Our division has a very international setup, which is also reflected in the diversity of languages we publish in. Our colleague Dmitry Arzyutov (Candidate of Sciences in the field of anthropology, Kunstkamera St. Petersburg, and PhD-student at KTH in History of Science/ Environmental History) has just now published an article in the Russian journal “Siberian Historical Investigations” (Sibirskie istoricheskie issledovaniya). In this article Arzyutov uncovers the difficult archival situation one encounters while doing research on the life of one of the most prominent Soviet ethnographers of the inter-war period.
Andrej Grigor’evich Danilin (1896-1942) was a leading Russian scholar conducting ethnographic research on the people living in the Altaj region. In their article, Arzyutov reconstructs the archival situation concerning Danilin’s life and creates a map, of how Danilin archived his documents in his personal archive. The co-author of this article is Lidiya Danilina, the daughter of ethnographer Andrej Danilin. Together, they propose what they call an “ethnography of the ethnographer”, which turns the investigator-investigated matrix of earlier times upside down.
How did Danilin correspond with different people? How were bureaucratic situations dealt with? How can one find Danilin’s personal voice in his papers? If you want to find out more, check out the publications entry in DiVA.
Anusha Batool Sherazi has finished a master thesis with a pressing topic this fall. Under the supervision of Ethemcan Turhan, researcher of our division and new Assistant Professor of Environmental Planning at the University of Groningen, our master student has produced a valuable contribution for the study of climate change, under the challenging conditions of the global pandemic.
While the effects of the current climate crisis are being felt everywhere, the global south has to mitigate its consequences under austere conditions. Sherazi investigates in this study the political dimensions of the pressing need to adapt to a rapidly changing climate in Pakistan. Struck by several severe disasters, this country deserves special attention to learn how adaptations can be framed, financed and realised to the benefit of people affected in a southern Asian context.
How has the relation between humans and Earth developed over the centuries? How have colonial and capitalist agendas operated globally, while the view of the planetary environment was shaped by the media?
Wickberg and Gärdebo see this relation as a “profound renegotiation” which continuously is reshaped, but which definitely encountered a “fundamental shift” after 1500 with the acceleration of human globalisation. The concept of environing media shall contribute to the scientific understanding of the role of media as a mediator to how the world is being seen on the basis of an ever-increasing collection of data in an age of digitisation. This can be used to understand the internal and ideological mechanics of colonial empires in a historical perspective. It also allows to understand today’s discourses on international flow of commodities and the movements of people on the background of the influence of modern mass media.
Check out this innovative approach in the journal Humanities!
“Water is everywhere in our economy, in nature and culture. Billions of years ago our planet had cooled down enough for the surrounding gas clouds to condense, fall down to Earth’s surface, and form the oceans. Everything started with water and water is still a precondition to all life. No wonder that World Economic Forum in 2016 listed water as the largest risk factor for sustained well-being on the planet.” https://www.kth.se/water/about
With the focus on water, one thing led to another a few years ago and in 2017 the WaterCentre was initiated at KTH Royal Institute of Technology – linked to our Division through center director David Nilsson, and research coordinator, Timos Karpouzoglou, both researchers with us. The Centre is a collaboration with a “mission to bring about water innovations for a sustainable future of the Earth”.
In line with their own motto “expect the unexpected”, the WaterCentre managed to sum up their four first year in a covid-19 safe conference last week. Read all about it in their blog, and visit their homepage for more news, research and other interesting pieces:
The WaterCentre@KTH has already existed for four years. Wow, time flies! To mark the ending of our first mandate period, we had decided to organise a water conference showcasing research, water inn…
Covid-19 profoundly changes the way we work. What luckily has not changed, is that new people join us at the division. Marta has recently taken up the position of a post-doc, while we are mostly working from home. Thus we asked her the following questions to introduce Marta’s work, show potential for collaboration and to get to know her a little bit better.
Could you please tell us about yourself and the fields you are working on?
