interest areas
a starting list of things we could talk about for hours - and then, ideally, turn all that talk into real-world application.
Systems & Structures - A true sociologist at heart, committed to real-world application. Systems thinking, intersectional and intersectoral* approaches to both issues and solutions, the whole (macro) represented in the small (micro/local/immediate), the small as a site of model-making for the whole, and so on.
*I separate these as two important and distinct concepts which I frequently notice become conflated.
Intersectionality is an approach which understands that “scale up” solutions are more effective than trickle down, or incrementalism. This means that the most dramatically impacted area, people, or issue will render the most effective, inclusive, and comprehensive resolutions to best benefit the whole.
Intersector (or interdisciplinary) is a structured approach to working between historically distinct sectors, industries, or disciplines, such as supply chain/manufacturing and public health working intersectorally.
Socioecology - An embedded framework which looks at trends in human culture, societies, and practices, in the context of the non-human world: atmosphere, flora, fauna, landscapes, species interaction, and so on.
Ecofeminism and Queer Ecology - Related to socioecology, ecofeminism and queer ecology both filter environmental movements through a lens of often dismissed perspectives. As a femme and queer person, these frameworks are interconnected with my reading on socioenvironmental phenomena. As a femme/inist, I am interested in reading environmental issues as collective and collaborative, while also focusing the impacts and solutions uniquely created from gender minority communities. As a queer ecologist, I connect with the fluid, interpermeable, non-linear and non-binary characteristics of our natural ecosystems, as well as the relationships between the human and non-human.
Sustainability modelling - When working towards systems change, specifically in industry, my framework is informed by the research of Mike Valenti. This framework lays out both the causes of environmental crisis (supply chain, labor, economics, resource use and management) and provides an analytical tool for assessing structural changes towards more sustainable and viable models.
Performance - For a long time I straddled my interest in art and sociology/social work as aligned-but-ultimately-separate lineages, until discovering “performance studies” - an interdisciplinary framework which recognizes performance as an inherent and multi-cultural practice of meaning-making, study, politicking, and real-world practice. Both my artistic and societal practices now filter through the lense of performance studies, as a philosophical foundation and methodology.
Speculative Fiction/Futurism/Reflectionism - With such a vibrant cacophony of identities, experiences, and visions for a more just, liberated, and healthy world, I find speculating through various media (writing, video, renderings/artworks/printmaking, performance, subcultures, etc) to be an important way to organize all this theoretical foundation into real-world practice, roadmaps, and clarity for what we are, ultimately, moving together towards.