The what and the why of Discard Studies
We tend to think that we are familiar with waste because we deal with it every day. Yet, this is not the case–most aspects of waste are entirely hidden from view and understanding.
Category Archives: Difference: Class, Race, Gender
Urban noise pollution is worst in poor and minority neighborhoods and segregated cities
Neighborhoods with median annual incomes below US$25,000 were nearly 2 decibels louder than neighborhoods with incomes above $100,000 per year. And nationwide, communities with 75 percent black residents had median nighttime noise levels of 46.3 decibels – 4 decibels louder than communities with no black residents. A 10-decibel increase represents a doubling in loudness of a sound, so these are big differences.
Review of Richard S. Newman’s “Love Canal: A Toxic History from Colonial Times to the Present”
Newman’s activists press for environmental change imbedded with critiques of capitalism and industrialization, racial injustice, and its global implications. This view distorts the complexity of historical events within the environmental movement.
Pollution is Colonialism
Colonialism in Canada is an ongoing structure whereby settler society and government assert sovereignty over lands already occupied by Indigenous peoples.
Cleaning up toxic sites shouldn’t clear out the neighbors
Notions of “sustainability” and “urban greening” ought to include values of justice and equity. Otherwise, important projects like the Blue Greenway will build sustainable waterfronts for the urban elite, rather than spreading the environmental benefits of toxic cleanup to the many.
Community Responses to Toxic Hazards: A Reading List
A reading list of the David and Goliath story of communities versus industries, governments, and polluting infrastructures.
On (not) seeing artificial light at night: Light pollution or lighting poverty?
By Dr. Sara B. Pritchard Department of Science & Technology Studies, Cornell University So it began. This was the image that sparked my interest in light pollution and light-pollution science (Figure 1). The National Aeronautics and Space Administration released new images of Earth at night, including this one, on December 5, 2012, at the annual meeting […]
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Difference in the Anthropocene: Indigenous Environmentalism in the Face of Settler Colonialism
Both Todd and Whyte argue that achieving climate justice for and by Indigenous people requires addressing the ways in which global environmental change is intimately connected with— and in fact is predicated upon— practices of settler colonialism.
Victory at Standing Rock reflects a failure of US energy and climate policy
Stopping the pipeline in one spot, after all, won’t stop oil altogether. Climate change, however, is a threat most of all to Indigenous peoples around the world.
Fracking, mining, murder: the killer agenda driving migration in Mexico and Central America
Why negotiate with poor Indigenous communities sitting atop valuable oil, water, wood and ore if they can be pushed off their land with hidden criminal, political and misogynistic forces?
