A symposium devoted to the (shared) coastlines of the Atlantic will be hosted at the School of Arts and Humanities of the University of Lisbon.
Centered on coastal areas and intertidal zones, and on how they might be addressed through more hydro- and eco-centered perspectives on languages, arts, and literatures, we aim to discuss some of the pressures and challenges to natural habitats and residential/working areas that result from climate change and anthropogenic activity. We likewise want to look at how these coasts have been shaped culturally and historically, particularly in what concerns Portuguese and North-American exchanges.
Bringing together scholars from literature and history, natural and environmental history, marine biology, science, philosophy, anthropology and geography, as well as policy-makers and activists working within affected coastal areas, we are mainly concerned with how we can combine knowledges and affections between the disciplines (ties) to imaginatively and more effectively bridge the temporal depth and urgency (times) of human environmental impact, and thus follow the traces and hopefully better track or change the tides of Portuguese and US coastlines and their insular clusters in the Atlantic (tides). Academically, we are structuring our event around three lines of inquiry, which can be branched out or streamlined according to the submissions for presentations that we receive:
- “Memories of distant quays” within the triangular Atlantic – History of relations between US and Portuguese-speaking countries across the oceans / comparative coastal (and insular/archipelagic) developments in the Atlantic: ex. East Coast and Azores/Portugal, Caribbean Islands to US and Cape Verde to Portugal, Portuguese-speaking countries – Brazil-US;
- “The currents outbound” – diasporic transits with emphasis on luso-American experiences, storytelling and (eco)poetry of opposite and parallel shores; intersections with border studies and environmental justice; hybrid genres and (id)entity crossings;
- “More-than-human shores” – coastal studies and the Humanities… or, more humbly, the “humusities” (Haraway 2015): challenge to the concept (and existence) of humanity/ies as seen from the shores and/or the edge of no return; the rising sea; nostalgia and anxiety of saltwater; environmental history and stories of the shorelines, traces, inscriptions and entanglements of humans and other-than-humans; exposition, toxicity and occupation threats to traditional work / community cultures, and biodiversity; ports, docks, bays, dunes, isles, marshlands and global warming.
It is hoped this event will help participants breathe in together and navigate with a better sense of intra-action towards facing the climate crisis.
Our program is part of a collaboration between ULICES’s project “American Studies Over_Seas: (Re)imagining Shared Pasts, Bridging Ecological Temporalities” and the American Studies Program at Georgetown University. Sponsored by American Corners @ULisboa, “Over_Seas: Active Ties, Tides, and Times” partners also with the following national institutions: Centre for History of the University of Lisbon, Centre for Humanities of NOVA Lisboa, IDL/School of Sciences, ULisboa, FCT of NOVA Lisboa.
