Hello and welcome to the August newsletter of morethanhumanworlds! This month, I'm sharing two upcoming online events on interdisciplinary research and plantation ecologies, a couple of essays and online talks on pandemic phenomenologies and the PhD journey, and three thought-provoking publications on storied mangroves, unthinking mastery, and epistemicide in the Global South. Also included is the announcement of the John Legge Prize for Best Thesis in Asian Studies, which I was hugely fortunate to receive this year. In this month's Morethanhuman Matters interview, I speak with Blanche Verlie, a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Sydney Environment Institute. Blanche has a multi-disciplinary background and works at the intersections between climate change, gender, culture, education, science studies, justice, emotions, affect, and the more-than-human world. If you'd like to share resources, news, or anything else related to morethanhumanworlds, please send them to me for inclusion in the September newsletter. Enjoy and thank you for subscribing to morethanhumanworlds! |
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UPCOMING EVENTS Join us on 6 - 7 August for two online workshops on interdisciplinary research, co-organized with Danielle Celermajer and hosted by the Sydney Environment Institute. The workshops bring together four pairs of scholars who will share their experiences in putting interdisciplinarity into practice in the study of more-than-human worlds. Join us on 24 August for an online guest talk on the multispecies politics of oil palm in West Papua, hosted by the University of Sydney's School of Philosophy and History of Science. This talk will examine how Indigenous Marind in West Papua theorize relations of parasitism and mutualism within monocrop plantations. | | |
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NEW PUBLICATIONS Read an essay on pandemic phenomenologies, published by critical theory and historical sociology journal Thesis Eleven. Part of the "Thinking and Living with Crisis" online collection, the essay examines how vulnerability, privilege, judgement, and awareness reshape our relations to bodies in the Covidscape. Watch an online seminar playfully titled "Getting Sh*t Done," hosted by Macquarie University's Anthropology Department. The seminar offers practical tips, tools, and tactics for PhD students on how to get words on paper, structure reading and writing, and stay sane and healthy throughout the research journey. Read the announcement of the John Legge Prize for Best Thesis in Asian Studies awarded for my PhD dissertation of 2019. A heartfelt thank you for this award to the Asian Studies Association of Australia and to the members of this year's Judging Panel, Kirin Narayan, Gary Rodes, and Antonia Finnane! | | |
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"Disciplinary knowledge cuts the world into discrete areas of study – the classic division being humans and nature – and pretends they don’t inter-relate. So, it makes sense to me that disciplinary knowledge will always have traces of extractivism and prevent us from inhabiting the complex, messy world in realistic and responsive ways." Blanche Verlie |
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MORETHANHUMAN MATTERS This week, morethanhuman matters interviews Blanche Verlie, a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Sydney Environment Institute. Blanche has a multi-disciplinary background and works at the intersections between climate change, gender, culture, education, science studies, justice, emotions, affect, and the more-than-human world. | | |
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TOP THREE READINGS Judith, Kate. 2020. “How Mangroves Story: On Being a Filter Feeder.” Swamphen: A Journal of Cultural Ecology 7: 1–10. On how filter feeding stories the relationship between the moon and the sea into thick embodied mangrove narratives. Singh, Julietta. 2018. Unthinking Mastery: Dehumanism and Decolonial Entanglements. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press. On how moving beyond the compulsive desire to become masterful human subjects can disentangle us from the legacies of violence and fantasies of invulnerability that lead us to hurt other humans, animals, and the environment. Sousa Santos, Boaventura de. 2014. Epistemologies of the South: Justice against Epistemicide. Boulder, C.O.: Paradigm Press. On "cognitive injustice," or the failure to recognize the different ways of knowing by which people across the globe run their lives and provide meaning to their existence, and its implications for global justice. | | |
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