Negotiating Environmental Knowledge - a workshop hosted by InSIS on 12-13 December 2018

On 12-13 December 2019, the Institute for Science Innovation and Society (InSIS) hosted an international workshop on ‘Negotiating Environmental Knowledges’. The event brought together scholars from across anthropology, STS, geography and environmental science to discuss negotiations between diverse forms of environmental knowledge in the context of interventions designed to assess and manage resources and hazards. This workshop was convened by Sophie Haines to conclude her ESRC-funded project ‘Envisioning Emergent Environments: Negotiating science & resource management in rural communities’.

Twelve speakers from the UK, Norway, USA and Brazil presented work from a wide range of geographical locations (Latin America, South Asia, Australia, Ireland, Madagascar), encompassing topics including watershed management, air pollution, subterranean aquifers, coastal embankments, water pumps and human-tiger conflicts. The presentations and roundtable discussions enabled lively debates on a variety of themes: how authority and expertise are enacted and contested; the roles of uncertainty, ignorance, and imagination; understandings of impact and accountability in projects we study and our own work and collaborations. More details and the workshop programme are available here.