Paisajes tóxicos: una reflexión sobre las espacialidades del Antropoceno

Catalina Giraldo Villamizar; Eduardo Brito-Henriques

doi:10.5565/rev/dag.728

Toxic landscapes: a reflection on the spatialities of the Anthropocene

Authors

Catalina Giraldo Villamizar Universidade de Lisboa
Eduardo Brito-Henriques Universidade de Lisboa

PDF (ES)

Abstract

This article explores the toxic landscapes and their importance in light of the Anthropocene. It begins by proposing the concept of hybrid landscape as a substitute for the cultural landscape. Based on the relational materialism of the Actor-Network Theory and neo-vitalism, a renewed conception of landscape more attentive to the interweaving between humans and non-humans is defended. We argue that the concept of toxic landscapes – taken from the archaeology of toxicity and in line with the abovementioned ontological questions – turns out to be pertinent for the Anthropocene debates, since it places the focus on human actions without losing of sight non-human agency. We end with an illustrative case: Agbogbloshie, a metal scrapyard and urban mining site of e-waste located in Accra, Ghana.

Keywords

landscape, toxicity, relational materialism, Anthropocene, Agbogbloshie

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Author Biographies

Catalina Giraldo Villamizar, Universidade de Lisboa

Catalina Giraldo has a degree in Anthropology from the Universidad de los Andes in Bogotá and a Master's in Human Geography: Globalization, Society and Territory from the Institute of Geography and Spatial Planning (IGOT) at the University of Lisbon. She is interested in studies on waste, toxic landscapes and the Anthropocene. Her master's thesis was titled "Tourism in Toxic Landscapes: The Case of the Agbogbloshie Metals Recycling Center in Ghana." She is also interested in the history of geographic thought, gender geography, and visual culture studies.

Eduardo Brito-Henriques, Universidade de Lisboa

Eduardo Brito-Henriques is Associate Professor at the Instituto de Geografia e Ordenamento do Território, Universidade de Lisboa (IGOT-ULisboa) and Integrated Researcher at its R&D unit, the Centro de Estudos Geográficos (CEG). At the IGOT-ULisboa, Eduardo is member of the Scientific Council, coordinator of the MA in Tourism and Communication and co-coordinator of the MA in Human Geography: Globalization, Society and Territory. He also is Head of the CEG's Research Group 'Tourism, Heritage and Space' (TERRITUR).
Eduardo's research interests are clustered around tourism geographies, mobilities and global connections, heritage and the socio-techno-natural entanglements in the cultural landscapes, and the geographies of devastation (disasters, postindustrial scars and shrinking cities, ruination, wastelands).