Futures in the Face of Ruin: An Environmental Humanities Conversation

What remains possible when so much seems to be coming apart at the seams? What does it mean to live in the shadow of the ruined promises of the past? Consider the many despoiled landscapes of the Chesapeake Bay and our Jones Falls and Patapsco watersheds: junk heaps, rotting piers, spoil basins, and the many lingering marks of this region’s industrial heritage. How can we imagine what these places have been and what they may yet become as elements of future lives? And how might we connect these relics of our time with the natural and cultural life of other places as we work to reforest our own imaginations, thinking and working through the ruins of our time? These are questions essential to the environmental sensibility of “The Future of Here: A Glimpse of a River Culture to Come.” Prompted by the forms of possibility the exhibition reveals, participants will reflect on the kinds of happenings that can emerge from unlikely resources.

A discussion featuring JHU Professors Jane Bennett, Marina Bedran, Harris Feinsod, Gisela Heffes, and Anand Pandian; and artist Jordan Tierney.