Eco-Panel: Deep Ecology, Shallow Action

Join us for an exciting panel dedicated to bringing an interdisciplinary discussion about the climate crisis to Oxford. We unite thinkers from the fields of literature, philosophy, academia, politics, and more in a conversation about the role of contemporary poetry (and the arts more broadly) in combatting the environmental challenges faced by humanity today. Can verses sway the tides of tomorrow? Could rhyme be the current of change we need? Does the global scale of the problem render poetry obsolete? Come to Mansfield Auditorium at 5.30pm on March 12th to hear our guests' thoughts on all of the above—and more! More info on the speakers can be found below. 🌏🌏🌏 ✒️🦋 Arran Stibbe is a Professor of Ecological Linguistics at the University of Gloucestershire with an academic background in both linguistics and human ecology. He is the founder of the International Ecolinguistics Association, and author of 'Ecolinguistics: language, ecology and the stories we live by' (2015) and 'Econarrative: ethics, ecology and the search for new narratives to live by' (2023). He is currently working on an analysis of narrative structure and emotions in the poetry collection Ecopoetikon (www.ecopoetikon.org). 🌱🌿 Riley Faulds grew up on unceded Whadjuk, Bindjareb and Wadandi Noongar Country. His poems have been published in various of Australia's best journals and have won prizes both at home and in the UK—but he saves his best work for birthday cards. His undergrad degree was in Agricultural Science and English, and he worked as an environmental scientist before starting his MSt (and now DPhil) at Oxford. He misses eucalypts. 🐝🪻 Rae Howells is a poet, journalist and lavender farmer from Swansea. Her debut collection, 'The language of bees' (2022), was shortlisted for Wales Book of the Year 2023. 'This Common Uncommon' (2024) is her second poetry collection. She has previously won the Rialto Nature & Place and Welsh poetry competitions and been featured widely in journals including Magma, The Rialto, Poetry Wales, New Welsh Review, Acumen and Poetry Ireland. A keen environmentalist and a believer in the restorative power of wild places, she is poet in residence at Llanelli Wetland Centre.