Week 1 Work

Question 1

What is the module about

Answer 1

The Anthropocene as a set of material conditions and also the Anthropocene as an idea

Question 2

How does this module benefit me as an environmental scientist

Answer 2

Places my knowledge about environmental change within a wider context of human-nature relationships

Question 3

What re the two summative coursework questions

Answer 3

What does your object tell us about the human geographies of the Anthropocene? 2000 words.
Critically evaluate how the museum of the Anthropocene and/or the feral Atlas presented the human geographies of the Anthropocene.

Question 4

What are the two attitudes/ mindsets that will help me do well in this module

Answer 4

Be critical, test and question what you read - are the ideas justified, look for connections and differences, challenge ideas with new evidence, spot and challenge potential biases- in others work, and you own, look for gaps suggest alternatives and construct own arguments
Be creative, creativity is at the heart of learning, and encompasses key cognitive skillsets. Being creative in this module means, being curious, thinking laterally, making use of previous knowledge, registering patterns, initiative and persistence, exploring synthesising, refining and generating knowledge.

Question 5

Two paradigm - shifting realisations in earth systems sciences

Answer 5

The earth system is a self-differentiating, self-organising entity that can flip between states.
Humanity has sufficient agency to drive such change.

Question 6

Which two scientist/human geographers thought of the idea of the Anthropocene

Answer 6

Eugene Stoermer, early 1980s
Andrew Revkin, ‘anthrocene”, 1992

Question 7

What are the four contenders of when the Anthropocene begun

Answer 7

The rise of agriculture, 5-8k years ago
European expansion 1492
Industrial Revolution 1784
Great acceleration 1950 or 5:30 am, 16th July 1945, Alamogordo,NM

Question 8

What is a Global Boundary Stratotype Section and Point (GSSP)

Answer 8

A point where future geologists would mark the beginning of the Anthropocene

Question 9

What are ecomodernists and eco pragmatists

Answer 9

Believe human kinds extraordinary powers can be put in place to create a good Anthropocene through technology and possible even bioengineering

Question 10

What do most Anthropocene scholars agree about the future

Answer 10

It will be challenging but not impossible to stop components of the earths system shifting into new, uncertain and potentially dangerous states. Urgent economic, political and perhaps cultural change is required to create a good, or at least better Anthropocene

Question 11

Example of how to reference properly

Answer 11

Crutzen, P. J. and Stoermer, E. F. (2000) ‘The Anthropocene’, Global Change
Newsletter, 41, pp. 17–18.
* Lidskog, R. and Waterton, C. (2018) ‘The Anthropocene: A Narrative in the
Making’, in Boström, M. and Davidson, D.J. eds., Environment and Society.
Basingstoke: Palgrave, 25-47.
* Palsson, G. et al. (2013) ‘Reconceptualizing the “Anthropos” in the Anthropocene:
Integrating the social sciences and humanities in global environmental change
research’, Environmental Science and Policy, 28, pp. 3–13
* Swanson, H. A., Bubandt, N. and Tsing, A. (2015) ‘Less Than One But More Than
Many: Anthropocene as Science Fiction and Scholarship-in-the-Making’,
Environment and Society, 6(1), pp. 149–166.
* Waters, C. N. et al. (2018) ‘Global Boundary Stratotype Section and Point (GSSP)
for the Anthropocene Series: Where and how to look for potential candidates’,
Earth Science Reviews 178 pp. 379–429.