Hazardous Hope

Abstract

This special section seeks to reconsider our troubled times and their histories of irreversible toxic pollution through the lens of hopeful yet critical ways of engaging with this unprecedented condition of life. Thinking with “hazardous hope” as a tool of analysis, the five contributions—combining perspectives from ecocriticism, environmental philosophy, film studies, visual arts, and history—showcase alternative presents and futures of living responsibly with a permanently polluted planet. Writing from the perspective of hazardous hope, the section’s editors argue, includes a plethora of conceptual and methodological repositionings to embrace the ambiguity that comes with living responsibly on a permanently polluted planet. Among them is a shift in focus on the acts and modes of hazardous hope as a relational practice that is focused on reorganizing established processes in radically different ways rather than wishing to achieve a predefined outcome, while at the same time remaining mindful of the polluted status quo. Contributions in this special section are situated across the entire troubled planet, from Chernobyl’s exclusion zone to Brazilian oil fields and from Canada’s tar sands to British asbestos-loaded homes.