Schedule subject to change, please check back regularly
Special Events
- 24 April – May 2 Buffalo Niagara Water Keeper Spring Sweep Events – Registration Open Now, Small Group and Solo cleanups.
- 20 April – Rest and Refuge with Rosy Simas, 9-10:30 AM, Performance Research Workshop, Simas is Haudenosaunee, enrolled Seneca, Heron Clan. “Her [dance] projects merge decolonized physical movement with media, sound, and objects …” uniting “cultural concepts and images with scientific and philosophical theories to create work that is literal, abstract, and metaphoric.” Register to receive info on joining the meeting at https://buffalo.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJ0sceihpz0tE9KflbPzVHD_jNrqMCLb6Chq
- 19 April – Sindhu Thirumalaisamy visiting artist lecture. Her most recent film The Lake and The Lake, won the Best Documentary Award at the 58th Ann Arbor Film Festival – PLASMA (Performances, Lectures and Screenings in Media Art)- access information on website.
- 16 April – Talk Green EVS Spring Seminars, John Atkinson, Department of Civil, Structural, and Environmental Engineering, University at Buffalo, Greenhouse Gas Emissions Associated with Waste Management Options, 12:00 p.m.-1:30 p.m.
- 2 April – Talk Green EVS Spring Seminars, Jenny Zambrano, School of Biological Sciences, Washington State University, What determines forest structure and dynamics? Investigating local and regional drivers in tropical and temperate forests, 12:00 p.m.-1:30 p.m
- 23 March – Dr. Asmeret Berhe – Digging Deeper: Role of Subsoils in Organic Matter Dynamics – Pegrum Lecture – Professor Berhe is a biogeochemist who focuses on the cycling of essential elements in soil, focusing on carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus. Sign Up
- 9 Feb – Dr. Megan Fork – “Northern Waters on the Front Lines of Global Change” –The first Pegrum Lecture of the semester will be given by Megan Fork on February 9th at 3:30PM. Dr. Fork is a biogeochemist who studies human impacts on the world’s freshwaters from socio-hydrological and socio-ecological perspectives. She is currently a postdoctoral fellow at the Cary Institute for Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, NY. She will be giving a talk on her work on anthropogenic change in the freshwaters of northern Sweden. (zoom link in UBlearns announcement for week 2)
Typical Weekly Schedule
- Part 1 Mon-Wed
- Do reading – Post to READING BLOG by Tues at 11pm.
- Watch/Play/Browse Media – Post to MEDIA BLOG by Wed at 11 pm.
- Part 2 Thur-Fri
- Web Lecture.
- Friday at noon – zoom meeting, attend live or watch video in panopto content on UB learns.
- Post to JOURNAL by Friday at 11 pm.
Feb 1: Week 1
1.1
Review syllabus & schedule, book, UBlearns
Watch Abuela Grillo, The Animation Workshop, vimeo, look at info
1.2
Web Lecture: Introduction
Zoom meeting: Introduction to Donna Haraway BOOK
Feb 8: Week 2
2.1
Reading: Staying with the Trouble, Donna Haraway “Introduction” p 1-8 (note this is the course text book on the syllabus)
- Reading Blog Due 11:00 PM Tuesdays. Write or paste into the blog a short quote from the week’s reading with page number. Use this blog to indicate passages that you would like explained or that particularly drew your attention. Annotate with one word comment i.e. “explain,” “confusing,” “interesting,” “provocative” etc.
Media: Gasland II by Josh Fox, 2013, (2:05) Rent from Amazon Prime (~$4) rent from HBO (~$4) NOTE CHANGE to GASLAND 2
- Media Blog Due 11:00 PM Wednesdays. Reflect on the week’s media and share ideas and comments. One post is mandatory but for full points actively engage with the blog, commenting on posts, creating your own threads, and pursuing topics with students who have similar interests.
2.2
Web Lecture: How media makes meaning: focus on Documentary
- Zoom Meeting 12 Noon Fridays – Josephine responds to your reading blogs
- Journal Due 11 PM Fridays. Describe a specific part/scene of the weekly media and show how it illustrates an important ecological point/thread/idea that permeates the whole work. Explain one or more of the theoretical concerns/ideas/key-words from the reading or web-lectures. Draw connections between the media you describe and the idea you explain.
