Climate Change and the Politics of Freedom

The idea of freedom contributes to climate change, as it insists that people are free to use and control natural resources however they want. This presentation will argue that different understandings of freedom, which connect humans to nature in less dominating ways, offer new possibilities for challenging climate change. It will offer wild and surprising sites for reimagining freedom today: in human guts, household dust, drought planes, and environmental pollution sites. About the Lecturer: Elisabeth Anker is an Associate Professor of American Studies and Political Science at the George Washington University. She is the author of Orgies of Feeling: Melodrama and the Politics of Freedom (Duke, 2014), which was a finalist for the Lora Romero Prize for the Best First Book in American Studies. She is currently working on two books: Ugly Freedoms and The Wrath of Sovereignty.