Introductory description

What responses do literary and cultural texts afford in the age of intensifying climate impacts? What role, responsibilities and effective powers—might the Arts in general offer in the grand endeavour to mitigate the crisis and enact the kinds of transition that mitigation requires: in culture, but also in politics, economics, infrastructure, habitat? As students will discover, the range and volume of cultural registrations of climate breakdown are considerable and diverse. The module will provide a curated selection oriented around the ‘climate imaginary’—realist, speculative, creative and performative envisioning of climate-affected presents and futures in different spaces and times. Such imaginaries offer the means for a generative response to readers, audiences and publics charged with understanding and acting on climate issues. The module will cover a variety of themes and concerns, from extractivism to conservation; from scenarios of catastrophic weather, resource depletion and radically transformed habitats to dystopian worlds of geoengineering and utopian forms of community such as solarpunk and post-oil lifeworlds.

Module web page

Module aims

Outline syllabus

This is an indicative module outline only to give an indication of the sort of topics that may be covered. Actual sessions held may differ.

Week One: Introduction to Climate Change: Conditions, Causes and Effects; Cultural Theory on Climate; The role of “Imaginaries” Week Two: Social Transformations—Octavia Butler, The Parable of the Sower (1993)/ Yōko Tawada, Scattered All Over the Earth (2018) Week Three: Learning the World—Barbara Kingsolver, Flight Behaviour (2012) Week Four: Denial and its Consequences—Adam McKay (dir.), Don’t Look Up (2021) Week Five: Climate Dystopia—Collapse (1)—John Lanchester, The Wall (2019) Week Seven: Futuring—The Museum of Carbon Ruins (2018-) Week Eight: Collapse/Recovery (2)—War, Peace, Repair — Omar Al-Akkad, American War (2018) Week Nine: Resistance—Activism in Song, Art, Performance Week Ten: Renewability/Solarfutures—Ganzeer, The Solar Grid (1) The Wretched of the Earth; Cixin Lui, The Wandering Earth (2000); Wanuri Kahui, Pumzi (2009); After Oil Collective, Solarities Selection from Jenny Fagan, The Sunlight Pilgrims (2016); Selected Solarpunk short tales.

Learning outcomes

By the end of the module, students should be able to:

• Demonstrate in broad outline a grasp of the nature, scale, causes and effects of climate change.
• Develop some understanding of recent cultural theory connected with climate change.
• Develop a critical approach to climate imaginaries that enables the construction of an argument, in both oral and written formats, through commentary on relevant (primary) cultural texts and artefacts.
• Demonstrate critical reading skills and an ability to develop a question about relevant literary and cultural texts that brings some theoretical (philosophical, anthropological, aesthetic, political, environmental, ethical, or scientific) context to bear on the analysis of one or more of these texts, making some appropriate use of scholarly reviews and primary sources.
• Demonstrate ability to present creative responses and approaches (written, visual, material) to the question of the imaginary and in particular show some grasp of the critical and creative methods and theories of ‘futuring’ as a form of climate action.
• Demonstrate ability to organize research on set module materials, showing appreciation for complexity and capacity to examine the premises of an argument.

Indicative reading list

Reading lists can be found in Talis

Subject specific skills

Demonstrate knowledge and understanding of climate change as a cultural phenomenon Demonstrate knowledge and understanding of arts and theory based methods and techniques oriented towards climate action/futures

Transferable skills

Demonstrate developed oral and written communication skills focused on complex theoretical material.

Demonstrate critical thinking and an ability to analyze literary and cultural texts to uncover theoretical (philosophical, anthropological, aesthetic, ethical, scientific) contexts, and to synthesize ideas across a range of media and disciplines.

Demonstrate independent research skills and ability to curate issue relevant module materials.