2024-2025 Networking Groups
Innovating toward Sustainability in Science and Society: The Anthropocene and its Systems
The complex and dynamic relationship between humans and the environment has driven significant changes to the Earth's landscape. Human industrial practices in globalized society have become a potential threat to life itself. This reality itself makes the case for advancing Northwestern University's key priorities in sustainability and global and social sciences. The way humans locate themselves vis-a-vis nature has profoundly shaped technological innovation in the developed world, with its anthropocentric worldview. This perspective inherently has promoted a human-nature dualism that reinforces a categorical separation between humans and non-human elements of the ecosystem, positing advancement, development, and innovation as synonymous with heavy industrialization and mass consumption, effecting high levels of contamination of the world’s ecosystems.
In this networking group, we will bring together faculty and staff from all fields and schools at NU to collaboratively investigate alternative models for solutions to the socio-ecological and scientific challenges of our time. Building on the insights from past luncheon series such as “Brand NU SDGs” and “Design+Nature,” we will connect via interactive activities that emphasize the deep interconnections between sociological systems and sustainable technological innovation, providing participants with new tools and insight into leading their respective research activities with an eye toward collaborative transformation.
Throughout the academic year, the interdisciplinary group will explore the themes such as:
- Research Impact in the Context of Human-Environment Interaction: We will discuss approaches to contextualize key research topics (e.g., a systems approach) to develop a deeper understanding of the interconnected social, ecological, and technological challenges, and explore effective strategies for addressing them.
- Models of Human-Nature Interaction: We will examine how models of human-nature relationships are shaped by economic, geographic, and cultural systems and how they influence power dynamics, inequality, and scientific progress.
- Technological Advances and Impact on Society: We will analyze the effects of technological innovations on society, particularly how they influence human behavior (both collective and individual), and interactions with the environment.
We expect this interdisciplinary dialogue to inspire innovative approaches and collaborations at the intersection of the natural sciences, engineering, social sciences, and humanities. We will consider how NU can leverage its position to harness the complexities of human-environment interactions, advancing sustainability initiatives and contributing to global social sciences. By deepening our thinking in a socioecological mode, and identifying connections and potential therein, we aim for our participants to pave the way for sustainable and equitable solutions that truly reflect the complex realities of human-environment interactions.
The group will be co-led by Cécile Chazot, Materials Science and Engineering, and Nivedita Arora, Electrical and Computer Engineering and Computer Science, in McCormick; and Diego Arispe-Bazán, Anthropology, in Weinberg.
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