Joshua Schuster and Derek Woods, Calamity theory: Three critiques of existential risk

Bould, Mark

Abstract

We live in perilous times. Atmospheric CO2 levels continue to rise, and with them global temperatures. Business-as-usual immiserates and impoverishes us all, depleting soil and water, melting glaciers and ice caps, acidifying oceans, deforesting, desertifying, imposing monocultures, destroying biodiversity, and creating the environmental pressure cookers that brew novel viruses. Expenditure on borders and the military massively outstrips funding for ameliorating or averting climate change and its consequences, much of it directly contributing to climate change and its consequences: burning fossil fuels, maintaining and extending fossil capitalism. The sixth extinction continues apace.

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Jun 30, 2022
• Online Publication Date: May 11, 2023
• Publication Date: May 11, 2023
• Deposit Date: Jun 5, 2023
• Publicly Available Date: May 12, 2025
• Journal: American Literary History
• Print ISSN: 0896-7148
• Electronic ISSN: 1468-4365
• Publisher: Oxford University Press (OUP)
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 35
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 1107-1110
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/alh/ajad069
• Keywords: Literature and Literary Theory, History, Cultural Studies, Joshua Schuster, Derek Woods, Calamity theory
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/10823737
• Publisher URL: https://academic.oup.com/alh/article/35/2/1107/7159610?login=true