Embattled Earth: Commodities, Conflict, and Climate Change in the Indian Ocean

475-min
11 Oct 2018 11.30 AM - 01.00 PM Alumni, Current Students, Industry/Academic Partners, Prospective Students, Public
Organised by:
Shirley Chew

Since the time of Vasco da Gama’s voyage, the Indian Ocean has been the theatre of intense imperial rivalries over commodities and resources. For centuries the main players in these conflicts were Western colonial powers, but over the last few decades the countries of the Indian Ocean rim have themselves become major consumers of commodities and resources. As such they are now among the principal drivers of anthropogenic climate change, an ongoing process that

will have catastrophic consequences for the billions of people who live around the Indian Ocean.

This presentation explores the continuities between the resource conflicts of the past and the future by focusing on two transformative imperial wars: the Anglo-Dutch spice wars of the 17th century and the First Opium War of 1840-42. It also poses some related questions: are the imperatives of empire and military supremacy among the major drivers of climate change? If so, why are these issues generally elided? Does the fact that the discourse on climate change is largely produced within university-based contexts have anything to do with this elision?

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Amitav Ghosh was born in Calcutta, grew up in India, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka. Educated in Delhi, Oxford, Alexandria, he is the prizewinning author of a highly distinguished oeuvre – an extensive range of fiction which includes The Circle of Reason, The Shadow Lines, The Calcutta Chromosome, The Glass Palace, The Hungry Tide, the Ibis Trilogy -- Sea of Poppies, River of Smoke, Flood of Fire; and non-fiction works such as the brilliant cross-generic In An Antique Land, and, more recently, The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable, described as ‘a book one travels on precariously and obsessively – thinking, trusting and terrified’.

The Glass Palace won the International e-Book Award at the Frankfurt book fair in 2001. In January 2005 The Hungry Tide obtained the Crossword Book Prize, a major Indian award. Sea of Poppies was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, 2008, and received the Crossword Book Prize and the India Plaza Golden Quill Award.

Amitav Ghosh’s work has been translated into more than thirty languages. His essays have been published in The New Yorker, The New Republic and The New York Times. He has taught in many universities in India and the USA, including Delhi University, Columbia, Queens College and Harvard. In January 2007, Amitav Ghosh was awarded the Padma Shri, one of India’s highest honours. In 2010, he was the recipient of honorary doctorates from Queens College, New York, and the Sorbonne, Paris. With Margaret Atwood, he was a joint winner of the Dan David Award for 2010. In 2011 he was awarded the International Grand Prix of the Blue Metropolis Festival in Montreal.

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