ENV 386 - Extraction and Energy Justice in the Anthropocene

This course will focus on two research projects:

The first is:

Global leaders are increasingly focused on renewable energy to address our climate crisis, driving the need for extracting critical minerals and metals. Adopting theories and methods from the field of critical geography, this course will interrogate whether and/or how new forms of “sacrifice zones” are being produced in the wake of these extractive projects. In this course, students will focus on renewable energy projects in the US Southeast-a region in the United States that has largely remained out of the purview of scholarly attention in discussions about energy justice. In this course, students will have the opportunity to explore publicly available transcripts of town hall meetings, and conduct surveys depending on their self-designed research project.

The second is:

Artisanal and Small Scale Gold Mining is practiced in over 70 countries and exists in the informal sector. This project builds off of research on risk perception, gender equity, and resource governance in Kenya’s gold mining communities. This new project brings together ecotoxicology, public health, and livelihood analysis to understand how land use changes caused by ASGM may contribute to underexplored disease pathways. 

Satisfies the depth or breadth requirement in the Social Studies track of the Environmental Studies major.
Counts as an additional course in the environmental Social Sciences in the Environmental Studies interdisciplinary minor.

Prerequisites & Notes
ENV 202 and permission of the instructor