My name is Marta Musso and I am the new post-doc in energy history at the department, working together with Per Högselius. My research follows two main strands: the first one is linked to energy policy history, and it focusses on the international economic policy of resource exploitation, and the relations between state and enterprises in negotiations for resource exploitation in the post-colonial years. The second strand of research refers to the development of digital archives, and the usage of digital-born documents on behalf of historians. I am involved in preservation projects to allow historians to make the best out of digitisation and digital technologies, such as Archives Portal Europe (www.archivesportaleurope.net). At the same time, I am an advocate of digital preservation, particularly for what concerns energy archives. Currently I am the president of Eogan, the network of energy archives.
What do you work on right now? Do you feel an impact by the current pandemic on your work?
My current research project at KTH is an extension of my PhD, which focussed on the development of the Algerian oil industry and on the nationalisation of oil resources in the post-colonial years. I am now looking at the claims of the G-77 and OPEC countries in particular with regards to the international commodity market in the years leading to and following the 1973 oil crisis. Luckily so far I have found a lot of material online (thumbs up to the UN archives which have a very good digitisation strategy!), and I have much material from my PhD years that I did not get to properly study (particular from the OPEC archives). However, I would like to also visit the OECD archives in Paris and not only are they closed, but on their website they state clearly that they do not do digitisation on demand. Hopefully the situation will change between now and Autumn 2021. Other than that, it is bad that I cannot get to meet my new colleagues and get a better feeling of the spirit of the department; on the other hand, there are a lot of interesting things happening online and I don’t feel like I am missing out. As a matter of fact, having a toddler in the house, some things are easier to do online than in person, so I also appreciate the good side of this difficult situation.
What do you aim for in the near future in terms of research, projects, or public outreach?
I hope to have a book manuscript by end of 2021, and 2/3 papers out in the meantime. I also really like to engage in public history projects, and I would like to be more involved in making documentaries or to communicate my research in other ways than academic papers – but it is difficult to find the time and the opportunities! I also hope that my research could be of interest to current energy policies, particularly with regards to international coordination in the fight against climate change. One of the aims of my current research is to show how many lost opportunities there were in the 1970s to develop a more balance global economy
In the very near future, I am presenting a volume I have recently co-edited, which is being published by the Journal of Energy History as open access, on the 11th December, at 2pm. (Registration here)
It is a new week at the Division of History of Science, Technology and Environment and this one begins with the official launch of the SPHERE podcast – produced by our very own Eric Paglia.
About the Podcast:
SPHERE is a podcast that investigates the historical evolution of global environmental governance through in-depth discussions with a wide array of scholars, scientists, and practitioners—including politicians, diplomats and other government officials—who have played decisive roles in shaping the course of environmental politics, science and activism over the past half century or more.
In the first episode, with 1948 as a starting point, Eric talks to prof. Sverker Sörlin on “the idea of “the environment” emerged at the outset of a radical reconfiguration of the human-environment relationship precipitated by an unprecedented post-war economic expansion that put enormous pressure on ecosystems and the Earth.”
Sverker is a professor of Environmental History at the Division, an author, writer, frequent debater and outdoor sports entusiast with an inexhaustible source of energy.
The SPHERE project is a historical study of humanity’s relation to planetary conditions and constraints and how it has become understood as a governance issue.
Context: Kati Lindström, a researcher at the Division, is currently in Antarctica as part of the CHAQ2020 Argentinean-Swedish expedition. Further reporting on this project is accessible through the researcher’s website, Melting History. As part of the expedition, she lead the curation of new posters for an exhibition at one of the southernmost museums in the world.
How to design an addition to a museum that you have never been to? A museum that is among the most austral ones in the world, where you cannot go to think, rethink, measure and measure again? Where you do not know the light conditions and where you can only guess from the photographs in what context your contribution will be displayed. A museum that, in addition, is managed by military officials in the capital who, if they have ever been to the museum, where not here in the recent years; a museum where the managing personnel changes every year as the Base inhabitants go back to their posts in Argentina and new ones flow in. And consequently, a museum, where objects are seldom removed or rearranged. And last, but not least, how to do it in a period of time when there are millions other and more urgent practicalities that need to be solved before the upcoming expedition?
