Guelph Institute for Environmental Research
Guelph Institute for Environmental Research
An aerial map has been cut into pieces to create a puzzle. Some pieces of the puzzle have been put back together, others remain disjointed. There are three light skinned hands in the frame. One is older than the others, another has a tattoo on its wrist, the third is wearing a bracelet. The hands point to different areas of the map, as if in conversation with each other.

Climate Conversations

“… imagination not only shapes the perception of the climate change but co-fabricates it in ways that affect the possibilities to act on it.”

Kathryn Yusoff and Jennifer Gabrys, Climate Change and the Imagination.

The complexity and range of climate change’s impacts make interdisciplinarity one of the most powerful ways to respond to our current predicament. In recognition of the variety of expertise that the University of Guelph has to offer, Imagining Climates is hosting a series of conversations pairing leading thinkers and creators from the University of Guelph’s Environmental Science and Arts communities to discuss the role of the imagination in their practice as they engage with ecological and climate crisis.  Imagining Climates will provide an opportunity for creators and scientists to reflect on their practices and research, discovering ways in which they might overlap and support each other. How do these experts use acts of imagining to face ecological loss and anxiety and keep going? How can the knowledge and expertise from a diversity of fields and backgrounds help shape our climate narratives? And how can the imagination serve as a mode of thought to invite researchers, students, and the greater public to engage with the climate crisis and envision the future?

Table of Contents

Introducing Imagining Climates

In this short introductory video Imagining Climates leads, Associate Professor and novelist Catherine Bush and Ph.D. candidate and ecologist Liane Miedema Brown discuss the conceptual origins of the Imagining Climates project and how arts and science can work together to deepen our understanding of our present environments in order to respond to and reframe our future.

Diane Borsato and Chris Earley in Conversation

Imagining Climates presents our inaugural Climate Conversation between environmental artist and University of Guelph Associate Professor and GIER Affiliate Diane Borsato and interpretive biologist Chris Earley of the University of Guelph Arboretum. Borsato and Earley discuss birds, bird feeding as a form of performance art, and the intersections between art-making and science as they explore the imaginative possibilities for responding to our current moment. 

Writing About The Past, Present & Future of The Environment

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Professor, poet and Director of GIER, Dr. Madhur Anand discusses with professor, author and GIER Affiliate Lawrence Hill on how their writing engages with issues relating to the environment, climate change, and social justice. 

Amanda Boetzkes and Karine Gagné in Conversation

Art historian and author of Plastic Capitalism: Contemporary Art and the Drive to Waste and GIER Affiliate Amanda Boetzkes and anthropologist and author of Caring for Glaciers: Land, Animals, and Humanity in the Himalayas and GIER Affiliate Karine Gagné discuss ice and the role of the imagination in their work tackling climate change. Moderated by novelist, GIER Affiliate, and author of Blaze Island, Catherine Bush.

An Artist and a Scientist on Writing and Glaciers

GIER Affiliates Catherine Bush (School of English and Theatre Studies) and Dr. Emmanuelle Arnaud (School of Environmental Sciences) join in conversation to discuss creative writing, glaciers and how art and science can come together to show different perspectives on subjects such as climate change and a human perspective on geologic time.

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Banner photo credit: Andrew Maize, saskatoon (puzzled), 2019.

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