“Ecologies – Environments – Ethics”
February 18-20, 2022, Grainau, Germany (or as virtual conference)

42nd Annual Conference of the
Association for Canadian Studies in German-Speaking Countries (GKS)

 

The Association for Canadian Studies in German-Speaking Countries is a multidisciplinary academic association which aims to increase and disseminate a scholarly understanding of Canada. The 42nd annual conference will focus on the themes of “Ecologies – Environments – Ethics” with an emphasis on Canadian and comparative ecological and environmental issue and topics.
It  ims at studying the relationships between physical environments, questions of ecologies and environmental ethics, and social, cultural, political, and economic concerns raised by environmental crises in public, scientific, academic, educational, literary, and media discourses.
Rising sea levels, a warming Arctic, more frequent and devastating storms, droughts, and bush fires – multiple environmental crises facing the earth are becoming ever more inescapable at both transnational and local levels. Given that climate change is influenced and produced by complex and globally entangled conditions, the role not only of economics and STEM fields of knowledge, but also of the humanities and social sciences is thus increasingly recognized as crucial for the critical exploration of possible solutions. Representations of nature’s agency and relationships between humans, animals, plants, and earth have become significant to many studies, from Indigenous and non-Indigenous perspectives.
Consequently, the work of climatologists and other natural scientists is supported by work of eminent Canadian personalities, such as environmentalist David Suzuki or journalist Naomi Klein, by Indigenous philosophers such as Richard Atleo (Umeek) and Jeannette Armstrong, environmental humanists such as Robert Boschman, Mario Trono, and Byron Williston, or filmmakers such as Zacharias Kunuk and Ian Mauro.
Bruno Latour (2017) argues that all problems that await society are linked to climate change, claiming that mainstream environmental movements are doomed to fail as long as they envision political ecology as tied to the protection and management of nature through politics and policies. Theoretical approaches and social movements from ‘Fridays for Future’ to Indigenous protests against environmental damage and economic exploitation highlight the centrality of considering ecological questions in a broad and interrelated context of politics, economics, and knowledge production about the environment as well as questions of social justice, philosophy, and ethics – within and beyond a Canadian context.
For its 2022 conference, the Association is interested in theoretical, empirical, and analytical contributions from any discipline in the following areas:

  1. Environment and Climate Change: Policies and Technologies for Sustainability and Concepts of Conservation;
  2. The Role of the Humanities and Social Sciences in the Environmental Crisis: Communications, Narratives, Visions;
  3. Indigenous Environmental Ethics, Experiences and Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK): Resource Management, Resilience, Sovereign Rights;
  4. Rethinking Nature, Culture, and Environment: Critical Discourses on Ecologies and Environmental Ethics and Environmental Activism.

Contributions from the following disciplines are especially encouraged:

  • natural/environmental sciences and studies on climate change;
  • social sciences;
  • history;
  • geography;
  • and literary studies.

Contact and Abstract Submission:

Paper proposals/abstracts of max. 500 words can be submitted in French or English
and should outline:

  • methodology and theoretical approaches chosen
  • content/body of research
  • which of the four main aspects outlined above the paper speaks to (if any).

In addition, some short biographical information (max. 250 words) should be provided, specifying current institutional affiliation and position as well as research background with regard to the conference topic and/or four main aspects.
Abstracts should be submitted no later than June 15, 2021 to the GKS administration: gks@kanada-studien.de.

 

Call for Paper [ENG]

Call for Paper [FRA]