These are some of the challenges that our team faced when preparing our small contribution to the museum at Esperanza base. Resulting banners were handed over to the head of the Base, Lieutenant Colonel Walter Nahueltripay, during a festive ceremony on Friday, January 31st. The part of the 2019-2020 overwintering group of the base that has already arrived (the second half is scheduled to arrive in coming days) lined up in a formation to the backdrop of a breathtakingly beautiful Esperanza Bay, filled with smaller and bigger white ice floats. Short speeches were given by Walter, Pablo, Dag and Kati after which everybody could take a look at one of the four banners that was already set up in the museum.
From the left: Dag Avango, Kati Lindström, Lieutenant Colonel Walter Nahueltripay, Pablo Fontana and Captain Arnaldo Aníbal Ramos with the banner on the scientific significance of the Nordenskjöld expedition in front of the museum. Photo: Daniel Mansilla
So how did we solve the above dilemmas? It is almost impossible to find one-two original objects that would narrate the intricate story of the 1901-1902 Nordenskjöld expedition. Besides, the base already contemplates with one of the biggest original artefacts left by the expedition: the stone refuge built by Andersson, Duse and Grundén. What other super-object could relate the story better? The best solution, given all the circumstances seemed to be classical information banners that could be set up on empty wall space. The result were four gigantic banners: one on the history of the expedition, one on its scientific relevance, a longer explanation of the Historic Sites and Monuments (HSMs) of the Antarctic Treaty and last, but not least, a banner on the Argentine Antarctic explorer Gustavo Adolfo Giró Tapper. The banners are bilingual and were printed in Buenos Aires with the support from the Swedish Heritage Board. Kati and Pablo extend their thanks to Lize-Marié van der Watt for her contribution to the HSM banner and flawless English, IAA researchers Andrés Zakrajsek and Matías Belinco as well as Cristian Ortiz-Villalón for their help.
Kati Lindström at the shop where the posters were printed. Photo: MasCopies
At the time of writing, February 2nd, we are waiting for a helicopter to fly back to Marambio base where we are still hoping to work on Penguin Bay and Larsen Cairn before heading back to Rio Gallegos and Buenos Aires. Because of the change in icebreaker’s schedule, Paulet Island will have to wait until the next occasion. With all the boxes in the work plan ticked for Esperanza, we leave for Marambio with an immense gratitude to Esperanza base’s friendly crowd without whose help none of it would have been possible.
Esperanza’s personnel with the CHAQ 2020 members. Photo: Daniel Mansilla
*Thanks goes to the research team for allowing us to reblog Kati’s post.
In the not-so-distant future, people in the rich parts of the world will see driverless cars, ‘smart houses’ controlled through 5G applications, and other new inventions, as part of their every-day lives. It will be evident that quite a bit of knowledge has gone into their development. Indeed, many things that surround us are the products of science and technological innovation, which is to say that the products of knowledge-making institutions matter – they have, as it were, an impact.
We also surround ourselves with a multitude of less “thingy” products of insistent research and knowledge production. These constitute products that we often cannot see, touch, smell or use instrumentally, and we often take their existence for granted. But they matter too, and profoundly so. We think of mundane words and concepts that help us make sense of ourselves and the world in which we live. We think of basic societal values, ideas, and ideals that shape how people act, societies work, and political decisions are made. We think of school subjects in the curriculum, social security systems or gender equality policies. Such intangible things are also products of systematic knowledge production, which have made their way into the world through slow, complex processes of knowledge uptake. They are social, conceptual or cultural innovations, and they have a profound impact on how we live our lives.
It is becoming increasingly common to re-think the impact of academic knowledge production in this vein. This is good, we think, not least because new modes of thinking do better justice to the knowledge produced by the human sciences. One part of such an agenda is to find new and better ways of thinking about the ways, modes and time-frames in which knowledge moves, and to become more receptive to the various effects such knowledge might yield. Our colleagues at Humanomics Research Centre at Aalborg University, for instance, frame such movement in terms of “the creep of knowledge,” and have developed quite sophisticated ways of measuring and visualizing the often slow but far-reaching significance of the human sciences.
