The two-day hybrid conference ‘Rethinking the Ecological Imaginary’, supported by the Susan Manning Workshop Fund, successfully took place at IASH and online from 8am-6pm on 30-31 May 2024. Over the two days, approximately forty members of the public attended, including students, staff, community activists, and creative artists. Organised and convened by IASH RACE.ED Postdoctoral Fellow Dr Marika Ceschia, it featured a creative, thought provoking, multi-sensory workshop, ‘Food Journey’, by Mama D. Ujuaje, and a powerful artistic keynote by Professor Mojisola Adebayo, based on her award-winning play Family Tree.
There were a total of twenty-four presentations given by researchers, scholars, activists, and creative artists from institutions across the British Isles, continental Europe, Switzerland, Finland, the Middle East, India, South Africa, and the United States. The discussions and interventions centred on Black feminist theory and the powerful insights it offers for tackling racial, gender, and environmental violence. The event was hybrid and over the two days we were joined by online participants from all over the world.
Each day featured four interdisciplinary panels, a creative keynote, and workshops, fostering a more collaborative and hands-on approach. As such, it innovatively blended different modalities and pushed against the boundaries of the traditional conference panel format. The first day started with an interactive workshop, ‘Acclimatization into the conference with Facing Futures cards’, delivered by Camila da Rosa Ribero and Taiane Linhares from Tampere University. It then went on with the panels ‘Worldmaking and Poethical Praxes’, ‘Ecological Imaginaries of Time, Space and Community’, ‘Octavia Butler’s Ecological Imaginaries’, ‘Unsetttling Colonialist Ecologies’ and the creative workshop ‘Food Journey’. The second day looked at ‘The interconnections of Racial, Gender and Environmental Violence’, ‘Reclaiming the Soil’, ‘Bodymemory and Remappings of the Past’, ‘Black Feminist Marine Futures’, and featured the keynote by Professor Mojisola Adebayo.
The atmosphere of the conference was very supportive and constructive, energizing all presenters to go back to their research with fresh insights and renewed vigour. It provided a much needed fruitful and productive space to workshop and explore new creative ideas and approaches to tackle timely issues such as gender, racial and environmental violence. The conference fostered a collaborative environment where opportunities for networking and long-term collaborations emerged. The discussions were very lively and engaged, with conversations always continuing over lunch and drinks, signalling the need for more events like this one, as many participants observed.
As a future output, several of the presenters involved have expressed the desire to collaborate towards an edited collection. As a result, work is ongoing towards the preparation of an edited collection.
The conference was made possible through the support of the Susan Manning Workshop Fund.
The organizer wishes to thank all the IASH staff, and in particular Dr Ben Fletcher-Watson, for technical and logistical support, and Poonam Sharma, PhD researcher at the University of Leeds, who oversaw Zoom and made sure everything ran smoothly for online presenters and participants.