POLITICS AND ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABILITY

This course aims to unravel the connections between politics and the environment through a discussion of contemporary capitalism, with a particular focus on everyday consumption practices in the Minority World/Global North. It discusses the politics-capitalism-nature nexus in two main ways: firstly, by exploring the contradictions inherent in consumption; second, by focusing on the tension between the visibility and invisibility of nature in general, and non-human animals in particular, in our consumption practices and in the contemporary world. By emphasising the consequences of overconsumption on people, health and the environment, the course invites us to rethink consumption as political and not as an everyday practice that we tend to take for granted.

Learn the main concepts that underpin critical approaches to consumption and the exploration of nature as a source of economic activities
Think critically about our everyday consumption practices and their consequences on people and the environment
Think about consumption as political, rather than an obvious practies
Learn to challenge the taken for granted-ness of our everyday practices
Learn to think of the world as more-than-human and for a more-than-human, social and environmental justice
Learn how to write and use diaries to think about our role in the world and as sources to write academic texts

being able to read, write and understand English

The main contents of the course, for attending ad non-attending students, cover:
Power and politics
Capitalism and its impact on people and the environment
Nature
Consumption and its contradictions and consequences
The (in)visibility of nature: introducing the field of human-animal studies
The commodification of nature and animals: between visibility and invisibility
Commodities as bundles of socio-technical and environmental relations
The politics of consumption: following commodities

The instructor will upload on Moodle relevant papers and chapters, which may include:
Cook, I and Crang, P. “Consumption and its geographies” in Daniels, P., Bradshaw, M., Shaw, D., Sisaway, J., & Hall, T. (2016). An introduction to human geography, Pearson
Cook, I., Evans, J., Griffiths, H., Mayblin, L., Payne, B., & Roberts, D. (2007). Made in…? Appreciating the everyday geographies of connected lives.
Angus, T., Cook, I., & Evans, J. (2001). A manifesto for cyborg pedagogy?. International Research in Geographical and Environmental Education, 10(2), 195-201.
Colombino, A., & Giaccaria, P. (2021). The Posthuman imperative: From the question of the animal to the questions of the animals. The philosophy of geography, 191-210.
Colombino and Bruckner (2023) “Hidden in plain sight: How (and why) to attend to the animal in human animal relations” in Colombino, A. Bruckner, H. K. (eds.) “Methods in Human-Animal Studies: Engaging with animals through the social sciences”, Routledge.
Healy, S. (2020). Alternative economies. International encyclopedia of human geography, 111-117.

Open book exam at home: write a short essay at home in 10-15 days on one of the topics discussed in class. The full list of potential topics will be available before the end of the course on Moodle. Students have also the possibility of writing a paper on a topic they choose after discussing it with the instructor. Detailed information about how to write the essay will be presented in class and uploaded on Moodle

First part of the course: front teaching. Second part of the course, if the number of attendants allows it, students will be asked to work in small groups to think about how nature is made invisible in our everyday consumption practices.

English

The lecturer will upload to Moodle all the materials on which the lectures are based and which are necessary for preparing the exam for frequent and non-attending students. Students are advised to check the course's Moodle page during and after the lectures.

written

This subject deals with topics related to the macro-area "Natural capital and environmental quality" and contributes to the achievement of one or more goals of U. N. Agenda for Sustainable Development