Set against this backdrop, this blog entry exemplifies two of the manifold cases where ideas developed in the human sciences have crept, but also leapt, into other societal spheres, where they have produced unexpected transformations. These are “source criticism” and “semilingualism” – two knowledge objects which have shaped the social world through their conceptual travels.
Source criticism
Source criticism refers to a scientific method for assessing sources of information. It was originally developed by historians during the nineteenth and twentieth century for distinguishing reliable sources from (e.g.) myths or propaganda. It has had a huge impact on historical research. There have been many revisions of source criticism, but it has remained an important methodological tool of Scandinavian historical scholarship over the twentieth century. It has also been taken up and developed in other domains of research and knowledge production, perhaps most notably in journalism.
Source criticism has also been a natural part of the Swedish psychological defence that developed after the Second World War, concerned with, for instance, protecting the population from propaganda and psychological warfare. It was essential that the population critically assessed information they received. This has become especially acute in relation to the major changes of the media landscape over the last decades, and not least through the broad public use of the internet since the 1990s. The National Board of Psychological Defence (Styrelsen för psykologiskt försvar, SPF) explicitly stressed how the principles of source criticism was essential to everyone using the internet for seeking information and knowledge.
Currently, the significance of source criticism is emphasised in relation to the potential influence of disinformation and deception campaigns on the political development. The Swedish Contingency Agency (Myndigheten för samhällsskydd och beredskap, MSB) underscores how a psychological defence is crucial for the protection of the democratic society and informed decision-making. In turn, it states that psychological defense depends on the capacity of the population of being critical of sources of information and its ability to judge whether information is credible or not. In a similar fashion, the Swedish Armed Forces emphasises that it is “part of everyone’s responsibility for the total defence … to learn more about source criticism, to be vigilant, and seek facts from several credible sources.” The significance of source criticism is also emphasised in the broad efforts of the Swedish government to promote and defend democracy as well as in the national strategy for information and cyber security. In addition, source criticism is part of the teaching on essentially all levels of education. Thus, from the pursuit of advancing the science of history in the nineteenth century, source criticism has now become a crucial tool in safeguarding fundamental democratic principles in the light of present and future challenges.
Semilingualism
Developed in the 1960s, semilingualism refers to an assumed form of failed bilingualism, a case of incomplete language learning. The concept implies that an individual does not master any language entirely, but speaks two “half languages.” Among linguists, the concept is nowadays rejected as being morally and scientifically obsolete. In fact, using it exposes the user’s lack of up-to-date knowledge in linguistics. Interestingly, some contemporary linguists seemingly feel ashamed that their field was responsible for producing a concept this flawed. What such linguists have yet to realise, however, is the “appealing” effects that this “appalling” idea had on the introduction of Swedish policies for linguistic minorities in the 1970s.
Insofar as semilingualism has an inventor, it was the Swedish linguist Nils Erik Hansegård. In the 1950s, he moved to Kiruna in the far north where he worked as a teacher. In this part of historically multilingual Sweden, Tornedalen, the state had for decades imposed a hardline Swedification policy, for example though Swedish-only school instruction. Hansegård was critical of this policy-line and started propagating in favour of allowing additional Finnish-medium instruction in the school system. In the 1960s, Hansegård also embarked on an academic career and sought to use his scientific authority and knowledgeability in the local print-press debates that his stances spurred. The idea of semilingualism was a case in point, construed by Hansegård by weaving an intellectual fabric with multiple threads: German cultural linguistics and psychology of language, North American bilingualism studies, structural linguistics, and input from bilingual education practices in Europe. The result was a concept that appeared well-anchored in research.
