Hi folks,
The Association of American Geographers conference is in April in Chicago
this year. If you are submitting a paper for AAG please consider joining
our session. Please feel free to circulate this to others who you think
may be interested. Thanks!
* The View from the Anthropocene: Measuring the Historic Human Impact on
the Environment and Landscape*
*Organizers: *Megan McCusker Hill and Katharine Johnson, Dept. of
Geography, University of Connecticut
*Discussant: *Dr. Anne Chin, Professor, Dept. of Geography and
Environmental Sciences, University of Colorado Denver. Editor-in-chief,
*Anthropocene.*
The U.S. Research Council recently identified one of their *Grand
Challenges* as understanding "How Will Earth's Surface Evolve in the
'Anthropocene'?" This proposed geologic epoch has been broadly defined as
the recent period of geologic history characterized by drastic and
widespread changes to Earth's surface, ecosystems, landscape, and climate
by human activity (e.g., Crutzen and Stoermer 2000, Steffen et al. 2007,
Syvitski 2012).
Meeting the challenge put forth by the U.S. National Research Council in
2010 requires detailed studies on past and present human interactions with
earth surface processes over multiple spatial and temporal scales (Chin et
al., 2013). Specific interactions can be measured within specific
disciplines (e.g., climate science, geology, archaeology) however these
interactions all occur within a spatial framework and thus are brought
together under the discipline of Geography. Understanding these
interactions from a historic perspective then provides a context for the
present and future. As a result, it is vitally important to be able to
reconstruct or understand how humans have transformed the earth on historic
timescales, and what this means for our future.
Through this paper session, we hope to further studies regarding the
Anthropocene by creating a discussion with a focus on quantifying the
historic human impact on the landscape and the implications for our present
and future. We seek to bring together a broad range of research interests
and locations to discuss the present epoch of the Anthropocene and the many
physical and spatial forms that it has taken. Papers should emphasize an
analysis or critical evaluation of historic human impacts on the landscape.
*Please submit abstracts of no more than 250 words by email to
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AAG abstracts which is November 5th.*
Citations
Chin, A., Fu, R., Harbor, J., Taylor, M.P., and Vanacker, V. 2013.
Anthropocene: Human interactions with earth systems. *Anthropocene 1*: 1-2.
Crutzen, P.J. and Stoermer, E.F. 2000. The 'Anthropocene'. *IGBP Newsletter*
41: 17-18.
National Research Council. 2010. *Landscapes on the Edge: New Horizons for
Research on Earth's Surface.* The National Academies Press, Washington, D.C.
Steffen, W., Crutzen, P.J., and McNeill, J.R. 2007. The Anthropocene: are
humans now overwhelming the great forces of nature?. *Ambio: A Journal of
the Human Environment* 36(8): 614-621.
Syvitski, James. 2012. "Anthropocene: An epoch of our making" *Global
Change Magazine* 78:12-15.
The Economist. 2011. *A man-made world: The Anthropocene - Humankind is
becoming a geological force. *Accessed 21 September 2014, published 31 May,
2011
http://www.economist.com/content/anthropocene?fsrc=scn/tw/te/bl/ed/theanthropocene
Best wishes,
Kate
--
*Katharine Johnson*
PhD student, Dept of Geography
Census & Geospatial Data Specialist
MAGIC & Connecticut State Data Center
University of Connecticut
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http://uconn.academia.edu/KatharineJohnson
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