In this course, students will be introduced not only to the politics of place but also to an ethics of place explored through the lenses of culture, ecology, and fossil fuel development. Students will explore and interrogate what communities in the arid Southwest look like in this era of climate change. The semester will consider the work of artists and writers engaged in witnessing and documenting environmental change and will involve research for a final project. There will be a seven-day field trip immersion in the complexities surrounding Bears Ears National Monument in southeastern Utah during spring break.
