Remarkable climatic events are leaving footprints on human memory. These events, particularly within mountainous and deltaic regions in South Asia, are a microcosm of a gradual shift in the environment or a result of climate change. Most of this emerge from systemic exploitation of the natural environment – constructions of dams and roads in the higher altitude, discharge of toxic waste into the rivers, sand mining, amongst others.
These anthropogenic activities cause a severe impact on the environment – transforming not only the physical landscape but an abysmal loss of social habitus, where the human and non-human world cohabits.
Recognising this fragility that shapes the contemporary landscape in South Asia and India, this lecture series offers insights into working on, thinking with environmental histor(ies) and politics in India. In particular, it insists on thinking about both environmental geographies such as glaciers, rainfall, the flow of the river, soil and water that are impacted in the age of Anthropocene.
While the series is oriented towards generating discussions on the environment and climate change, it is also inherently interdisciplinary and offers great resources for early graduate and PhD students. The series may be recorded; however, it is not promised at this stage. All confirmed speakers will deliver a lecture, which is followed by a brief discussion. The aim of this series is to create space for an interdisciplinary conversation.
The series is a continuation of the OsloMet South Asia Seminar Series hosted in the early Spring 2021 and is a part of the “Riverine Rights: The Currents and Consequences of Legal Innovations on The Rights of Rivers” funded by the Research Council of Norway, based at the Oslo Metropolitan University (Oslo, Norway). This lecture series is delivered by distinguished scholars, activists, journalists who have had a sustained research contribution in the area. Series ends with a book launch event.
Below is the list of the speakers, title, and zoom link for each seminar:
| 22 September: Lecture on “Problematising environment versus development narratives in the Himalaya: The case of Uttarakhand, India” @Upadhyay_Cavita Kavita Upadhya (Journalist, academic). Link: Meeting Registration – Zoom |
| 29 September: Lecture on “Transformation as praxis in marginal environments: Reframing nature-society relations, knowledges and livelihoods” by @Lylamehta Dr. Lyla Mehta (University of Sussex). Link: Meeting Registration – Zoom |
| 4 October: Lecture on “Muddy Waters: Conjuring Land in Indian Rivers” by @itihaashtag Dr. Debjani Bhattacharya (Drexel University). Link: Meeting Registration – Zoom |
| 8 October: Lecture on “Precarity and Possibility: Indigenous environmentalism and disastrous hydropower in Sikkim, India” by @mgergan Dr. Mabel Denzin Gergan (Vanderbilt University). Link: Meeting Registration – Zoom |
| 15 October: Lecture on “Perennial versus Inundation Colonial Engineering and the Crisis of River Control in South Asia” by Dr. Rohan D’Souza (Graduate School of Asian and African Area Studies, Kyoto University). Link: Meeting Registration – Zoom |
| 22 October: Lecture on “More-than-human health. Soil and people in natural farming (India)” by @MuensterDaniel Dr. Daniel Muenster (University of Oslo). Link: Meeting Registration – Zoom |
| 29 October: Book launch event that hosts conversation with lovely @CameliaDewan Dr. Camelia Dewan (UiO) Book: “Misreading Climate Change: How Development Simplifications have failed environment and society in coastal Bangladesh” University of Washington Press: Seattle. Link: Meeting Registration – Zoom |
For more details on the programme, contact below:
Series Director: (Dr) Rahul Ranjan, Postdoctoral Research Fellow
Institution: Oslo Metropolitan University, Oslo (Norway)
Email: rahulran@oslomet.no
Twitter: ranjana_rahul