If one reads the newspaper, it appears that catastrophe and crisis are everywhere and at all times. Fires burn from the American West to Australia. Spanish islands are buried under lava. Glaciers melt. These have all been described as catastrophes, but in what way are they transformative? There are other kinds of catastrophes that are widely reported. Woke intellectuals are invading the French Academy; white supremacists are ready to topple the American government; Indian currency reform is destroying the social fabric. These are all transformative, but in what way are they catastrophes?
Catastrophe and crisis are contextual and they are differently experienced, interpreted, reported, and remembered.[1] And for this reason, they are good to think with. In this seminar, we will try to understand what constitutes a catastrophe (an event?). We will also try to understand the relationship between a catastrophe and a crisis (a transformational opportunity?) The course is informed by ongoing debates within urban studies, and in particular, the relationship between critical urban studies and an increasingly urgent discourse around climate change. Some within the urban studies community argue that “there is no such thing as a natural disaster”; that “catastrophe” is a vehicle for the proliferation of new technologies of capital; that “crisis talk” is a mask for raced, gendered, classed power. These things are clearly true, and we see it in our cities every day. But does that mean catastrophe is a fiction; that crisis is simply a tool? Perhaps it would be better to ask, catastrophe for whom; crisis of what?[2]
Thinking through these questions generates insights not only into particular urban cases, but hopefully also methodological and conceptual strategies for imagining urban futures.
- Trainer/in: Avinash Sharma