About the presentation:
Striving for security is one of the fundamental characteristics of the human condition. In the age of Anthropocene, the age of homo faber – ‘the maker’ or ‘fabricator’– we have strived for security through conquest and subjugation of the environment. It is only recently that, confronted with various multi-layered crises, our self-identification as the species that is detached from the rest of nature has been re-evaluated. One of the challenges that we, the homines fabri, are now facing, is the urgency to reinvent ourselves and our societies based on a different objective than compulsive production, and from a perspective of planetary interconnectedness. This need has found articulation, among others, in the current discussion revolving around the ‘crisis of care.’ Guided by Marshall Berman’s observation that ‘going back can be a way to go forward,’ Ada Arendt proposes to take a look at the early modern environmental ethic of care, centred around seeking balance between sustainability and exploitation, when human and non-human actors formed local networks that used land, reared animals, ensured resilience from natural disasters and provided food safety through caring.
About the presenter
Ada Arendt is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Institute of Archaeology, Conservation and History at the University of Oslo. Her research is archive-driven, reflexive, and informed by historical anthropology, microhistory, environmental history, and ethics of care. She works with early modern popular literature: household books, agronomic treaties, broadbooks, and astrological almanacs. Her award-winning 2019 book "Archeologia zatroskania" [Archaeology of Care], offers a microhistorical study of almanac annotations against a broader reflection on the shift in the temporal regime triggered by the scientific revolution of the 17th century, with its consequences for early modern modes of rationality, production of memory and techniques of the self. Before coming to Oslo, she was a Swiss Excellence Grant Fellow at the University of Bern, Switzerland, and Assistant Professor in Cultural Studies at the University of Warsaw, Poland.
About the event series
The OSEH Environmental Lunchtime Discussion series consists of short, 15 minute presentations by invited guests, followed by a discussion. We invite speakers from a wide variety of fields, both academic and beyond. The presentations are accessible and are aimed at anyone with an interest in environmental issues. All are welcome.