In the 1970s, semilingualism became a buzzword also in national media as well as in national politics. The fact that it went viral cannot be explained only with reference to its perceived scientific qualities. Rather, the early 1970s was characterised by a particular climate of opinion. The Swedish administration was busy finding viable solutions in immigration-related policy areas. It sought after actionable knowledge. A central concern here was educational language provisions for immigrants and their children. Here, semilingualism came to be readily used as a warning flag: if children are not offered instruction in and about their mother tongue, Sweden would foster generations of linguistically impaired – semilingual – immigrant children. This was a much-unwanted scenario, and through commission work mother tongue instruction (or home language instruction) became a reality. This policy has now been in place for more than 40 years. Over time, the impact that semilingualism had on its introduction has gradually bleached.
Two highly impactful ideas
We have here outlined two highly impactful ideas which originally came into being in the academic world but subsequently traveled into new regions of the social world. While they differ in some ways, as impact stories they share a number of traits. Source criticism arose in the scientific field of history. In due time, it travelled into other societal realms: journalism, the educational system and even the national security apparatus. Semilingualism emerged out of the language sciences, more particularly, early bilingualism research. It later traveled into state politics, where it shoehorned the school subject mother tongue instruction into the curriculum. Gradually, and often discreetly, they have thus impacted the management of major societal areas sometimes far beyond their academic origins. This sort of impactful movement, we think, is neatly captured by the concept of “the creep of knowledge,” which pinpoints the slow and continuous character of knowledge movement. However, both cases also illustrate that knowledge does not only creep. It also leaps. Such leaps are manifested in historical moments where the slow pace of knowledge movement is promptly accelerated in ways which enables it to cross over and move into new and perhaps unexpected regions of the social world. The impact of the human sciences seems to require such leaps, and the leaps seem to invariably depend upon broader social, political and cultural developments which pave the way for their successful travels.
Note: For those who are interested, take a look at this study that focuses on semilingualism, co-authored with David Karlander.
As we returned to Narsarsuaq after a week of fieldwork in communities of southern Greenland, the outer world came charging in: planes arriving with tourists on their way to various local excursions and high-profile news stories about US president Trump wanting to buy Greenland, including the aftermath of political reactions of uncomfortable surprise at such an absurd idea.
What people living in the villages and towns of Greenland think about this diplomatic exchange, we can only guess as it has not been visible in the reporting in international media. However, after talking to people and visiting places in southern Greenland, we know that opportunities to take part in important decisions are often lacking and that living conditions in small communities are often shaped by the priorities of others. The communication network is just one example. The Narsarsuaq airport in is on a US air force base, established during World War II and still serves a major communication hub for travels anywhere outside the region. The priorities of others also relate to mining, where Greenland has a long history of outsider’s attention because of its unique geology with a wealth of minerals. Past interests in southern Greenland included establishing a mine of cryolite, which was used for aluminum processing, in the small town Ivittuut. Today, we found this mine and the town deserted and the building in decay, though memories of past activities and their links to people in nearby places remain.
Approaching Narsarsuaq – Photo : Annika Nilsson
AMIDST MINING AND A POST-INDUSTRIALIZED FUTURE
Today’s focus is on the strategically important rare earth minerals that occur in the same ore as uranium at Kuannersuit (Kvanefjeld) by the small town of Narsaq. At the time of our visit, people were still waiting for a decision ‘from above’ about whether a mine would be opened. The discussion and the focus on mining had however already affected the town by creating social tensions between people who were either for or against this development. Some saw it as a source of new jobs as well as a base for a livelier service industry with restaurants, grocery stores and other facilities. As pointed out by one politician, it could also help pay for infrastructure in the form of roads that would connect nearby towns. For others, concerns about the impact of pollution raised major questions, especially if the mine would become detrimental to the rich fisheries in the area. A major hope was instead that the local fish processing plant would reopen. According to the local fishermen, shrimp was again abundant. The development of the local fish processing industry was however hampered by a changed structure of the Greenlandic fishery industry and what they saw as imposed bureaucracy and rules.
