smoke rising from a tall chimney
Open Seminar

The Anthropocene as a mediated fact? How can we understand – and perhaps act upon – climate change?

In recent years scientists, journalists, scholars and politicians have talked about the new Anthropocene epoch, which includes phenomena like climate change, the so-called sixth extinction, and the acidification of the oceans.

It is often claimed that new planetary condition cannot be represented; the processes involved are typically too massive, too small or too slow. All in all, the processes are supposedly difficult or even impossible to grasp for the human perception and, by consequence, by way of communicative media.

However, from an intermedial and multimodal point of view, the Anthropocene epoch and the inherent climate change that lie ahead of us are not fundamentally different from any other object in the world, and as is well known, journalists, artists, writers and activists are constantly trying to find suitable and convincing and educational ways of showing what is going on. They do this in different forms, with different agendas, and in different media.

In this open seminar event, Linnaeus University Centre for Intermedial and Multimodal studies has invited science journalist from the renowned website Carbon Brief, Leo Hickman, to demonstrate some of the strategies that are used to make climate change visible and understandable for the public. Post doc at IMS, Péter Krystof Makai will discuss the question of how climate change is made visible and understandable in computer games, and Corina Löwe, lecturer in German, will discuss the issue from the perspective of children's and young adult literature.

Directly following the short presentations, the speakers will answer questions from the audience, and after the seminar IMS hosts a reception with drinks and snacks.

Programme
4.30 pm: Introduction and presentation (Jørgen Bruhn)
4.40 pm: Leo Hickman: making climate change understandable
5.00 pm: Péter Krystof Makai: Gaming studies and the Anthropocene
5.10 pm: Corina Löwe: Climate change for young readers
5.20 pm: Panel discussion and questions for the speakers
6.00 pm: Drinks and snacks at Matisse

Date and time: May 24, 4.30 pm–6 pm.
Place: Lammhult, F building, Linnaeus University, Växjö

The event is the 2018 open IMS-lecture, funded by the Linnaeus University Centre for Intermedial and Multimodal Studies

The event is free and all are welcome.

Lammhult, House F, Växjö Jørgen Bruhn Add to your calendar