“Energy and the Humanities”– A Yearlong Conversation

During the 2018-2019 academic year, Yale Environmental Humanities will mount a yearlong conversation to explore the intersection of energy and the humanities. The program includes roundtables and workshops featuring Yale faculty and student work, six visiting speakers, and two international workshops in the spring. Two new courses, “American Energy History” and “Energy and Society” also will be offered in the spring semester.

These activities seek to bring together a diverse set of voices to explore the present and future of the energy humanities. Participation is invited from Yale faculty and students working on energy issues from fields as disparate as literature, philosophy, the arts, history, anthropology, gender studies, development studies, and film and media studies, as well as colleagues approaching energy studies from the social sciences, engineering, and natural sciences.

Aerial Image Conference Poster
April 27, 2019
This interdisciplinary conference explores the ”aerial image,” broadly conceived. Drawing upon recent work in the environmental humanities, the conference aims to open...
Suzana Sawyer
April 17, 2019
A talk by anthropologist Suzana Sawyer on indigenous rights and oil development in the Ecuadorian Amazon, and the years-long litigation against Chevron over oil pollution...
Victor McFarland
April 4, 2019
Event time:  Thursday, April 4, 2019 - 3:00pm Location:  McClellan Hall 101 (Old Campus) see map  New Haven, CT 06511
David Roberts Poynter Poster
April 1, 2019
David Roberts, climate and energy reporter with Vox Media, will discuss recent political and policy developments. 4PM, Branford College Common Room
March 29, 2019
A two-day workshop at the Whitney Humanities Center to assess recent progress in the field of the “energy humanities,” and to explore new directions in research and teaching...
Jennifer Wenzel
February 27, 2019
Jennifer Wenzel is jointly appointed in the Department of English and Comparative Literature and the Department of Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies at...
February 22, 2019
We are normally told that climate responsibility is diffuse. Particularly in the Global North it is “all of us” with our high carbon footprints and affluent lifestyles. In...
February 20, 2019
A workshop presentation with Yale history professor Jennifer Klein on her current research on the history of waste management, labor, and toxic petrochemicals in...
Sheena Wilson Poster
February 18, 2019
Sheena Wilson is Associate Professor at the University of Alberta, co-founder & director of the international Petrocultures Research Group, and research lead on Just...
GCRE: Exploring Energy Conference
February 8, 2019
Hosted annually at Yale University, the Graduate Conference in Religion and Ecology (GCRE) is a unique academic venue for graduate students and working professionals to share...
Deepti Chatti Poster
January 31, 2019
Cooking energy technologies of low-income families in the Global South have drawn the attention of development actors for decades. “Traditional” cookstoves are seen as smoke...
January 22, 2019
Cajetan Iheka’s research and teaching focus on African and Caribbean literatures and film, postcolonial studies, ecocriticism, ecomedia, and world literature. He is the...
December 3, 2018
Solar technology is not only an emerging source of industrialized energy; it is also a potent force of affective energy. Cultivating imaginaries and reorienting desires, it...
November 7, 2018
A roundtable featuring ongoing research by Yale graduate students on the intersection of energy and social inequalities and social justice. Roundtable Participants:  Deepti...
Isabel Lane
November 1, 2018
Isabel Lane, a doctoral candidate in Slavic Languages and Literatures, discusses a chapter from her dissertation on Russian and American fiction in the nuclear age. This...
Ashley Dawson, "Energy Democracy" Poster
October 11, 2018
The future is electric. At least, it had better be if we are to survive as a species. We know that we must decarbonize societies the world over with all due haste in order to...
Omolade Adunbi
October 10, 2018
Omolade Adunbi is a political anthropologist and an Assistant Professor at the Department of Afroamerican and African Studies (DAAS).  His areas of research explore issues...
“Energy and the Humanities: Interventions and Ambitions” Poster
September 7, 2018
Roundtable on studying energy from a humanities perspective. Speakers include: Isabel Lane (Slavic Languages and Literatures) Myles Lennon (Anthropology/F&ES) Katja...