Some hopes were connected to increasing tourism but with a great concern that the transport infrastructure was insufficient. Most tourists appeared to stay around Narsarsuaq. To make tourism a viable industry also for other communities would require affordable and reasonably frequent boat transport or roads that connect at least some of the small towns in the area. The high cost of transport was a major concern for many people living in villages we visited.
Modern infrastructure is also about virtual communication routes. A visit to an internet café in Narsaq illustrated the cost of access to internet – a cup of tea and a blueberry muffin bought me 15 minutes of internet access. While some people have other access option, Greenland’s sea cable for internet was being repaired when we were visiting in August, limiting wire-carried internet access for private citizens in order to allow public institutions to continue to function. So, while international politicians and businesses discuss Greenland in ways that would have profound impact on the everyday lives in southern Greenland, people’s opportunities to get their own voices and priorities heard in the debate are circumscribed by costs and access to communication networks.
CREATING OPPORTUNITIES FOR ARSUK
Earlier in the week, we visited the settlement of Arsuk. We heard proud stories about how this town once had one of the world’s highest per capita income, when the cod was still plentiful. However, since the crash of the cod stock that previously brought riches and job opportunities to many Greenlandic communities, the outlook for economic opportunities has been bleak. With only four children left in the local school, no nearby access to health care and a harbor that the big ships pass by but do not stop at, several people expressed concern about the future of the community. However, there were also hopes from new sources of income. They included the possibility of selling carefully hand processed wool from muskox, which two women entrepreneurs were developing as a business. Once the 15 kg of fine wool prepared, it would be sent to Denmark for spinning and later sold to others who would knit garment for the Greenlandic market and possibly also for tourists. Arsuk is also home to a fish factory, whose owner expressed hopes that fish would again become plentiful.
While fishery is still part of everyday life in Arsuk, as it has been since the small town was funded in 1805, fishing is also circumscribed by other activities. An elder fisherman described how he had been ordered by a Danish Arctic Command vessel to cut his long line and get out of the way because the military was about to start an exercise in the area. Arsuk fishing activities have previously been hampered by military and industrial activities in the Arsuk fjord, which was home both to the Ivittuut mine, which has left lead pollution in the fjord, and to the Danish Grønnedal military station, both of which were geopolitically important during World War II. Thus, when we visited Ivittutt, Grønnedal, Arsuk and Narsaq, we were at the same time at the periphery of transport infrastructure and at the center of geopolitics.
Arsuk harbor – Photo : Annika Nilsson
The Narsarsuaq airport may close in the future to be replaced by a regional airport near the town of Qaqortoq. However, the future is uncertain. It will depend not only on what might happen with the mine near Narsaq but also if climate change will have a positive impact on local fisheries. Indeed, in a scenario exercise with four young students, the military was highlighted as a major point of uncertainty when looking 20-30 years ahead in time. Although, when asked about what was most important, the focus was on education opportunities, the future of fisheries, and places to work. The voices of these young people and their peers need to be heard in the narratives about Greenland’s future.
*This post was initially published on the REXSAC blog. Many thanks to REXSAC for sharing this post with us.
by Elisa Privitera (Lizzy), C. M. Lerici Foundation Fellow
My story with Sweden started around two years ago. It was a scorching and sunny summer. I had just gotten my Masters Degree that explored the creation of a community laboratory that sought to regenerate a historical and neglected district in Catania—my hometown in Sicily—when my supervisor said to me, “What do you think about Sweden?”
“Sweden, hmmm…” I hesitated, trying to take time in order to dig into my memory and knowledge, to collect ideas for a right answer.
Waiting patiently, my supervisor prompted me again, “So?”
I sighed, “Actually, not too much. Why do you ask?”
Two years later, at the end of January 2019, I landed in the evening at Stockholm’s Skavsta Airport in order to accomplish about 6 months of research as a visiting scholar at the Environmental Humanities Lab at the Division of History of Science, Technology and Environment here at KTH. Oh yeah, I was in Sweden!
