Please join us as Matthias Stephan, Associate Professor of Intercultural Studies and Literature, Department of English, School of Communication and Culture, Aarhus University will give this CEH Talk on literature and climate change.

The event is free and open for all to attend. Read more about Matthias here.

Abstract

Climate change is an entangled, large-scale challenge which calls for not only a scientific response but presents a representational and imaginative challenge. The question becomes not if we can articulate climate change, but rather how can fiction impact the contemporary imagination sufficiently to enact meaningful change?

In this talk, I will discuss how to present a literary response to the global climate crisis based on my recent book, Anglophone Literature and the Fight Against Climate Change.

I will present a new methodology for considering effectiveness in promoting real world change. In doing so, I will look at which narratives, historically, have had an impact on social consciousness. Then I will present popular and canonical strategies of climate fiction, or cli-fi along with their effectiveness. Finally, I will present alternative narrative strategies, which I suggest can have a greater impact by causing people to act. I will then discuss the need for testing and empirical evaluation.