Abstract
Climate change has been ubiquitously defined as a global issue and must be tackled as such. But how do these strategies land on the ground we know, in the cultures where we live? Antiquated definitions of conservation and ecology stand disconnected and rigid in the face of how climate mitigation can work to address centuries of systemic and widespread cultural issues. In many ways, how can the work of climate resilience help to fix the environmental and social violence and destruction that helped create it? By looking at the potential of a cultural reparation ecology, climate resilience and mitigation can be understood and communicated as a cross-disciplinary method towards simultaneously addressing issues of cultural, ecological, and social change. This paper examines American peripheral lands including Hawaii and the US Virgin Islands to offer examples of how ecological thinking and practice can further evolve and work towards climate mitigation. This work can not be done alone by landscape architects and the design professions at large. Cultural reparation ecology necessitates an approach that pulls from multiple disciplines ranging from cultural anthropology, to art and literature, and the science and design professions in order to successfully be integrated into how we work together to address the issues of the climate crisis. Here, the paper looks towards building a new method of ecology where multiple disciplines can actively and equally engage and contribute towards robust and forward-thinking solutions that maintain ecological resilience and cultural vibrance.
Presenters
William ShiversLecturer and Ph.D Student, Landscape Architecture, University of Virginia, Virginia, United States
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
KEYWORDS
Ecology, Climate Adaptation, Ethnographic Studies, Sustainability, Environmental Humanities, Colonialism
