Conference Sessions

This session will bring together papers that seek to better understand links between decolonization, social justice, and the environment. Scholars such as Julian Agyeman have developed concepts such as “just sustainability” to attest to the fact that environmental quality and human equality are often closely connected, emphasizing connections between social justice and environmental stewardship. Many scholars writing on environmental justice and just-sustainability have demonstrated how racism and environmental deterioration are caused by, and mutually reinforce, the same social structures, while environmental amenities and race are also intertwined, with environmental amenities being unequally distributed to privileged (often white) groups. Agyeman and others have called on environmental organizations to critically analyze their leadership and objectives, challenging the white and privileged positionality often characterizing them. Indigenous scholars such as Eve Tuck have emphasized that decolonization is not simply reducible to social justice, as social justice and Indigenous sovereignty and rights movements often come into dialogue, including dialogues led by Black scholars such as Tiffany Lethabo King and Robyn Maynard and Indigenous scholars such as Leanne Betasamosake Simpson. The session will start from the opening premise that movements for decolonization (or Indigenous sovereignty and rights) and social justice have close links with the environment. The papers in this session will provide overviews of these connections and seek to advance the understanding of them.

This session blends sociology of culture, sociology of mental health, and environmental sociology perspectives on the topic of the environment, climate change, and environmental crises. Culture forms one central basis of how people think about and act in relation to the natural environment and environmental degradation. Environmental sociology examines how societies can produce problematic consequences for the natural environment. Climate change, ecosystem deterioration, and biodiversity loss have increasingly led to eco-anxiety, eco-grief, and other forms of distress. The session analyzes the emotional dimensions of dealing with and confronting socio-environmental issues in the face of mounting ecological crises. It addresses the motivation for political and ethical transformation (in the tradition begun by Ashlee Cunsolo and co-authors). We start by clarifying the concept of ecogrief and discussing its links to settler colonialism and neoliberal capitalism. Two case studies follow, regarding a feeling of loss of nature and place amongst baby boomers and women’s experience of flooding. We then consider escapism in the portrayal of environmental catastrophe in the multiverse. We conclude by returning to capitalism and its links to environmental problems, exploring ethical consumption as a possible but complicated solution. Mental health, culture, and environmental themes are woven throughout the presentations.

Homelessness in Canada is on the rise and its increasing visibility in communities is creating divisiveness, hate, and violence. Research suggests that people experiencing homelessness are more likely to be victims of violence than perpetrators1. These instances reveal the spectre of violence that unhoused people are faced with. Central to these challenges is the phenomenon of NIMBY-ism (“Not in my Backyard”) which describes the sentiments and actions of house residents to remove and exclude people experiencing homelessness from public spaces and the services that support them. How do we address NIMBY narratives, community tensions, and violence against unhoused peoples and move towards addressing the systemic factors that contribute to and sustain homelessness? How do we rethink these increasingly everyday encounters with homelessness as normative and not ‘out of joint’2? T

At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, countries around the world experienced a rise in food insecurity. Within so-called Canada, this rise occurred at an especially alarming rate, particularly within and around the densely populated cities of Toronto, Vancouver, and Montreal. In response, food justice activists here and abroad formed dozens of mutual aid projects in support of those experiencing food insecurity exacerbated by COVID-19. At first, the public rallied to support these initiatives. However, as the pandemic persisted, the “new normal” began to set in, and food justice groups experienced a rapid decline in public support, and food justice activists accused the wider public of coopting mutual aid. Simultaneously, global rates of food insecurity skyrocketed, with non-white, im/migrant, disabled, queer, trans, and postcolonial communities at the forefront of those impacted. As COVID-19 continues to disproportionately starve and impoverish the marginalized without much public concern or intervention, and the devastations of climate crisis not only become more salient but overlap with this uncanny new world, our panel asks: What does it mean to do food justice in times of crisis/postcrisis?

This session brings together papers which examine the limitations of social and institutional responses to gender-based violence, while also considering how women’s sexual autonomy is both constructed and contested.