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Summer 2024
This weekly pod and video cast series features widely comprehensible bite sized presentations by academics working on the cutting edge of climate change and sustainability research across various disciplines. The series will connect an emerging community committed to climate action and justice; transition to renewable resources; strengthening grassroots communication and capacity building, with a strong focus on incorporating Indigenous and subaltern worldviews and sustainability strategies into global conversations.
All episodes are available on YouTube.
We welcome interested academics to participate live and contribute to the conversation – please contact r.bold@ucl.ac.uk
Dr. Jonathan Mille: Wednesday 24 April
UCL Climate Action Unit
Jonathan specialises in the study of systemic risks, natural hazards and resilience strategies, focusing on how these interact in the context of climate change and energy transitions. His work is multidisciplinary, bridging the gap between the physical sciences and risk management to help diverse stakeholders develop adaptation and mitigation approaches. He also works on issues of systemic dependencies in the intertwined context of climate change and energy systems. Jonathan is also involved in science communication and education, particularly in the areas of systemic risk, vulnerability and resilience. Drawing on his extensive experience, he creates compelling narratives to inform diverse audiences about environmental challenges. He is also contributing his expertise to the creation of the documentary series Into the Rewild, whose development he is advising.
Dr. Tejas Rao: Wednesday 1 May
Department of Land Economy, University of Cambridge
Tejas will explore the pivotal role of food sovereignty within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and its prominence during Conference of the Parties (CoPs) meetings, examining how food sovereignty principles have emerged as a critical component in addressing the complex challenges at the nexus of climate change, agriculture, and food security. He will analyse the evolution of food sovereignty discourse within the UNFCCC framework, highlighting key milestones and achievements. In the context of UNFCCC CoP28, this talk delves into the specific instances where food sovereignty has been underscored during CoPs, showcasing its relevance in shaping global climate policies and ultimately advocating for the protection of farmers in an era of climate uncertainty.
Tejas’ central research investigates how lawyers influence the “implementation of” and “compliance with” international environmental agreements, including the Paris Agreement – how do their biases define our shared normative understandings of these phrases, what are their mechanisms, and what is their community (if at all)?
Prof. Hannah Knox: Wednesday 8 May
Department of Anthropology, UCL
Hannah’s research is concerned with understanding processes of social and political transformation through the ethnographic study of technical relations and expert practices. Most recently she has been studying the politics of energy and climate change in a project that has been following the pursuit of carbon reduction strategies by a network of scientists, activists and local authority officers in Manchester, UK. Her work is concerned with understanding contemporary manifestations of risk and responsibility, territorial politics, expertise, knowledge and technology.
She is the co-editor of Ethnography for Data Saturated World (2018), ‘Objects and Materials: A Routledge Companion’ (2013), Digital Anthropology Second Edition (2022), and Speaking for the Social: A Catalogue of method (2022). She has also published the research monographs Roads: An Anthropology of Infrastructure and Expertise (2015), and Thinking like a Climate: Governing a City in Times of Environmental Change (2020).
Ruben Dario Chambi: Wednesday 15 May
Ludwig-Maximilians University Munich: PhD Candidate
Reconstituting Suma Qamaña:
Economic practices and expressions of well-being among Aymara traders in the city of El Alto, Bolivia
Ruben Dario Chambi studied Anthropology at the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés (UMSA), Bolivia, and holds a master’s degree in Human Rights, Democracy and Globalisation from the Universidad Oberta de Catalunya (UOC). Since 2006, he has worked as a project manager, consultant, trainer, and researcher in various academic and development organizations in Bolivia. He is the author of several publications on issues related to autonomy and Indigenous rights, decolonization, “Buen Vivir” (Living Well) and child labour. His current project is focused on the processes of modernity, identity, coloniality and reflection on categories such as “Buen Vivir” among Aymara communities.
His CAoS session will deal his recent studies of Aymara Futurism, as well as his work tracing Suma Qamaña as an anti-colonial Aymara concept of the 1970s and 1980s (different from “Vivir Bien”) to analyse in which ways this notion of well-being manifests itself among contemporary Aymara traders in El Alto. In recent years, this group has become a prolific sector in terms of social, economic and political positioning, giving way to novel expressions that reconfigure the urban. The aim is to delve into the logics of contemporary Aymara well-being, its transitions and projections and, in this process, to discover perspectives that go beyond the official discourses that present these people as communitarian and anti-mercantile societies.