Assistant Professor Julie Klinger

Assistant Professor Julie Klinger
University of Delaware

Big holes, shiny satellites, solar shields, and people on the move: Rethinking the extractive imperative of the present

Human activity – its ambitions, problems, and solutions – exceeds the planetary but is also inescapably grounded in specific places and times. Whether we are discussing space exploration, the energy transition, warfare, or development and disaster recovery, these activities rely on hardware, and hardware is comprised of minerals, metals, and materials wrested from the Earth by human labor and their automated proxies. Drawing on several examples from around the world, this talk rethinks the immensities of present challenges and ambitions through the labor and land use practices of extractive supply chains that link Earthly and extraplanetary geographies.