Over the course of my graduate studies, I’ve grown to appreciate the power of storytelling practices in environmental politics. I have also enjoyed engaging my students around these questions. There’s this story, for instance, narrated by UNEP Goodwill Ambassador (and guy from Fight Club) Edward Norton:
And this one, produced for The Natural Capital Project:
The workings of the narratives seem easy for my students to identify: highlighting what context is established, what kind of problem is framed, and what solution is posited. Once encouraged to spot these features of the environmental texts swirling around us, it’s kind of hard to unsee. These particular clips serve as windows into the so-called “economic turn” in conservation, which my dissertation seeks to analyze, and they provide revealing glimpses into the kinds of work policy discourses can do.
DANIEL CHIU SUAREZ 