consequences of that use. We see massive floating abalone farms off China’s Fujian coast and the construction site of the biggest arch dam in the world – the Xiluodu, six times the size of the Hoover. We visit the barren desert delta where the mighty Colorado River and the water-intensive leather tanneries of Dhaka.We witness how humans are drawn to water, from the U.S. Open of Surfing to the Kumbh Mela in Allahabad, where millions of people gather for a sacred bath in the Ganges. We speak with scientists who drill ice cores deep into the Greenland Ice Sheet, and explore the sublime pristine watersheds of Northern British Columbia. Shot in stunning 5K ultra high-definition video and full of soaring aerial perspectives, this film shows water as a terraforming element, as well as the magnitude of our need and use.
​

Our very own Prof. Degroot will be taking part in an interdisciplinary panel about strategies for writing persuasively and accurately about environmental disaster and climate change, in Copley Formal Lounge (in Copley Hall, accessible on the south side of Red Square).

It's a task than many of us have to cope with, so come and join the discussion! 

This Saturday, April 23, the Georgetown University History Department is proud to host the annual spring workshop of the African History Series of the Georgetown Institute for Global History, on the subject of African Environments and their Populations. The all-day workshop features Nancy Jacobs (Brown University), Sandra Swart (Stellenbosch University) and guest panelists.

Workshop Description: Humanistic approaches to the study of environments over the last several decades opened intellectual space for new fields of humanities and social science research on topics like climate change. Indeed, the anthropocentric approach dominates both environmental and climate studies in disciplines ranging from history to anthropology to critical theory. Consensus is growing around the value of concepts like the Anthropocene and the place of the humanities and social sciences in contributing to the research agenda undergirding policy about the environment and the changing climate. But, these developments have generally unfolded in isolation from other developments in the humanities and related fields that take seriously the study of non-human populations of environments, often in changing climate regimes. Scholars in a number of humanistic disciplines have recognized the need to study animals, pathogens, and even trees through humanities approaches. New thematic fields of research (and journals) are emerging for these approaches, of which the best known is Animal Studies. We seek to put into conversation traditionally anthropocentric approaches to the study of African environments—including under new and historical climate regimes—with emerging humanities approaches to the many other kinds of non-human populations that also live in African environments. We hope some of these connections will emerge in individual papers, while others will develop as we draw out links between papers during the workshop.

Please RSVP here. Contact Prof. Kathryn de Luna to receive copies of the pre-circulated papers.

Read on for the schedule of the day's events ->

Several Georgetown University scholars will participate in the annual conference of the American Society for Environmental History, taking place this week at the Westin Hotel in Seattle, Washington. See below for details on the relevant panels, roundtables and events.

Thursday March 31: 

Professor Dagomar Degroot chairs the informal Climate History Network lunch at 11:30 a.m. at Icon Grill.

Doctoral candidate Adrienne Kates presents 'Capitalism and Maya Autonomy in Mexico's Forest Frontier, 1902-1945', on the panel 'Landscapes and Peoples in the Yucatán, 1500-Present' from 1 to 2:30 p.m., in the Adams room. 

Dr. Andrea Williams (PhD 2013) presents 'French Foresters Abroad: French Empire and the Nineteenth-Century Evolution of Forest Science', on the panel 'Trees Crossing Borders - Towards a Transnational History of Forestry' from 3 to 4:30 p.m., in the Olympic room.