Articles tagged with: Julia Baird

  • Julia Baird and Marilyne Jollineau awarded SSHRC Insight Development Grant

    Monday, May 27, 2019 | By

    On January 30, 2019, Drs. Julia Baird (GeoTour), Marilyne Jollineau (GeoTour), and Ryan Plummer were awarded an Insight Development Grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council for their project “A comparative analysis of approaches to evaluating ecological outcomes from environmental stewardship”. Read more about this project on Dr. Baird’s Water Resilience Lab website.

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  • The meaning of environmental words matters in the age of ‘fake news’

    Monday, May 27, 2019 | By

    Reposted from The Conversation | January 10, 2019 5.34pm EST
    Authors: Jessica Blythe, Christine Diagle, and Julia Baird (GEOTOUR, ESRC)

    This week, U.S. President Donald Trump gave a live address on prime-time television where he repeatedly used the words “violent,” “illegal aliens” and “crisis” to arouse public fear. While Trump’s speech was based largely on fallacies, his fear-mongering shapes the national tone and can generate real-world impacts.

    Words matter because they wield power. Words shape our thinking about the world and, in turn, the actions we take. The meaning of words has never been more relevant than now — in the era of “fake news” — when so-called alternative facts abound.

    Environmental words can also be misinterpreted or misused. In the most sinister cases, language can be put to work to promote particular agendas and silence others.

    Remember “beautiful clean coal?” The Trump administration used the term as the backbone for the continued development of the fossil fuel industry. At the same time, it systematically removed the words “climate change” from federal websites, a measure aimed at undermining climate action.

    Power can be expressed through environmental buzzwords. They are used to influence policy direction, funding and produce norms that become entrenched in their meaning around the world. Motivated by this idea, our recent research explores the meaning of three environmental buzzwords — resilience, sustainability and transformation. Meaning influences the way we understand environmental problems and shapes the solutions we prioritize — or don’t.

    The rise of resilience

    Let’s begin with “resilience.” Over the past decade, resilience has increasingly become a rallying cry in the face of climatic change. Resilience has many meanings, from the time it takes to bounce back from a disturbance to more complex interpretations that consider the capacity to persist, adapt or transform in the face of change.

    Evidence shows that individuals, even those who share demographic characteristics or professions, interpret resilience in very different ways. These differences matter and can have implications on real-world actions.

    Flooding of Lake Champlain (seen here) and the Richelieu River in 1991 caused tens of millions of dollars in damage in Vermont, New York and Québec.(AP Photo/Toby Talbot)

    When considering policy and planning related to flooding, for example, understanding resilience as bouncing back can lead to decisions to focus solely on infrastructure investments, while a more complex interpretation may lead to a decision to relocate a vulnerable subdivision away from a floodplain.

    The rise of resilience as a buzzword has also led to its prominence in agendas put forward by organizations looking for funding often without a clear intention or accountability.

    Sustainability for whom?

    The concept of “sustainability” has dominated environmental thinking since the publication of the influential essay “A Blueprint for Survival” in 1972. The notion of sustainability rests upon the idea that we are obligated to future generations and ought to live in a way that preserves natural resources and environments so that our children and grandchildren can enjoy them.

    The underlying idea is that we have the technological and scientific know-how and power to achieve this goal. And this definition of sustainability centres on humans. Asking “what is sustainability and who is it for?” may lead to a surprising shift in this thinking.

    An alternative perspective on sustainability raises new questions: Must we work toward preserving natural environments for ourselves? Is it justified to work toward preserving a species that is harmful to itself and others — like we have been?

    Is this wind turbine sustainable? Different perspectives may produce different answers. SCA/flickr, CC BY

    Privileging the well-being of other species over our own — by significantly reducing our use of highly polluting natural resources — may help to slow climate change, for example. This requires, however, a radical shift in our thinking, displacing the human from the centre of our preoccupations.

    Clearly our know-how has not prevented the acceleration of the environmental crisis. Rethinking ourselves as beings that are deeply interconnected with our habitats and those we share it with, as post-humanist thinkers do, could lead to redefining the notion of sustainability and what constitutes an appropriate course of action. Significantly, this new vision of sustainability may not always favour the human…

    …Continue Reading on The Conversation

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  • Students celebrate World Water Day with water-themed research posters

    Thursday, April 19, 2018 | By

    On March 22, 2018, students in GEOG/TOUR 3P83 (Geography of Water Resources) and GEOG/TOUR 4P83 (Research Themes in Water Resources) celebrated World Water Day by presenting their water research posters in the Maps, Data and GIS Library. A few of the posters are pictured below.

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  • Achievements of Geography and Tourism Studies professors and students recognized by FOSS

    Wednesday, January 31, 2018 | By

    The Department of Geography and Tourism Studies would like to congratulate our professors and students who were recognized last week by Brock’s Faculty of Social Sciences at their annual Celebration of Excellence.

    • Dr. Julia Baird, Assistant Professor (Canada Research Chair, Human Dimensions of Water Resources and Water Resilience)
    • Dr. David Butz, Professor (Brock SSHRC Institutional Grant)
    • Dr. Michael Pisaric, Professor (NSERC Discovery Grant)
    • Dr. Kevin Turner, Assistant Professor (Canada Foundation for Innovation John R. Evans Leaders Fund)
    • Dr. Ebru Ustundag, Associate Professor (Ontario Undergraduate Students Alliance Teaching Excellence Award)
    • Katelyn Pierce, MA in Geography student (Ontario Graduate Scholarship)
    • Connor Dingle, MA in Geography student (Best Major Research Paper)

    Read the full story on the Brock News.

    Graduate student award winners and their supervisors and mentors were among the honorees at the Faculty of Social Sciences Celebration of Excellence. From left, Dawn Zinga, Acting Associate Dean of Graduate Studies and Research, Megan Earle and supervisor Gordon Hodson, Xiaomei Zhou and supervisor Catherine Mondloch, Christie Milliken accepting on behalf of Devon Coutts, Ebru Ustundag accepting on behalf of Connor Dingle, and Ingrid Makus, Interim Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences.

     

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