But why did I come here? Tracing back the story, during the two years in between my masters degree and my arrival, I continued to work and do fieldwork concerning environmental and urban planning. I collaborated with some grassroots associations, which furthered my interests in the processes of reactivation of derelict spaces. And I started a PhD program where I’ve continued to explore the link between environmental issues and urban planning as a member of LabPEAT– an action-research lab of ecological and environmental design. Working on my PhD, “Evaluation and mitigation of urban and land risks”—begun in 2018 at the Department of Civil Engineering and Architecture at the University of Catania—I began to investigate the issues of community empowerment with environmental risks and the planning and regeneration of derelict areas.
Locations of LabPEAT in Catania and EHL in Stockholm
My thesis explores risky landscapes, such as all those post-industrial or in transition landscapes that have been deeply modified and contaminated due to the heavy human footprint. If the landscape can be conceived as the place of people and people’ point of view (Pizziolo and Micarelli, 2003), how can the local knowledge collected by the people’ stories influence the planning field? Or more generally, what can be the role of subaltern communities in the production of knowledge about risk in order to co-design neglected and contaminated areas? Starting from these research questions, my aim is to experiment an alternative approach to risk landscapes by investigating the issue of environmental risk from a qualitative and environmental justice point of view and by putting particular emphasis on storytelling. Since I believe that the industrial and contaminated areas represent a melting-pot of the inequalities as well as a prime example for debate on how to plan current and future risk landscapes, I have chosen to focus on Gela, a fishing village in the South of Sicily that has been converted into one of the main Italian petrochemical poles. In Gela, I had already started to collect stories about daily life from some inhabitants. But I understood that I still needed to deepen the theme of the potential role of the narrative.
That is why I came to the Environmental Humanities Lab (EHL) on a C. M. Lerici Foundation fellowship. Understanding the roles of narratives in order to tell the right story (Barca S., 2014) or to portray a more complex story of landscapes (Gravagno F., 2008) is an expertise of the EHL. It combines research, training, and outreach to tackle crucial societal challenges, such as climate justice, migrations, environmental justice, and rights to the city. The EHL has driven several projects on environmental justice over the years, such as Toxic Bios.
This public environmental humanities project has assisted my research through its aims to co-produce, gather, and make visible stories of contamination and resistance, by using the methodology of storytelling, as also explained in a published article. The collection of oral stories can be a useful tool for many purposes:
for uncovering toxic narratives centered on structural environmental injustice;
for co-producing knowledge;
for increasing the empowerment and collective capabilities of local communities (community building);
and for triggering an action-research path in contaminated territories in order to co-design a different future.
So, by having in mind the purpose of deepening the potential role of the toxic biographies in the planning of contaminated areas, I landed in the darkness at the airport of Skavsta, covered by layers of white snow during that January night. The day after my arrival I moved to live into one of the student dormitories on KTH Campus—a newly erected building with an amazing view on the cityscape of Stockholm. The following months have been an intense flurry of learning, experiences, and challenges!
View from KTH dormitory
Upon my arrival, I began a literature review about environmental justice, political ecology, and environmental history, as suggested by my KTH supervisor: Prof. Marco Armiero. Stockholm was so cold, with iced lakes and fascinating snowscapes sprinkled with nightlights in front of windows to face the darkness. February passed in a jiffy, and in March I started to attend a course for the Ph.D. candidates in “Theory and Method in Historical Research” and a course for master students in “Environmental History.” Both the courses have been challenging. In the first course, “Theory and Method in Historical Research,” I had the possibility to study and debate on many current issues, from Bruno Latour’s books to the epistemological research of feminist theory, from materiality to STS studies. The array of themes has been quite varied and helped me to frame and address my own research questions from time to time in a new way, by enriching certain points of view about it. Meanwhile, thanks to the “Environmental History” course, I investigated the historical connections between migration flows and environmental pull and push factors. These experiences gave me some insights on how to frame my topic as well.
Until then, I have collaborated with the EHL on two running projects. Also, I have collaborated and participated in the lab meetings that take place more or less once a week. On the 21st of March, I also had the opportunity to present the activities and research carried out by LabPEAT of Catania during one of these lab meetings. Over the months, I got fully involved in Division life, for instance, by attending the Higher Seminars in which other scholars come from everywhere about present on current research topics.
