I had a really good experience at #Petrocultures overall, despite heaviness of context (USC). I'm really excited that I met a tradeswoman elder/labor studies scholar & filmmaker who has been doing a ton of stuff on climate justice in the building trades. Also a bunch of other cool people + new ideas to think through. Shout-out to @inquiline for all her work co-organizing the conference with so much care and attention to accessibility & political circumstances. (My first fedi in-person meetup!)
(in plenary talk literally today, a discussion of pumpjacks as artistic springboard for queer sexuality in dialogue w ecocide, Heather Davis' talk, I can't remember the artist's name tho)
Thoughts on a #TV show and some real science notes.
I watched the #BBC miniseries Last Light -- a look at what would happen to the world if all #oil production were stopped overnight. In this fictional scenario, eco-folks introduced oil-eating bacteria into oil sources.
A mediocre script, nothing special about the cinematography, and a too straightforward approach to the storytelling. But, a lot about it feels real and it maybe a reasonable guess was to what would happen. Societal collapse, mass deaths, panic, lack of transport, chaos and all the rest. It focused on the human experience, not nature's response.
REAL SCIENCE. An interesting tidbit is there really is such as thing as oil-eating bacteria and archaea. Extremophiles. Several varieties, in fact. I once wrote an article about one type. The oil industry has a problem with a type of archaea (primitive bacteria) that sticks to the inside surfaces of pipelines. Colonies of the archaea build up thick layers of slime as they grow there and block the flow of oil. They are anaerobic (don't need oxygen), hang off the pipeline walls with tendrils that hang down and catch sulfur, which they eat.
Some of these oil-eating organisms are being use to help clean up oil spills.
@AskPippa Sounds terrible TBH, so thanks for enduring it and reporting back! A similar premise as #Occupied but global. Interesting for #petrocultures researchers! :blobcatthumbsup:
#introduction: taking this opportunity (meltdown at .lol) to open a professional account here and a separate personal one (still looking), all a bit chaotic so apologies if you see me following you from a million accounts today!
Prof of Film Studies at NTNU Trondheim (links in profile)
Working across environmental humanities, film / TV studies, intersectional feminist cultural studies on topics like: