CFP: Strengthening infrastructures of resistance to fossil fuel infrastructures in North America
Martina Angela Caretta, West Virginia University Pavithra Vasudevan, The University of Texas at Austin Kai Bosworth, Virginia Commonwealth University Energy independence has been a major policy goal of recent US energy governance regimes. The development of increasingly advanced technologies for oil and gas extraction, in the form of hydraulic fracturing, has been framed as crucial for the well-being of the nation. The magnitude and acceleration of this energy infrastructure development raises concerns about the substantial infrastructural, ecological and social impacts exacerbating socioeconomic inequalities across the US, particularly among poor communities that have been historically disenfranchised in energy decision-making. Unconventional oil and gas extraction and transport often happen in small rural communities and in communities of color; their surroundings are turned into industrial sites, with little input in the development, construction and location of gas pads, pipelines, frac sand mines, and cracker plants. Transmission and distribution networks are developed through eminent domain in the name of ensuring public energy access and distribution, enacting a transfer of land and wealth to private companies profiting heavily from pipeline construction. Landowners and Indigenous communities are required to sacrifice part of their property and territory to allegedly guarantee national energy independence, even while much of the gas could be heading for export (Estes, 2019; Estes and Dhillon 2019; Bosworth, 2019; Finley-Brook et al, 2018; Ordner, 2019; Spice 2018; Whyte, 2017). We seek scholars invested in conducting research alongside and/or in support of grassroots efforts against energy infrastructure development to join an emergent network against North American extractive industry. This paper session (preceeded by a panel) will focus specifically on critical/feminist geographic research projects committed to repurposing the tools of academic, government and corporate knowledge-making towards justice-oriented projects (Zaragocin 2019; Dalton and Stallmann 2018), to amplify the experiences and political knowledges of communities most deeply impacted by racial capitalism and settler colonialism. We are interested in producing collaborative research on energy infrastructure development in North America that clarifies and compiles the impacts of extractive industries through the integration of trans-disciplinary findings; translates existing knowledges into accessible forms such as graphic narratives and audiovisual testimonials for use in organizing campaigns; and magnifies the utility and political insights of geography towards creating a livable world. We value the distinct contributions of plural scientific and social modes of knowledge production, and invite papers that examine energy infrastructures development with the following approaches: ethnographic work on/with frontline communities, hydrological studies, census data, survey and focus group data, legal scholarship, financial and economic analyses, public health approaches, social movement analyses, industry discourses, security studies, public participation in permitting, citizen science and counter-expertise, legal challenges, energy analyses. If you are interested in participating in a paper session, please email a title and 150 word abstract to [email protected] and [email protected] by Sept. 26th. You will receive a notification of acceptance within a few days FYI: First registration deadline is Oct. 9th, and you will need to submit your abstract by Oct. 30th. References Bosworth, K. 2019. The People Know Best: Situating the Counterexpertise of Populist Pipeline Opposition Movements. Annals of the American Association of Geographers, 109(2), 581–592. https://doi.org/10.1080/24694452.2018.1494538 Dalton, C. M., and Tim Stallmann. 2018. "Counter‐mapping data science." The Canadian Geographer/Le Géographe Canadien 62(1): 93-101. Estes, N. 2019. Our history is our future. London and New York: Verso. Estes, Nick, and Jaskiran Dhillon, eds. 2019. Standing with Standing Rock: Voices from the #NoDAPL Movement. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Finley-Brook, M. et al. 2018. “Critical energy justice in US natural gas infrastructuring.” Energy Research & Social Science, 41(1): 176-190. Ordner, J. 2019. “Petro-politics and local natural resource protection: Grassroots opposition to the Keystone XL pipeline in Nebraska.” In: The Right to Nature E. Apostolopoulou & J. A. Cortes-Vazquez (Eds.). New York: Routledge. Spice, A. 2018. “Fighting Invasive Infrastructures: Indigenous Relations against Pipelines.” Environment & Society 9(1): 40-56. Whyte, K.P. Kyle Powys. 2017. “The Dakota Access pipeline, environmental injustice, and U.S. colonialism” Red Ink. 19(1): 154-169. Zaragocin, Sofia. 2019. "Feminist geography in Ecuador." Gender, Place & Culture 26: 1032-1038.. Comments are closed.
|
blogArchives
October 2021
Categories |