Lizzy at the Lab. From left to right: Roberta Biasillo, Lizzy Privitera, and Marco Armiero
Also, frankly speaking, I have fallen in love with fika, an on-purpose-organized break with the aim of socialising among colleagues. The fika is sweetened by tea, coffee and a lot of sweets, typical from Sweden. Some of the main sweets are the “Princess cake,” the “kanelbullar” or “kardemummabulle”, and so on. In particular, the cinnamon bun can be considered the queen of Swedish cuisine! Thereby, in my opinion, among the key-words regarding Sweden, I would suggest FIKA! Between fika, readings, assignments and interesting discussions with colleagues, April arrived. It brought lighter hours, warmer weather, Easter and Walpurgis night, or Valborg. If the days of Easter have been characterised by the blooming of the trees at Kungsträdgården that attracted locals and tourists during several days, Valborg is one of these things about which I did not know about but that is a quite important event for Swedish society. In fact, it is a custom coming from northern Europe, and it consists of lighting bonfires in public spaces in order to celebrate the arrival of spring collectively. All throughout Sweden, there are bonfires with family and groups of friends who enjoy the flames. I got to enjoy Valborg from the seaside of Stockholm!
In the middle of May, the two courses ended. I started to draft a summary of the concepts learned about toxic autobiographies and environmental justice. In the meanwhile, nicer days came. When the sun arrives, it is a bursting event, a kind of explosion of joy and chilling out, and all Swedish (and not only!) people begin to scatter among the public places of the city: picnic on the parks, walks on the city, beers in terraces and gardens, events in the squares. A festive spirit rises. I started to stroll around the city in order to explore it. I visited Skansen park which gives lots of information about the history of Sweden and typical Nordic animals, some museums, such as the Nobel Prize Museum, and the park behind the KTH campus which is full of deer and forest animals.
At the beginning of June, I went back to Italy for a conference where I presented work I developed based on what I learned in the “Theory and Method in Historical Research” course. The title of the work is “Contaminated Entanglements,” and it will be soon part of a publication. “Contaminated Entanglements” concerns the complex set of connections between environmental components. Things, matters, bodies, humans and not, all are part of this entanglement. Especially, according to Stacy Alaimo (2010) in the contamination of the human and non- (more than) human bodies can be read the transcorporeality of the toxicity.
Another first output of this period of research at the EHL has been the paper titled “The Toxic Biographies and the “Small Data” from an Italian petrochemical town (Gela, Sicily)” that I have presented at the City Futures IV Conference in Dublin. This paper is a first and embryonic fruit of the collaborative work between the two research laboratories, LabPEAT and the EHL. This collaboration has brought us to experiment and propose an ecological and relational community design that uses toxic biographies as tools for converting the personal stories of life into collective knowledge. In fact, through the collection of stories a shift occurs from an individual tragedy to a self-aware community which can embark upon the quest for justice. By doing so, toxic auto-biographies become also a way to re-politicize the embodied experience of injustice. Once a community—formed as the result of a struggle—becomes aware of the diffused injustices, an ecological community design path can be triggered.
As July arrived, the end of my experience drew near, and I returned home. A second intense year of Ph.D. is now in front of me. The future goals for this year will be to continue to carry out a full-immersion and fieldwork in Gela (Sicily). More and more auto-biographies will be collected, and I will try to trigger an action-research path by engaging inhabitants and grassroots movements in order to map the risk landscapes as they are perceived by citizens and also in order to co-design alternative futures for this contaminated area. For sure I will have to deal with doubts, readings, editing and so on, but I am also optimistic about the decisive turning points. I do believe that future meetings with some of the scholars I have met at this division during these past few months will be fruitful and inspiring for my ongoing research!
That’s why I am really looking forward to coming back to Sweden one day again, and at the Division of History of Science, Technology and Environment of the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in particular!
