Queering images of environmental violence

This session aims at proposing a queer+ guide to critically explore images of environmental violence, and how these images shape our understanding of climate crises. Nature exploitation is socially shaped by Western, white, patriarchal, and capitalist representations of the more-than-human, which is subsequently apprehended as resources, commodities, and objects of inquiry. On the contrary, queer, anarchist, anti-racist, and anti-capitalist ecologies invite to redefine human/more-than-human relationships against all forms of hierarchy and exploitation, while criticizing the limits and biases of mainstream images of “the Anthropocene” (T. J. Demos). By doing so, these critical theories invite to expand how we understand environmental violence (i.e., what can be considered as a form of violence, against what form of life, and according to which criteria), and how environmental violence is imagined and visualized. This session invites proposals about queer, anarchist, anti-racist, and anti-capitalist contributions to understanding how environmental violence is represented in art and digital culture, how these images shape our understanding of the more-than-human, and of the environmental consequences of these images (for both film and digital imagery). We are especially interested in how visual representations of the environment influenced by white, patriarchal, and capitalist imagination shape how we interact with non-human species, and how these representations can contribute to ecological crises.