Allison Carruth, professor of American studies and the High Meadows Environmental Institute, will present “‘The Science Is Clear’ — Why the Climate Crisis Needs New Narratives” for the third talk in HMEI's spring 2022 HMEI Faculty Seminar Series.

Carruth will discuss why data-driven doomsday stories of extreme weather and sea-level rise have proven inadequate in countering disinformation about climate change. While “the science is clear” has become a rhetorical appeal to accept the expert consensus on climate change, who holds this view is still defined by political affiliations and online networks. Carruth will highlight artists and journalists whose work captures the diverse reality of climate change through everyday stories of global warming upending local communities, satires of climate denialism that lampoon oil and gas corporations and their political allies, and narratives of more livable futures in which worst-case scenarios have been averted.

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