Extreme Landscapes of the Anthropocene: Final Student Essays
Anthropocene . Personal ReflectionsAnthropologist Anna Tsing writes that as “sites for more-than-human dramas, landscapes are radical tools for decentering human hubris. Landscapes are not backdrops for historical action: they are themselves active.” As active spaces, engaging with landscapes takes active observation, and a willingness to look beyond the self-as-observer, perhaps through additional research about the history and ecology of
Exploring With Turkeys: An Illustrated Story
Anthropocene . Collaboration . Ecology . For Kids, Teachers, and Parents . Resilience . Tales of ProgressThis post corresponds with an essay entitled: “Stories in, of, and for the Anthropocene: Exploring with Turkeys“ For a short essay on why I went exploring with turkeys click here: http://anthropocene.wescreates.wesleyan.edu/uncategorized/stories-in-of-and-for-the-anthropocene-why-explore-with-turkeys/
Students from the open but fiercely inward-focused Wesleyan University would benefit from talking to people in the local Middletown community. Wesleyan is where woke kids go to get points for their hot takes. When the afro-indigenous girl in your indigenous literature class makes a succinct, venerable comment, now you can raise your hand and respond
Refusing to Produce During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Anthropocene . Capitalism . COVID19 . Op-EdsAn interesting graphical depiction for the word change is that, when it occurs in our lives, change forces us to leave our state of inertia in the past, altering the general direction of our future. But extreme changes, such as those caused by COVID-19, are different. This epidemic, like other uncontrollable disasters, forces humans to
Recently, I have felt like the world is ending. My friends have nonchalantly referred to our current times as the “apocalypse” in casual conversation, and this sentiment feels increasingly more true as I scroll through coronavirus related news articles and updates on the rising death toll that litter my social media accounts. Long lines at
I used to go to the Ballard Locks as a child and watch the salmon swimming up the fish ladder. There were always so many of them! So active and so beautiful. My parents told me these ladders help salmon navigate around the Locks which were obstructing their natural migration pattern up the river. Childlike
Explaining the Anthropocene
Anthropocene . For Kids, Teachers, and Parents . PodcastsThe term “anthropocene” has been getting thrown around recently to help understand humanity’s impact on the earth. But what does it mean? In this podcast, I break down the term and why people use it at a level appropriate for a middle schooler interested in the environment. Podcast transcription: I want to talk about my
Standing at the edge of the diving board, looking straight down, I become aware of the distance I contain. There is a long way from my eyes to my toes, twice that from my toes to the surface of the water, and again from the surface to the bottom of the pool. There is only
The pandemic has derailed reality at every level. Grocery shopping now seems like a suicide mission and people are already comparing the stock market crashes to the Great Depression rather than the Great Recession. The speed and intensity with which seemingly fundamental social structures are toppling reveals their inherent fragility. Recently, I’ve overheard a lot
Teach Local: The importance of place based education in a climate crisis context.
Ecology . For Kids, Teachers, and Parents . Op-Eds . ResilienceThe ocean has been my life long companion and has played a key role in shaping and enhancing my education. Like most kids, the most impactful parts of my early education started long before I entered school. I grew up in a small, close knit community on the coast of Maine. Some of the first
