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Folklore, Geography and Environment: Ways of Knowing Water, Landscape and Climate in the Anthropocene

  • 14 to 16/07/2023
  • The Wilberforce Institute, University of Hull, 27 High St, Hull, HU1 1NE, and online

Kate Smith

‘Folklore, Geography and Environment: Ways of Knowing Water, Landscape and Climate in the Anthropocene’

A Folklore Society Conference

Friday 14 to Sunday 16 July 2023

at The Wilberforce Institute, University of Hull, 27 High St, Hull, HU1 1NE, and online

Scientific knowledge tells us that the Anthropocene’s climate crisis will bring huge changes to the way that water flows in, around and alongside landscape. Sea levels may rise up to 1.1m by 2100, with substantially higher rises likely if Antarctic ice-melt increases (IPCC, 2019). Taken together with increasing severity and frequency of extreme coastal flooding and weather events, it is clear that our relationships with water in the landscape—both in excess and scarcity—face an unprecedented challenge.

This hybrid conference responds to that challenge in two ways.

Firstly, it asks what other kinds of knowledge might inform our responses to the challenge of increasingly volatile relationships with water: what can anthropologists, folklorists and human geographers tell flood and climate science about human/water/landscape relationships?

Secondly, it asks how we can make that other knowledge intelligible to mainstream climate and flood science: how is knowledge about the human/water/landscape relationship co-produced and reproduced? What distinctive perspectives can scholarship from outside the physical geo-sciences bring to the urgent need to develop realistic, Anthropocene-ready resilience strategies?

Topics covered include:
  • Cryptozoology, belief, custom and tradition
  • Toponymics/hydronymics and historical geographies
  • Water activism and guardianship
  • Water cultures
  • Cultural/historical geography
  • Community co-production models
  • Place-legends and place-making
  • Anthropology of water and flooding
  • Risk and resilience
  • Culture and Climate Migration
  • Climate Impacts on Social (In)Justice
  • Environmental memory
  • Maritime traditions and coastal culture
  • Expressive culture—songs and stories of water
  • Folk belief and the environment
  • Vernacular architecture and rising tides
  • Flood stories
  • Traditions under threat from climate change

Venue: This will be a hybrid conference, taking place at The Wilberforce Institute, University of Hull, 27 High Street, Hull, HU1 1NE, and online.

Conference Fees: All participants apart from student speakers are expected to pay the conference fees:

Online participants
Standard Rate: Full conference: £90.00, book via Eventbrite: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/folklore-geography-and-environment-tickets-648282679947

or Day Rates: Friday £35 / Saturday £60 / Sunday £35: to book, please contact us

Concessionary Rate (Speakers, Folklore Society Members, Students, Seniors):
Full conference £70.00, book via Eventbrite: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/folklore-geography-and-environment-tickets-648282679947

or Day Rates: Friday £25 / Saturday £40 / Sunday £25: to book, please contact us

In Person participants: to book, please contact us

Standard Rate: Full conference £140.00, or Day Rates: Friday £45 / Saturday £90 / Sunday £45

Concessionary Rate (Speakers, Folklore Society Members, Students, Seniors):
Full conference: £90.00, or Day Rates: Friday £35 / Saturday £50 / Sunday £35

Catering: The in-person conference fee includes teas/coffees between sessions. Other meals are not provided.

Accommodation is not provided but here is a list of hotels in and near to Hull city centre.