Troubling Ecologies__Ungefügige Umwelten

Ecology is the study of relations and dynamic exchanges. In an expanded understanding, ecology overcomes the separation between nature and culture and situates humans in the midst of environments. This in turn influences our understanding of time and ecology: to engage with ecology in this way is to engage less with the future than with the connections between human and other-than-human beings that exist in the present. These relations are often uncomfortable for our thinking, they are troubling and – as we will discuss – should stay with the trouble. In this seminar, we want to get to know different perspectives on an expanded concept of ecology. We want to analyze ecologies less "from the outside", but rather learn to think relationally and thus ecologically. Texts by Félix Guattari and Suely Rolnik as well as queer-feminist approaches by Donna Haraway and Anna L. Tsing will help us to do this.

Selection of literature:

Félix Guattari, Die drei Ökologien, Wien 1994

Donna Haraway, Staying with the Trouble, Durham 2016 (dt. Unruhig bleiben, Frankfurt/M. New York 2018)

Anna L. Tsing, The Mushroom at the End of the World, Princeton 2015 (dt.: Der Pilz am Ende der Welt. Über das Leben in den Ruinen des Kapitalismus, Berlin 2018)

Ökologien der Sorge, hrsg. von Tobias Bärtsch u.a., Wien u.a. 2017

Hybride Ökologien, hrsg. von Susanne Witzgall u.a., Zürich 2019