41. Environmental Futures – Promoting Images Of Desirable Human-Nature Relationships
Ludwig Weh, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin; Lisa Kinne, netzwerk n e.V.
Posted: February 28, 2022 Accepted Languages: English/Inglés/Inglês
Following Vargas Llosa’s ‘The Storyteller’ into the richness of Indigenous oral tradition reveals deep and intricately interwoven relationships between cultural practices of humans and their mutually meaningful interactions with nature. In sharp contrast, modern sciences assess anthropogenic impacts on nature from often abstract, technical and codified perspectives, employing data-driven methods to substantiate stories of global ecosystems in peril and decline. Yet, science communication seeks comprehensive media narratives to inform social discourse and foster policies for mindful future ecosystem management.
In this sense, this panel explores the wide range of approaches ideating images of environmental futures and debating their social desirability. Based on Inayatullah (1990), their various epistemologies may include: rational-analytical / empirical-predictive, ethical-normative / activist-emancipatory, creative-aesthetic / cultural-interpretative, visionary-imaginative / open-explorative, utopian-speculative / critical-poststructural.
Examples may include: climate forecasts predicting ecosystem services; ecosystem scenarios and pathways within Integrated Environmental Assessments; ethnographic inquiry of cultural nature-futures; climate action research; environmental design futures; non-anthropocentric / posthuman concepts such as more-than-human futures, multi-species futures, non-human futures; storied approaches such as climate fiction and solar punk.
The panel invites good practice case studies, innovative research projects and novel conceptual and methodic designs (science-art, quantitative-qualitative, biophysical-socioeconomic-cultural, design-based, …). Contributions may address, but not confine to, these aspects:
diverse approaches to environmental futures building socially meaningful narratives
related methods improving relational values of stakeholders such as care, trust and identification with the research subject, process and results
multi-method innovations enhancing comprehensiveness, applicability, usability and praxis relevance of environmental futures
suitable forms and tools of science communication negotiating environmental futures in public debate
advancement of environmental futures as interdisciplinary concept and praxis framework within social / natural / sustainability sciences
