Environmental Humanities

Revised to incorporate and reflect changes and advances since it was first published the new edition of Architecture in a Climate of Change provides the latest basic principals of sustainability and the future of sustainable technology. Including new material on wind generation, domestic water conservation, solar thermal electricity as well as international case studies Architecture in a Climate of Change encourages readers to consider new approaches to building making minimum demand on fossil based energy.

This book focuses on the way aspects of the built environment are experienced by the occupants and how that experience is interpreted in architectural design. Unlike most textbooks in this area this one concentrates on general principles rather than technical calculations and is a very accessible introduction for undergraduate students. Specific climatic conditions covered include: sun, heat, light, sound, air flow, water, fire and ecological design.

Papers are contributed by leading experts in fields ranging from philosophy, the social, political and physical sciences, engineering, architecture, mathematics and complexity science. The resulting volume will be essential reading for all those involved with changing the mindsets of a generation on the need to, and ways to, build resilience to rapid change and transforming markets in the built environment.

Every day we are bombarded by reports about ecosystem breakdown, social conflict, economic stagnation and a crisis of identity. There is mounting evidence that deeper transitions are underway that suggest we may be entering another period of great transformation equal in significance to the agricultural revolution some 13,000 years ago or the Industrial Revolution 250 years ago. This book helps readers make sense of our global crisis and the dynamics of transition that could result in a shift from the industrial epoch that we live in now to a more sustainable and equitable age.

Modern and professional communication is required to realise the goal of sustainability in society. This book develops a theoretical and empirical framework, integrating interdisciplinary perspectives from communications theory, psychology, sociology, educational sciences, systems theory and constructivism. Its aim is to inform the establishment of sustainability communication. Complementing this theoretical framework, the book provides methods and concepts in a range of fields such as corporate practice, education and media. The book addresses the scientific community and students as well as communicators in all categories of sustainability communication.

Understanding how rhetoric, and environmental rhetoric in particular, informs and is informed by local and global ecologies contributes to our conversations about sustainability and resilience -- the preservation and conservation of the earth and the future of human society. This book explores some of the complex relationships, collaborations, compromises, and contradictions between human endeavor and situated discourses, identities and landscapes, social justice and natural resources, movement and geographies, unpacking and grappling with the complexities of rhetoric of presence.

Geoengineering, Persuasion, and the Climate Crisis: A Geologic Rhetoric exposes the deeply worrying state of discourse over geoengineering--the intentional manipulation of the earth's climate as means to halt or reverse global warming. These climate-altering projects, which range from cloud-whitening to carbon dioxide removal and from stratospheric aerosol injection to enhanced weathering, are all technological solutions to more complex geosocial problems.

"Climate change is one of the most significant challenges facing the global community in the twenty-first century, and with its position at the border between people, technology, science, and communication, technical communication has a significant role to play in helping to solve these complex environmental problems. Curiously, however, technical communication (TC) research has remained relatively quiet on the ways our field contributes to positive environmental action. To help invigorate the conversation in TC about environmental issues, this collection of essays amplifies the work of scholars engaging with these challenges by creating a conversation about the ways that our field has contributed to pragmatic and democratic action to address climate change." (Introduction)

This book provides an overview of the forms of agency in urban climate politics, discussing the friction and power dynamics between them. Written by renowned scholars, it critically assesses the advantages and limitations of increasing agency in urban climate governance. In doing so, it sheds critical new light on the existing literature, advances the state of knowledge of urban climate governance and discusses ways to accelerate urban climate action.

Relationships between cities and energy, water, waste and transport networks are changing. World Cities and Climate Change argues that this is not something that is happening naturally but is the product of social, economic, political and spatial processes and that these changes have profound implications for the shape of contemporary and future cities. Drawing on research and examples from London, New York, Tokyo, Melbourne, Shanghai, San Francisco and other world cities, Mike Hodson and Simon Marvin pose a critical question: Are visions of future urbanism socially and ecologically progressive or do they promote the selective and partial re-bounding of particular social groups and places predicated on new - often hidden - interdependencies?

In Constructed Climates, ecologist William G. Wilson demonstrates the value of urban green. Focusing specifically on the role of vegetation and trees, Wilson shows the costs and benefits reaped from urban open spaces, from cooler temperatures to better quality ground water--and why it all matters. While Constructed Climates is a work of science, it does not ignore the social component. Wilson looks at low-income areas that have poor vegetation, and shows how enhancing these areas through the planting of community gardens and trees can alleviate social ills. This book will be essential reading for environmentalists and anyone making decisions for the nature and well-being of our cities and citizens.

This is a book about the complex and contradictory roles that universities play in climate change. Through their diverse functions of providing general education for increasing proportions of the population, delivering professional training, conducting basic research and technological innovation, engaging with the public and offering services to government, private sector and civil society organisations, they give us the tools to both destroy and save ourselves" (p. 2).

Curriculum and Learning for Climate Action offers researchers, practitioners, donors, and decisionmakers insights into entry points for education systems change needed to reorient human society’s relationship with our planetary systems.

Matthew S. Henry examines cultural representations that imagine a just transition, a concept rooted in the U.S. labor and environmental justice movements to describe an alternative economic paradigm predicated on sustainability, economic and social equity, and climate resilience. Focused on regions of water insecurity, from central Arizona to central Appalachia, Henry explores how writers, artists, and activists have creatively responded to intensifying water crises in the United States and argues that narrative and storytelling are critical to environmental and social justice advocacy.

The climate crisis is a crisis of leadership. For too long too many leaders have prioritized corporate profits over the public good, exacerbating climate vulnerabilities while reinforcing economic and racial injustice. Transformation to a just, sustainable renewable-based society requires leaders who connect social justice to climate and energy.

The untold story of climate migration in the United States--the personal stories of those experiencing displacement, the portraits of communities being torn apart by disaster, and the implications for all of us as we confront a changing future

2020 was a year defined by crisis. For decades, scientists have been sounding the alarm about the urgency of addressing climate change, but it took COVID-19 to demonstrate clearly that the future of human life on Earth is interconnected and at risk. While the virus quickly spread across the globe, extreme weather events compounded the suffering and economic catastrophe. In the U.S., public demonstrations of outrage over the murder of George Floyd expanded to include a growing awareness of the pandemic's disproportionate impact on communities of color. In cities around the world, people took to the streets to protest racial inequity in all of its forms. In The Path to a Livable Future, Stan Cox makes plain the connections between the multiple crises facing us today, and provides an inspired vision for how to resolve them.

An examination of why government agencies allow environmental injustices to persist. Many state and federal environmental agencies have put in place programs, policies, and practices to redress environmental injustices, and yet these efforts fall short of meeting the principles that environmental justice activists have fought for. In From the Inside Out, Jill Lindsey Harrison offers an account of the bureaucratic culture that hinders regulatory agencies' attempts to reduce environmental injustices.

Freedom Farmers expands the historical narrative of the black freedom struggle to embrace the work, roles, and contributions of southern Black farmers and the organizations they formed. Whereas existing scholarship generally views agriculture as a site of oppression and exploitation of black people, this book reveals agriculture as a site of resistance and provides a historical foundation that adds meaning and context to current conversations around the resurgence of food justice/sovereignty movements in urban spaces.

At the intersection of river sciences, queer and trans theory, and environmental justice, Underflows explores river cultures and politics at five sites of water conflict and restoration in California, Oregon, and Washington. Incorporating work with salmon, beaver, and floodplain recovery projects, Wölfle Hazard weaves narratives about innovative field research practices with an affectively oriented queer and trans focus on love and grief for rivers and fish.