Ocean waste: The absurdity of matter out of place
By Max Liboiron The Surfrider Foundation’s mission “is the protection and enjoyment of oceans, waves and beaches through a powerful activist network.” As it turns out, that means most of their work has to do with discards, waste and pollution. Litter, oil spills, wasting water, plastic trash, and chemical runoff are some of their primary […]
Read More »
Swept Away: Dust, Ashes, and Dirt in Contemporary Art and Design
There’s a show up at New York City’s underappreciated Museum of Art and Design. Swept Away: Dust, Ashes, and Dirt in Contemporary Art and Design includes “works that deal with issues such as the ephemeral nature of art and life, the quality and content of memory, issues of loss and disintegration, and the detritus of human […]
Read More »
Dumpsters, Muffins, Waste and Law
A guest post by Sebastian Abrahamsson and Katja de Vries. This is the fourth post in a series of guest posts by participants of the Association of American Geographers conference series on waste. Dumpsters, Muffins, Waste and Law Sebastian Abrahamsson and Katja de Vries I. This is a bag of muffins. Muffins are edible breads that […]
Read More »
“Singapore is a gold mine”: Re-Orienting global trade flows of secondhand electronics. Guest post by Creighton Connolly.
Trade within developing regions is increasing in prevalence due to the falling price of electronics and increasing affluence in those countries. This finding thus makes the Basel Convention largely irrelevant, as it only bans trade from developed to developing regions. Yet, it is clear that Singapore generates at least as much, if not more electronic waste per capita than European and North American countries. Therefore, national e-waste legislation, as well as international policy aiming to reduce the international flow of secondhand electronics, such as the Basel Convention as well, needs to take seriously the role that countries like Singapore play as significant sources of such devices.
Wasted opportunities? Waste-to-Energy in the United States. Guest post by Jordan Howell
Since the American Association of Geographers (AAG) held a unprecedented number of sessions on waste in February of this year, the Discard Studies blog has invited participants from the AAG to post their work. This post is by Jordan Howell, a PhD student in the Department of Geography at Michigan State University. One of the […]
Read More »
WasteDiversions: Sculpture and Collage from New York’s Waste Stream
WasteDiversions: Sculpture and Collage from New York’s Waste Stream March 29 – October 4, 2012 Opening reception March 29, 6-9 pm MFTA Gallery is pleased to present WasteDiversions: Sculpture and Collage from New York’s Waste Stream, an exhibition of new sculpture and collage by artists from MFTA recipients Culture Push and Vaudeville Park, as well as […]
Read More »
In Colonial Shoes: Notes on the Material Afterlife in Post-Oslo Palestine
Guest post by Sophia Stamatopoulou-Robbins Close-up of used goods in Jaffa’s pishpushim market. All pictures in this article were taken by the author. Introduction: The Toilet Bowl Graveyard A strange and unexpected kind of waste fell across my path as I set out to research what I had neatly packaged for myself as “the politics […]
Read More »
The balance of nature
Anyone who has read widely in the literature of the environment recognizes that the phrase, “the balance of nature,” recurs throughout ecological texts and statements made by environmentalists over the past few decades. Even a cursory glance at the canon of environmental writing reveals a plethora of usages, both implied and implicit, of the controversial […]
Read More »
CFP: Slum Clearance 1900-1930 3/11
SLUM CLEARANCE, 1900-1930 Urban History Association (UHA) New York City, NY 26-28 October, 2012 http://uha.udayton.edu/conf.html Deadline: 11 March, 2012 I’m interested creating a panel for the UHA meeting that treats major downtown rebuilding projects (such as City Beautiful civic projects, union stations, and others) that occurred prior to the postwar “urban renewal” era as slum […]
Read More »
“Article” alert- Beyond Passaic: Contamination, security threats, hobo encampments. A Meadowlands photo essay.
A stunning, melancholy, mysterious landscape ethnography has just been published by Triple Canopy. Triple Canopy supports non-traditional, multimedia “articles” particularly well suited to projects on waste, as “Beyond Passaic: Contamination, security threats, hobo encampments. A Meadowlands photo essay” proves. The artist-author Bryan Zanisnik walks through the no-man’s land of The Meadowlands, a combination of parks, […]
Read More »
Discard Studies 