See more interviews with residents here: Waiting to Die (Human Rights Network, 2019)
A look at 200-foot moving wall of gypsum that might cause an environmental disaster (The Advocate, 30 January 2019)
Field Campus meeting with Concerned Citizens of St. John inTchoupitoulas Chapel in Reserve, Louisiana. Photo by Tim Schütz, September 2019.
Robert Taylor speaking to Field Campus participants. Photo by Tim Schütz, September 2019.
CCSJP members rallying to relocate the Fifth Ward Elementary school, located next to the Denka/DuPont plant in Reserve, LA. Photo by Concerned Citizens of St. John.
DEUTERO: What capacity (and incapacity) is there to recognize and attend to “the Anthropocene” in this setting? How might academic projects contribute to or scaffold this capacity?
META: How is “the Anthropocene” – by this, or some other name – talked and worried about in this setting? What modes of communication carry and occlude engagement with anthropocenics? What discursive histories shape contemporary articulations?
EXDU: Who is imagining and planning for anthropocenic futures in this setting, with what modes of expertise, cut by what vested interests? What educational programs -- environmental, civic, media, STEM and so on -- are addressing anthrhopocenics?
MACRO: What economic activities have contributed to anthropocenics in this setting? How are future economies imagined and planned? What laws and policy have addressed anthropocenics?
MESO: Who are stakeholders in this quotidian Anthropocene and how do they relate to each other? What forms of political organization have emerged to address and weather the Anthropocene?
MICRO: What labors have contributed to and go on within this quotidian Anthropocene? What practices (for flood management or controlling toxic contamination, for example) have anthropocenics provoked?
NANO: What psychologies have anthropocenics produced in this setting and how is this refiguring what people want and consider possible? What thought styles and language ideologies are in play?
BIO: How are bodies in this setting laced and burdened with anthropocenics? How are anthropocenic bodies racialized bodies?
DATA: What data infrastructure supports recognition, characterization and response to anthropocenics in this setting? Who has access to relevant data and sense-making tools?
TECHNO: What industries and infrastructure have produced anthropocenics in this setting? What infrastructure has been built in response? How, for example, has energy transition and climate change adaptation been pursued?
ECO-ATMO: What ecosystems in this setting are depended on, protected, or compromised, and how is this recognized (or not)? How are global warming and other atmospheric currents stressing local landscapes?
GEO: How has intensive human activity marked, transmuted, destabilized and harmed this setting? What levels of lead and other metals are in the soil? Where are hazardous waste stored?
1) What is the setting of this case?
2) What environmental threats (from worst case scenarios, pollution and climate change) are there in this setting?
3) What intersecting factors -- social, cultural, political, technological, ecological -- contribute to environmental health vulnerability and injustice in this setting?
4) Who are stakeholders, what are their characteristics, and what are their perceptions of the problems?
5) What have different stakeholder groups done (or not done) in response to the problems in this case?
6) How have environmental problems in this setting been reported on by media, environmental groups, companies and government agencies?
7) What local actions would reduce environmental vulnerability and injustice in this setting?
8) What extra-local actions (at state, national or international levels) would reduce environmental vulnerability and injustice in this setting and similar settings?
9) What kinds of data and research would be useful in efforts to characterize and address environmental threats in this setting and similar settings?
10) What, in your view, is ethically wrong or unjust in this case?
Lerner, S., 2006. Diamond: A struggle for environmental justice in Louisiana's chemical corridor. MIT Press.
