Posts

Ep 9 - "Everything is Connected" with Sheila Watt-Cloutier

In the ninth episode of the "Capitalism, Climate Change, and Culture" podcast series from GMU Cultural Studies, Christine Rosenfeld talks with Sheila Watt-Cloutier, an Inuit advocate who has worked on issues related to climate change and Persistent Organic Pollutants. Watt-Cloutier was a Nobel nominee and has receive the prestigious Right Livelihood Award for her work addressing climate change as a question of collective human rights. Her memoir The Right to Be Cold narrates her life, beginning as a youth in a remote Inuit village. Watt-Cloutier and Rosenfeld discuss some ways to highlight the cultural and human dimensions of climate change, the value of understanding climate change as an issue of collective human rights, and what will be lost if decisive action is not taken immediately. This podcast series is associated with George Mason University Cultural Studies' Colloquium Series. This year's series is called "Capitalism, Climate Change, and Culture."

Ep 8 - "Just Urban Futures" with Ashley Dawson

In the eighth episode of the "Capitalism, Climate Change, and Culture" podcast series from GMU Cultural Studies, Eric Ross talks with Ashley Dawson, who has written about climate change in The Boston Review, The Guardian , In These Times , Jacobin , and elsewhere. He's the author of the books Extreme Cities: The Peril and Promise of Urban Life in the Age of Climate Change , Extinction: A Radical History , and others. Ross and Dawson discuss what we can learn about climate politics by paying attention to cities and urban social movements. This podcast series is associated with George Mason University Cultural Studies' Colloquium Series. This year's series is called "Capitalism, Climate Change, and Culture." The industrial revolution liberated human beings from the cycles of nature — or so it once seemed. It turns out that greenhouse gases, a natural byproduct of coal- and petroleum-burning industries, lead to global warming, and that we are now locked i

Ep 7 - "The Storm State" with Christian Parenti

In the seventh episode of the "Capitalism, Climate Change, and Culture" podcast series from GMU Cultural Studies, Richard Todd Stafford talks with Christian Parenti, who has written about climate change in The New York Times, The London Review of Books,  The Nation,   Jacobin ,  Dissent,  and elsewhere. Parenti is an associate professor of economics at John Jay College of CUNY. Among others, he's the author of the book  Tropic of Chaos: Climate Change and the New Geography of Violence and is working on books about Alexander Hamilton as a political theorist and about the state as an environment-making force .   Stafford and Parenti discuss the role of the state in climate adaptation and mitigation. This podcast series is associated with George Mason University Cultural Studies' Colloquium Series. This year's series is called "Capitalism, Climate Change, and Culture." The industrial revolution liberated human beings from the cycles of nature — or so i

Ep 6 - "Planning The Good Anthropocene" with Leigh Phillips

In the sixth episode of the "Capitalism, Climate Change, and Culture" podcast series from GMU Cultural Studies, Richard Todd Stafford talks with Leigh Phillips, a science and politics writer who may be read in  Nature,   Scientific American ,  The Guardian , and  Jacobin . He's the author of the books  Austerity Ecology and the Collapse Porn Addicts: A Defense of Growth, Progress, Industry and Stuff  and, with Michal Rozworski,  The People's Republic of Walmart: How the World's Biggest Corporations are Laying the Foundations for Socialism.  Stafford and Phillips focus on how Phillips' broader concerns intersect with the arguments he advanced in "Planning the Good Anthropocene," the theme of one of Phillips' widely-shared articles, which was developed further in the penultimate chapter of  The People's Republic of Walmart  and a lecture he gave at George Mason University.  This podcast series is associated with George Mason University Cul

Ep 5 - "Greenwashing Culture" with Toby Miller

In the fifth episode of the "Capitalism, Climate Change, and Culture" podcast series from GMU Cultural Studies, Pavithra Suresh talks with Toby Miller, renowned cultural studies scholar, and author of Greenwashing Culture (2017), Greenwashing Sport (2017), Greening the Media (2012) with Richard Maxwell, and Technologies of Truth: Cultural Citizenship and the Popular Media (1997), among other books This podcast series is associated with George Mason University Cultural Studies' Colloquium Series. This year's series is called "Capitalism, Climate Change, and Culture." The industrial revolution liberated human beings from the cycles of nature — or so it once seemed. It turns out that greenhouse gases, a natural byproduct of coal- and petroleum-burning industries, lead to global warming, and that we are now locked into a long warming trend: a trend that will raise sea levels, enhance the occurrence of extreme weather events, and ultimately could threaten foo

Ep 4 - "Cheap Nature; or, the Cultural Logic of Historical Capitalism" with Jason W. Moore

In the fourth episode of the "Capitalism, Climate Change, and Culture" podcast series from GMU Cultural Studies, Richard Todd Stafford talks with Jason W. Moore, Associate Professor at the Binghamton University Sociology Department, and author of Capitalism in the Web of Life: Ecology and the Accumulation of Capital (2015) and, with Raj Patel, A History of the World in Seven Cheap Things: A Guide to Capitalism, Nature, and the Future of the Planet. This podcast series is associated with George Mason University Cultural Studies' Colloquium Series. This year's series is called "Capitalism, Climate Change, and Culture." The industrial revolution liberated human beings from the cycles of nature — or so it once seemed. It turns out that greenhouse gases, a natural byproduct of coal- and petroleum-burning industries, lead to global warming, and that we are now locked into a long warming trend: a trend that will raise sea levels, enhance the occurrence of extreme

Ep 3 - "Toxic risk, Corporate Negligence, Public Reckoning" with Merlin Chowkwanyun

In the third episode of the "Climate, Capitalism, and Culture" podcast series from GMU Cultural Studies, Tauheeda Yasin talks with Merlin Chowkwanyun, the Donald H. Gemeson Assistant Professor of Sociomedical Sciences at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health about his work creating the archive "Toxic Docs." "Toxic Docs" makes documents provided during the discovery process in environmental lawsuits concerning pollution searchable. As it turns out, many of the same techniques used to generate doubt about climate change were previously used by companies seeking to hide the harms of lead, asbestos, and the manufacture of PVC. They also talk about Dr. Chowkwanyun's upcoming book, which uses cases studies to explore the on-the-ground histories of public health and pollution in Los Angeles, Cleveland, Central Appalachia, and New York. This podcast series is associated with George Mason University Cultural Studies' Colloquium Series