THE VIEW FROM THE ANTHROPOCENE:
EXPLORING THE HUMAN EPOCH FROM POST-ANTHROPOCENTRIC PERSPECTIVES
on 15-16 October 2022
“If the sadness of life makes you tired
And the failures of man make you sigh
You can look to the time soon arriving
When this noble experiment winds down and calls it a day”
In
this age of ecological, economic and social crises, the notion of the
Anthropocene is becoming ever more significant. Proposed by Paul J.
Crutzen and Eugene F. Stoermer in 2000, the Anthropocene as a new
geological epoch highlights detrimental human impact on the planet,
while as a critical notion it synthetises anti-, non- or
post-anthropocentric views challenging the dominant discourses and
practices that place humans at the centre of the world. However, with
its scope incessantly expanding and its meanings ever in flux, the
Anthropocene requires constant redefinition and reassessment. So far it
has been criticised for its ideological implications and several terms
such as Plantationocene (Haraway 2015), Capitalocene (Moore 2016, Davies
2016), and Occidentalocene (Bonneuil and Fressoz 2017) have been
offered as alternatives. Yet could we define the Anthropocene and its
implications more clearly and harmoniously? Above all, it is an urgent
warning about the future of ecosystems, cultures and societies alike,
forcing us to realise that “we are embedded in various social, economic,
and—especially—ecological contexts that are inseparably connected”
(Kersten 2013). Addressing the need for coherence across versatile
approaches, the conference calls for a transdisciplinary investigation
of the challenges of our age.
We also realise that the
Anthropocene must be acted upon, although its cry for action is
crippling. As Judy Wilson put it during one of the panel discussions at
COP26, “the human epoch is not only external, it is also internal”, for
it not only denotes a number of ecological and social crises – including
climate change, loss of biodiversity, pollution, poverty and starvation
in the global south, causing waves of migration which in turn fuel
global conflict –, but it also involves anxiety and apathy that render
us passive in the face of these crises. As Liz-Rejane Issberner and
Philippe Léna put it, it seems “as though humanity is being lethargic –
waiting for the end of the film, when the heroes arrive to sort
everything out, and we can all live happily ever after” (2018).
The
conference aims to address some of the controversies, the lethargy and
(wilful) ignorance that conceal the significance of the Anthropocene,
exploring the notion itself as well as its theoretical and practical
challenges from the perspectives of posthumanism, animal studies,
ecocriticism and any other approaches that question anthropocentrism
from their respective viewpoints. We invite proposals that may address,
yet are not restricted to, the following topics:
- Critiques
of and conceptual alternatives to the Anthropocene—Donna Haraway’s
‘Cthulhucene’, JasonMoore’s ‘Capitalocene’, Bernard Stiegler’s
‘neganthropocene’ and the like
- Cli-fi, dystopian and/or utopian responses to climate change
- Speculative and fantastic fiction related to the Anthropocene
- Eco-anxiety
- Fantastic texts exploring indigenous worldviews on ecology
- Literary fiction or other media that interrogate humanity’s relationship with other lifeforms
- Literary fiction or other media that question the human/animal boundary
- Human-Animal Studies, Literary and Cultural Animal Studies, Animal Ethics, Critical Animal Studies
- The
non- and posthuman other (animals, plants, monsters, aliens, artificial
intelligence) in art, literature, cinema and other media
- Nonhuman perspectives in literature and cinema; the nonhuman gaze
- Non-anthropocentric spaces and temporalities in literature and cinema
- Ecocriticism, environmental humanities, deep ecology and ecosophy
- Eco-horror; aesthetics and themes
- Bioethical considerations
- Posthumanism, post- and transhumanist frameworks, posthumanist ethics
- Anti-humanism, meta-humanism
- Speculative
realism, object-oriented ontologies, new materialism,
post-anthropocentric ecologytheories, theories of social assemblage
- Object-oriented art; bioart, microbial art
- Eco-art, eco-literature, eco-media, eco-cinema
Confirmed
plenary speakers include Márk Horváth and Ádám Lovász who will give a
talk on the post-anthropocentric turn, and László Nemes, who will speak
about his current inquiry into the ethics of de-extinction. Accompanying
programmes will include a roundtable discussion addressing the
challenges of the Anthropocene, with participants from various fields
including philosophy, literary and film criticism, biology, and
psychology; a photography exhibition; and a multimedia art event
organised by the members of Művészek a klímatudatosságért (Artists for
Climate Awareness). With these programmes we hope to turn the collective
experience of inertia symptomatic of the Anthropocene into awareness,
new forms of agency, and action.
“Time has come now to stop being human
Time to find a new creature to be
Be a fish or a weed or a sparrow
For the earth has grown tired and all of your time has expired.”
(Thinking Fellers Union Local 282: “Noble Experiment”)
Technical details:
The
conference is planned as an on-site event, to be held in English and
Hungarian, on 15-16 October 2022at the University of Debrecen. Depending
on the dynamics of the pandemic, we will nevertheless adapt and
consider moving parts of or the whole conference to a digital platform.
Participants will be informed about any changes via email in due time.
Please send a 250 word abstract of your proposed paper with a brief, max. 100 word biography to theviewfromtheanthropocene@gmail.com
by June 30, 2022. Responses will be given by July 31, 2022.
It
is intended that a selection of the papers based on the conference
presentations will be published, either in a separate collection of
articles or a thematic volume in a scholarly journal.
For more information please visit the event’s Facebook page or contact the organizers at the following e-mail address: theviewfromtheanthropocene@gmail.com.
Co-organised and supported by the Hungarian Society for the Study of English (HUSSE).
Supported by the Institute of English and American Studies (IEAS), University of Debrecen (UD).
The
conference is planned as an on-site event, to be held in English and
Hungarian, on 15-16 October 2022at the University of Debrecen. Depending
on the dynamics of the pandemic, we will nevertheless adapt and
consider moving parts of or the whole conference to a digital platform.
Participants will be informed about any changes via email in due time.
Please send a 250 word abstract of your proposed paper with a brief, max. 100 word biography to theviewfromtheanthropocene@gmail.com
by June 30, 2022. Responses will be given by July 31, 2022.
It
is intended that a selection of the papers based on the conference
presentations will be published, either in a separate collection of
articles or a thematic volume in a scholarly journal.
For more information please visit the event’s Facebook page or contact the organizers at the following e-mail address: theviewfromtheanthropocene@gmail.com.
Co-organised and supported by the Hungarian Society for the Study of English (HUSSE).
Supported by the Institute of English and American Studies (IEAS), University of Debrecen (UD).
