Dear valued TRACTS members,
We are delighted to advise that we are now able to offer a small number of our network members the opportunity to attend the Traces of Extinction: Species Loss, Solastalgia, and Semiotics of Recovery conference in Tartu, Estonia. These places will be eligible for reimbursement following the usual COST EU rules.
I appreciate the news of additional funding brings with it, very short notice to make travel arrangements, so please scroll to the end of this post for the details on how to apply.
Conference Details
June 5–7 2024, at Oecologicum at the University of Tartu, Juhan Liivi 2, 50409 Tartu
The sixth mass species extinction is one of the greatest ecological threats of our time. This conference focuses on cultural, subjective, and semiotic approaches to extinction. A subjective approach to extinction may raise the question of how we experience extinction in the shared lifeworld or semiosphere. At the same time, artistic research seems to open fresh perspectives in combining cultural creativity with environmental decline. Extinction also reduces biocultural diversity and the resilience of ecocultures. By taking a perspective through nature cultures and cultural-ecological systems, we treat extinction as the degradation of such combined systems.
This perspective raises questions about cultural strategies that are effective in adapting to extinction, supporting endangered species, and overcoming trauma:
How is extinction perceived subjectively, both from the point of view of the dying species and the humans who witness it?
What cultural strategies can be used to raise awareness of extinction?
What means do individuals and communities have for reducing and avoiding species extinction?
Keynote speakers:
David B. Rothenberg (New Jersey Institute of Technology, USA)
Sonic Species Memory
Extinction in a world beyond mechanical reproduction
Linda Knight (RMIT University, Australia)
Mapping the multispecies cosmopolitics of extinction
Conference webpage: https://www.ecosem.ut.ee/en/valjasuremise-jaljed-konverents/
*Non-presenting participants must register (on the webpage).
How to apply
If you would like to attend this fantastic event, then please email me on tracts@st-andrews.ac.uk with your note of interest (maximum of 150 words) no later than 4pm GMT on the 23rd May 2024.
Due to the very short turnaround, successful applicants of our network will be notified by the 24th May to allow time to make travel arrangements.
