"People speak about the Anthropocene. I don't quite like this term, but the idea that humans have been transforming nature and have been altering it, adulterating it, something to put into perspective regarding this nostalgia for pristine nature. And utopianism actually goes hand in hand with nostalgia. I mentioned the myth of the Golden Age. This was something that used to exist, the Golden Age or paradise, an idea of pure nature in harmony with human beings. These nostalgic imaginaries that feed into and can reactivate utopian thinking in our day. We should by no means let go of an idea of pristine nature. And I also don't think, just to return to this idea of species extinction. I don't think that the de-extinction efforts are particularly utopian, even though they may seem this way. How do we compensate for the material loss of biodiversity? I think no amount of technological ingenuity will actually fulfill this desire for a return to the pristine nature that we have lost.”

S. D. Chrostowska is professor of humanities at York University, Canada. She is the author of several books, among them Permission, The Eyelid, A Cage for Every Child, and, most recently, Utopia in the Age of Survival: Between Myth and Politics. Her essays have appeared in such venues as Public Culture, Telos, Boundary 2, and The Hedgehog Review. She also coedits the French surrealist review Alcheringa and is curator of the 19th International Exhibition of Surrealism, Marvellous Utopia, which runs from July to September 2024 in Saint-Cirq-Lapopie, France.

https://profiles.laps.yorku.ca/profiles/sylwiac/

www.sup.org/books/title/?id=33445
https://chbooks.com/Books/T/The-Eyelid
https://ciscm.fr/en/merveilleuse-utopie

www.creativeprocess.info
www.oneplanetpodcast.org
IG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast

As Surrealism turns 100, what can it teach us about the importance of dreaming and creating a better society? Will we wake up from the consumerist dream sold to us by capitalism and how would that change our ideas of utopia?

S. D. Chrostowska is professor of humanities at York University, Canada. She is the author of several books, among them Permission, The Eyelid, A Cage for Every Child, and, most recently, Utopia in the Age of Survival: Between Myth and Politics. Her essays have appeared in such venues as Public Culture, Telos, Boundary 2, and The Hedgehog Review. She also coedits the French surrealist review Alcheringa and is curator of the 19th International Exhibition of Surrealism, Marvellous Utopia, which runs from July to September 2024 in Saint-Cirq-Lapopie, France.

"People speak about the Anthropocene. I don't quite like this term, but the idea that humans have been transforming nature and have been altering it, adulterating it, something to put into perspective regarding this nostalgia for pristine nature. And utopianism actually goes hand in hand with nostalgia. I mentioned the myth of the Golden Age. This was something that used to exist, the Golden Age or paradise, an idea of pure nature in harmony with human beings. These nostalgic imaginaries that feed into and can reactivate utopian thinking in our day. We should by no means let go of an idea of pristine nature. And I also don't think, just to return to this idea of species extinction. I don't think that the de-extinction efforts are particularly utopian, even though they may seem this way. How do we compensate for the material loss of biodiversity? I think no amount of technological ingenuity will actually fulfill this desire for a return to the pristine nature that we have lost.”

https://profiles.laps.yorku.ca/profiles/sylwiac/
www.sup.org/books/title/?id=33445
https://chbooks.com/Books/T/The-Eyelid
https://ciscm.fr/en/merveilleuse-utopie

www.creativeprocess.info
www.oneplanetpodcast.org
IG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast

“There's that old saying, ‘blessed are the cracked for they shall let in the light.’ For a lot of people like myself, I think it's true that losing your mind can be a proportionate response to the climate crisis. Those of us with mental health issues are often branded as being in our own world. But paradoxically, being in our own world can actually be a result of being more connected to the outside world rather than less. And in the context of climate change, it may be fairer to describe people who fail to develop psychological symptoms as being in their own separate anthropocentric world, inattentive to the experiences of the billions of other human and nonhuman beings on the planet, unaffected by looming existential catastrophe. There are layers and layers of insulation made up of civilizational narratives that dislocate many people from climate chaos and those whose psyches buckle upon contact with this reality are the ones deemed mad. But this pathologizing is a defense mechanism employed by the civilized or by the dominant culture, which ends up subjugating those of us whose minds stray from accepted norms. There are lots of studies that show that certain forms of psychosis are actually a form of meaning-making for communities that feel like they have no sense of purpose. We've had generations and generations of trauma visited upon the human species by picking apart communities and our intimate relationships with nature. Especially since the 80s, picking apart our inability to even consider ourselves as part of society in a meaningful sense. That kind of pulling apart means that we're locked in quite individual and atomized spaces, where when something as massive as climate change starts to happen, people feel both responsible for it, and completely unable to do anything about it. That's not me saying that being depressed is the only objective kind of indicator for reality, but it's quite easy for the human species to underestimate or discount quite how significantly dangerous our situation is and people with depression are more able to see that with eyes unclouded by biases.”

Charlie Hertzog Young is a researcher, writer and award-winning activist. He identifies as a “proudly mad bipolar double amputee” and has worked for the New Economics Foundation, the Royal Society of Arts, the Good Law Project, the Four Day Week Campaign and the Centre for Progressive Change, as well as the UK Labour Party under three consecutive leaders. Charlie has spoken at the LSE, the UN and the World Economic Forum. He studied at Harvard, SOAS and Schumacher College and has written for The Ecologist, The Independent, Novara Media, Open Democracy and The Guardian. He is the author of Spinning Out: Climate Change, Mental Health and Fighting for a Better Future.

https://charliehertzogyoung.me
https://footnotepress.com/books/spinning-out/

www.creativeprocess.info
www.oneplanetpodcast.org
IG www.instagram.com/creativeprocesspodcast