Climate change and the imagination

TLDR

Imagination is defined as a way of seeing, sensing, thinking, and dreaming that creates conditions for material interventions and political sensibilities. This review surveys how imagination helps understand and explore anthropogenic climate change in culture and society. The authors draw on literary, filmic, and creative arts practices, linking scientific and imaginative forms, to argue that such practices are crucial for developing diverse environmental understandings—from scenario building to metaphorical, ethical, and material investigations—and examine climate futures, adaptive strategies, and climate science practices. Published in WIREs Climate Change 2011 (vol.

Abstract

Abstract This review article surveys the complex terrain of the imagination as a way of understanding and exploring the manifestations of anthropogenic climate change in culture and society. Imagination here is understood as a way of seeing, sensing, thinking, and dreaming that creates the conditions for material interventions in, and political sensibilities of the world. It draws upon literary, filmic, and creative arts practices to argue that imaginative practices from the arts and humanities play a critical role in thinking through our representations of environmental change and offer strategies for developing diverse forms of environmental understanding from scenario building to metaphorical, ethical, and material investigations. The interplay between scientific practices and imaginative forms is also addressed. Thematically, this review addresses the modalities of climate futures, adaptive strategies, and practices of climate science in its study of key imaginative framings of climate change. WIREs Clim Change 2011 2 516–534 DOI: 10.1002/wcc.117 This article is categorized under: Trans‐Disciplinary Perspectives > Humanities and the Creative Arts