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CITIZEN SCIENCE

Epistemic negotiation

Stakeholders (indigenous groups, activist, scientist, scholars, etc)

Why is the rate of incarceration in Louisiana so high? How do we critique the way prisons are part of infrastructural solutions to anthropocenic instabilities? As Angela Davis writes, “prisons do not disappear social problems, they disappear human beings. Homelessness, unemployment, drug addiction, mental illness, and illiteracy are only a few of the problems that disappear from public view when the human beings contending with them are relegated to cages.” One way of imagining and building a vision of an anti-carceral future is practiced in the Solitary Gardens project here in New Orleans: 

The Solitary Gardens are constructed from the byproducts of sugarcane, cotton, tobacco and indigo- the largest chattel slave crops- which we grow on-site, exposing the illusion that slavery was abolished in the United States. The Solitary Gardens utilize the tools of prison abolition, permaculture, contemplative practices, and transformative justice to facilitate exchanges between persons subjected to solitary confinement and volunteer proxies on the “outside.” The beds are “gardened” by prisoners, known as Solitary Gardeners, through written exchanges, growing calendars and design templates. As the garden beds mature, the prison architecture is overpowered by plant life, proving that nature—like hope, love, and imagination—will ultimately triumph over the harm humans impose on ourselves and on the planet.

"Nature" here is constructed in a very particularistic way: as a redemptive force to harness in opposition to the wider oppressive system the architecture of a solitary confinement cell is a part of. It takes a lot of intellectual and political work to construct a counter-hegemonic nature, in other words. Gardeners in this setting strive toward a cultivation of relations antithetical to the isolationist, anti-collective sociality prisons (and in general, a society in which prisons are a permanent feature of crisis resolution) foster.

My interest in NOLA anthropocenics pivots on water, and particularly the ways in which capitalist regimes of value and waste specify, appropriate, and/or externalize forms of water. My research is concerned with water crises more generally, and geographically situated in Flint, Michigan. I thought I could best illustrate these interests with a sampling of photographs from a summer visit to NOLA back in 2017. At the time, four major confederate monuments around the city had just been taken down. For supplemental reading, I'm including an essay from political theorist Adolph Reed Jr. (who grew up in NOLA) that meditates on the long anti-racist struggle that led to this possibility, and flags the wider set of interventions that are urgently required to abolish the landscape of white supremacy. 

Flooded street after heavy rains due to failures of city pumping infrastructure.

A headline from the same week in the local press.

Some statues are gone but other monuments remain (this one is annotated).

A Starbucks in Lakeview remembering Katrina--the line signifies the height of the water at the time.

Reading:

Adolph Reed Jr., “Monumental Rubbish” https://www.commondreams.org/views/2017/06/25/monumental-rubbish-statues-torn-down-what-next-new-orleans

P.S. In case the photos don't show up in the post I'm attaching them in a PDF document as well! 

This article particularly focuses on analysis in the aftermath of emergencies. Specifically, in the investigative processes of structural disasters. It highlights the awkward melding of various agencies in the face of public demand for answers. More than anything, it presents this instability in the investigative processes surrounding many emergencies; understanding the logistics of a building's collapse or how a fire rapidly spread only furthers comprehension of the disaster as a whole. Moreover, findings from this analysis could provide strategies for avoiding future emergencies of a similar nature. The article opens investigations for scrutiny, asking why such an integral part of the post-disaster process often gets swept aside.

The chapter appears to be a compilation of accounts of immigrant medical treatments and overviews of the historical context behind several key situations. There is no bibliography, making it difficult to discern where these accounts came from. I can only assume most of this historical context came from Fissan's peers or other peer-reviewed works-- potentially another anthropological book. 

The report includes information gathered by both authors during the course of their own research, including citing several of their own publications within the report. Moreover, as a review article, the report includes work from other prominent epidemiologists, psychologists, and organizers of disaster relief; additionally, there appear to be several reports from various emergency response agencies providing data for prevalence of various mental disorders

It addresses the public as a whole. Throughout the film, those involved in fighting for information/responsibility over Camp Lejeune emphasize the power of the public to write or speak about this issue. Moreover, it strongly demonstrates how often public welfare is shunned by those in power-- ironically, the least effected group. 

1)      From the perspective of readers or hearers of stories that are in process, plot is less a finished form or structure than an engagement with what has been told or read so far in relation to imagined outcomes that the story may bring - outcomes that are feared, longed for, or seem ironically or tragically inevitable.

2)      Second. several prototypical plot types can be identified among the illness narratives, as well as among the specific stories of which they are constituted. These have a distinctive cultural form, rooted in Turkish popular medical culture. They are present as the plot structures of the narratives we heard. They are also available as cultural resources for those in the midst of illness attempting to make sense of their experience; that is, they are possible stories one might reasonably tell about such an illness, potential plots giving order to the events one is experiencing.

3)       Meanwhile, he continues to work in a job at the municipality, where he is treated well by co-workers. His major concern is that he and his wife have had no children, and he wonders if either the illness or the medications are to blame. This, rather than treatment of the primary disease, organizes his interest in shaping the outcome of his illness story.

Miriam Ticktin, PhD, is a current associate professor of Anthropology and a co-director of Zolberg Institute of Migration and Mobility. She received degrees from both Stanford University, Oxford University, and Ecoles de Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales. Her work typically focuses on the intersection of medicine, science, law, anthropology, and postcolonial feminist theory. She has multiple publications on the above subjects, including journal articles, books, special journal issues, and chapters. 

The report comes within a much larger book edited by Richard Hindmarsh focused on the Fukushima nuclear disaster. The book as whole explores social, environmental, and political issues in the aftermath of the incident. It appears to be available at multiple collegiate libraries including Boston College, Williams College, Harvard University, MIT, and Cornell University.