RE-ENVISIONING THE EPISTEMIC GROUNDS OF THE ANTHROPOCENE: TOWARD A GEO-PLANETARY APPROACH
RE-ENVISIONING THE EPISTEMIC GROUNDS OF THE ANTHROPOCENE: TOWARD A GEO-PLANETARY APPROACH

Summary/Abstract: The concept of the Anthropocene has inarguably catalysed the formulation of new understandings regarding planetary change by placing humanity at the very core of geophysical transformations of the planet that have contributed to the current climate crisis. However, such theoretical framing tends to overlook the racialised aspects of human activity, which are inseparable from the project of modernity. By placing Kathryn Yusoff ’s decolonial critique of the biocentric subject alongside Dipesh Chakrabarty’s planetary critique of the global, this paper calls for a geo-planetary approach as an alternative that would integrate the materiality of Earth’s geophysical processes, criticise the racial nature of socio-political structures, and incorporate the multitude of human and non-human timescales, thereby repositioning the concept of Anthropocene as a critical junction between geological, historical, and (bio)political dimensions.

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