Feb 15: Week 3 (Project Groups Assigned, start Group Project 1)
3.1
Media : Oceans of Noise Podcast, episodes 1-3 (30 mins each), The Guardian: episode 1 … episode 2 … episode 3
Reading: Staying with the Trouble, Donna Haraway, Chapter 1 (note this is the course text book on the syllabus)
3.2
Web Lecture: Oddkin, Companion Species and String Figures
Feb 22: Week 4
4.1
Media: BBC Beautiful Minds: James Lovelock, 2011 (YouTube 60 minutes)
Reading: Haraway, chapter 2
4.2
Web Lecture: Gaia to Earth System Science
March 1: Week 5
5.1
Media: Tambien La Lluvia, 2010, Icíar Bollaín (1 hr 42) (NETFLIX)
Reading: Ecocinema Theory and Practice, Chapter 3, “do ecocritics dream of clockwork green,” by Andrew Hageman, pp 63-66 & 72-77 2012: electronic version available in library
5.2
Web Lecture: Ideology, Tambien La Lluvia
Mar 8: Week 6: Group Project 1 DUE
6.1
Media: Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, 1984, Hayao Miyazaki, (1 hr 58) (YOUTUBE ~$4)
Reading: Haraway chap 3, 59-76
Instructions for Group Project 2/Games Assigned
6.2
Web Lecture: Nausicaa, microbes, food, soil
Mar 15: Week 7
7.1
Media: Chasing Coral, Jeff Orlowski, 2017 (1 hr 33) NETFLIX
Reading: Haraway Chapter 3, (reread from 71 then) pp 76-98 critical zones – ref Crocheted Coral Reef
Journal: Special Assignment this week. Read 7.2 webpage for details
7.2
Midsemester Review of frames/things to think with
Mar 22: Week 8
8.1
Media: Games and VR
Reading: Ecocinema Theory and Practice, Chapter 2 by David Ingram, 2012, electronic version available in library
8.2
Web Lecture Cognitive Media Theory
Mar 29 : Week 9:Group Project 2 DUE APRIL 2 by 11 PM
9.1
Media: Mad Max: Fury Road, 2015, Dir. George Miller (2 hours): YOUTUBE + variety of streaming sources (~$4)
Reading:
- The Ecofeminism of Mad Max by Sarah Mirk
- Mad Max Fury Road: A Savage Masterpiece of Eco-feminist Violence by faustusnotes
- Haraway Chapter 4 Making Kin (PLUS LOOK AT FOOTNOTES)
9.2
Web Lecture: Ecofeminism.
April 5: Week 10 Group Project 3 Starts
10.1
Media: Sogobi by James Benning, 2002 (1 hr 26 mins), you might want to read the MacDonald article first to give context.
Reading: Ecocinema Theory and Practice, Chapter 1, Scott MacDonald , “The ecocinema experience,” part 1 pp 18-36, electronic version available in library
10.2
Web Lecture: Reattuning the Mind
The ecocinema experience – Reading Notes
Group Project 3 – Social Media Posts – Instructions
April 12: Week 11
11.1
Media: Watch TED Talks Katherine Hayhoe 17 mins & Per Espen Stoknes 15 mins & Kate Raworth 17 mins
Reading: Listen to Podcast Communicating Climate Change: a psychoanalysis – Science Weekly Podcast, Jan 19, 2017, The Guardian, Please quote as accurately as possible and put timestamp into reading blog instead of page number.
11.2
Web Lecture: Communication
April 19: Week 12
12.1
Media: The Yes Men Fix the World, 2009 (1:25 start at 8.59)
Optional Media: The Yes Men Are Revolting 2015 (1:57) from $2.99 on YOUTUBE
Reading: Haraway Chapter 5
12.2
Web Lecture: Media and Eco-Activism
Reading Notes for Haraway Chapter 5
April 26: Week 13
13.1
Media: When the Levees Broke, Part I, 2006, Spike Lee, (~ 1 hr), Amazon, Hulu, HBO, $1.99 on Vudu, $8.99 on I-Tunes for all 4 acts.
Reading: Listen to The Jump: HIV podcast, BBC Sounds, 3/24/21 (27 mins) Please quote as accurately as possible and note the minute and second of your quotation in the reading blog instead of page number.
Reading: Look in the index of Staying with the Trouble for pages relating to “colonialism” and “colonization” and read them.
13.2
Web Lecture: Environmental Disasters, Environmental Justice, and Media
May 3: Week 14
14.1
Just Podcasts this week: Plastic Fantastic, BBC Radio 4, 2018: Episode 1, The First Flush of Love 28 min, Episode 2, Things Start to Go Stale 28 min, Episode 3, What’s the Solution, 28 min
14.2
Web Lecture: Sensing and Simulation
FINAL DUE DATE: ALL DELIVERABLES MAY 16th