On 23rd March 2023, seven speakers and almost forty members of the audience have gathered at the Museum of Work in Norrköping for “Ecologies of Death, Ecologies of Mourning. Vol. I: An International Symposium“. The event was the first in the series of activities focused on critical and creative approaches to grief and mourning in a more-than-human context of the planetary environmental disruption and ecological crises.
The symposium was organised by The Eco- and Bioart Lab, in collaboration with Queer Death Studies Network.
Here we would like to bring some memories from the event. Check out the short video recap below, filmed and produced by Per Wistbo Nibell (Linköping University), as well as the collection of pictures taken at the symposium (at the bottom of this page).
Ecologies of Death, Ecologies of Mourning: Volume I
International Symposium
23RD MARCH 2023, 13:00 – 18:00
VENUE: ARBETETS MUSEUM (THE MUSEUM OF WORK), NORRKÖPING
KEYNOTE SPEAKERS:
Prof. Patricia MacCormack (Anglia Ruskin University, UK)
Prof. Em. Nina Lykke (Linköping University, SE/Aarhus University, DK)
SPEAKERS:
Dr Evelien Geerts (University of Birmingham, UK)
Prof. Christina Fredengren (Uppsala University, SE)
Dr Tara Mehrabi & Dr Wibke Straube (Karlstad University, SE)
Dr Marietta Radomska (Linköping University, SE)
In the Anthropocene, the epoch of climate change and environmental destruction that render certain habitats unliveable and induce socio-economic inequalities and shared ‘more-than-human’ vulnerabilities, death and loss become urgent environmental concerns. As climate scientists indicate, in order to achieve UN Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs), a much more radical transformative action is needed from all stakeholders: governments, the private sector, communities and individuals (Höhne et al. 2020).
Simultaneously, planetary environmental disruption, contributing to the mortality of humans and nonhumans, destruction of entire ecosystems, the sixth mass extinction, both abrupt and ‘slow’ violence (Nixon 2011), evoke feelings of anxiety, anger and grief, manifested in popular-scientific and cultural narratives, art, and activism. These feelings are not always openly acknowledged or accepted in society; and the ecological, more-than-human dimensions of death have traditionally been underplayed in public debates. Yet, what we need now – more than ever – is the systematic problematisation of the planetary-scale mechanisms of annihilation of the more-than-human world in their philosophical, socio-cultural, ethico-political and very material dimensions. Only then will it be possible to talk about the issues of responsibility, accountability and care for more-than-human worlds (Radomska & Lykke 2022).
Taking its starting point in critically investigating and challenging conventional normativities, assumptions and expectations surrounding issues of death, dying and mourning in the contemporary world (Radomska, Mehrabi & Lykke 2020; https://queerdeathstudies.net/), this interdisciplinary symposium zooms in on more-than-human ecologies of death, dying, grief and mourning across spatial and temporal scales.
Furthermore, the event was combined with the official launch of the four-year research project Ecological Grief, Crisis Imaginaries and Resilience in Nordic Lights (2022-26), led by Dr Marietta Radomska and generously funded by FORMAS: a Swedish Research Council for Sustainable Development.
PROGRAMME:
13:00 – 13:15 – Introduction / Launch FORMAS Eco-Grief Project
13:15 – 14:15 – Keynote I: Prof. Patricia MacCormack (Anglia Ruskin University, UK), “The Difficult Joy of Death Activism”
14:15 – 14:45 – Break (fika)
14:45 – 15:15 – Dr Evelien Geerts (University of Birmingham, UK), “The Memorial 22/3’s more-than-human hauntings: Reimaging memory, commemoration & mourning through queer(ing) spacetimematterings”
15:15 – 15:45 – Prof. Christina Fredengren (Uppsala University, SE), “Ancestral ecologies of life, death and regeneration”
15:45 – 16:15 – Dr Tara Mehrabi & Dr Wibke Straube (Karlstad University, SE), “Unsettling Intimacies: On World-Making Practices with the Other in Minoosh Zomorodinia’s Mixed-Media Installation Knots and Ripples“
16:15 – 16:45 – Dr Marietta Radomska (Linköping University, SE), “Between Terminal Ecologies and Arts of Eco-Grief: A Queering Reflection”
16:45 – 17:00 – Break
17:00 – 18:00 – Keynote II: Prof. Em. Nina Lykke (Linköping University, SE), “Mourning (with) Diatoms”
For detailed programme, click below:
The Eco- and Bioart Lab 