New 3S project to ‘activate the archives’ of volcanic geoheritage

3S researcher Martin Mahony has received funding from the Arts & Humanities Research Council to work with colleagues in the UK and the Caribbean to shed new light on the volcanic geoheritage of the Caribbean island of Montserrat. The project, titled ‘Archives Assemble! Activating the Archives to Collaboratively Reimagine Volcanic Geoheritage’, brings together researchers from three UK…

3S Seminar: Critical Circularity – (Re)configuring repair and reuse

Professor Matthew Kearnes (University of New South Wales (UNSW), Sydney) will be giving our next 3S Seminar, Wednesday 18th December 2024, 13:00-14:00pm, SCI 01.38 (UEA). During the seminar, Professor Kearnes will introduce the concept of ‘critical circularity‘ of the circular economy, with reference to two overlapping studies focused on the configuration of projects of repair and…

Public Engagement Laboratory for Nature and Society

The Public Engagement Laboratory for Nature and Society experiments with new ways of mapping, practicing, learning about, and responding to diverse public engagements with nature and biodiversity, within Natural England and its networks in the UK and internationally.  Public Engagement Laboratory is a partnership between researchers in the 3S Research Group and Natural England – the…

3S researcher to give Geneva Environmental Lecture

3S researcher Martin Mahony is due to speak on 26th November 2024 at the Biannual Geneva Environmental Lectures series which brings together leading scholars from across the social sciences and humanities explore the interplay of knowledge, nature, and governance. Through his talk entitled “Science in a crisis: Networks, hierarchies and colonial continuities in responses to volcanic crises”, Martin…

Funded PhD opportunity – Mapping public engagement with energy and climate change

Addressing climate change and realising net zero demands long-term systemic changes and the meaningful engagement of society. However, most existing approaches to public engagement focus on communicating to the public or inviting publics to engage in discrete one-off processes – such as behaviour change initiatives, attitude surveys, and deliberative processes – in specific parts of…

smart home devices smartphone screen mockup

Intersectionality & the Net Zero Transition: 3S Doctoral Researcher collaborates with UK Power Networks

Nickhil Sharma, a 3S PhD Student, has recently completed some pioneering work with UK Power Networks (UKPN) where he introduced intersectionality as both a critical theory for reflection and a methodological tool. UKPN, who are responsible for elecricity networks across London, the South East, and East Anglia were encouraged to adopt the lens of intersectionality…

3S contributes to Encyclopedia of Science and Technology Studies

3S members have contributed to the recently-released Elgar Encyclopedia of Science and Technology Studies. Edited by Ulrike Felt and Alan Irwin, the volume offers a comprehensive overview of the field of STS through short, accessible chapters on the field’s key frameworks, themes, and topics. It is intended to act as a guide to STS for newcomers and students, as well as to help more senior researchers keep apace with this rapidly expanding and impactful field of research.

‘Remaking and Doing’ Participation at the EASST-4S Conference

Moving beyond mainstream ‘residual realist’ perspectives of participation as discrete, specific and pre-given, constructivist STS scholarship sees participation, publics and public issues as co-produced through the performance of collective practices that interrelate in wider systems. Work on remaking participation in STS, and specifically within UKERC’s Public Engagement Observatory, has developed the theoretical basis for an…

UEA People’s Assembly

Universities are increasingly being challenged to show leadership in responding to and addressing climate change. Staff, students and the wider UEA community are already attempting to address some of these challenges on their own terms. However, universities have wider untapped potential to move beyond a siloed approach to decision-making and address the many social and…

Shaping Just Housing Futures in Norwich Symposium

We invite you to join us for this symposium co-organised by 3S member Casper Laing Ebbensgaard as part of the Housing Future research project to share your experiences of housing and discuss the future of housing in Norwich on Thursday 14th March 2024, 12-5 pm, at Anteros Gallery (11-15 Fye Bridge Street, Norwich, NR3 1LJ)!…

Mapping participation – call for papers

We are delighted to invite contributions to a panel on ‘mapping participation’ at the RGS-IBG Annual International Conference 2024 in London on 27th-30th August 2024. The panel is organised by 3S members Jason Chilvers, Helen Pallett, Phedeas Stephanides and Elliot Honeybun-Arnolda. This session brings together work on mapping public participation and engagement that is emerging in geography,…

Kate Dewally

I am an ARIES-associated PhD researcher, funded by the Science Faculty at the University of East Anglia. My PhD research is looking at new nature markets within a UK agricultural context. In this work, I hope to use a mixture of qualitative interviews, and GIS techniques to explore possible environmental, social and economic aspects of…

Marina Nicolaidou

I am a SeNSS ESRC funded Postgraduate Researcher and Associate Tutor at the University of East Anglia. I am also a member of the Science Society and Sustainability (3S) Research Group, and associated with the UKERC Public Engagement Observatory. My research is looking into the interconnected nature of technological future-making and appraisal, science fiction, and…

Visiting researcher at 3S

Teresa Guadalupe De Leon Escobedo is a PhD researcher in Human Geography at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM). She is doing a short-term research visit with 3S member Martin Mahony. Her research focuses on the production of Regional Climate Scenarios for Mexico and the construction of anticipatory adaptation policies. Through interviews with climate scientists in…

Webinar: Mapping Participation for Democratic Innovations

Through a series of collaborative experiments with partners, the UK Energy Research Centre’s (UKERC) Public Engagement Observatory, based in the 3S Research Group, is actively exploring how new approaches to mapping diverse forms of public engagement across systems can make a difference in practice to energy and climate-related decisions, innovations and new forms of participation.…

New briefing mapping public engagement with energy, climate change and net zero

3S researchers Jason Chilvers, Phedeas Stephanides, Helen Pallett, and Tom Hargreaves have just published a new UKERC Public Engagement Observatory briefing note presenting the findings of a major new analysis of public engagement with energy, climate change, and net zero occurring in the UK between 2015-2022. The study used the comparative case analysis method developed by the…

Sensing Volcanoes: 3S research contributes to exhibition at Royal Society Summer Exhibition

3S member Martin Mahony has contributed to an exhibition called ‘Sensing Volcanoes’ which will feature at this year’s Royal Society Summer Science Festival. The interactive exhibition brings together findings from the Curating Crises project with cutting-edge scientific research on recent volcanic eruptions to tell the story of how techniques of sensing and detecting volcanic processes…

Adopting an intersectional approach to smart urban technologies

3S researchers Nickhil Sharma, Tom Hargreaves and Helen Pallett have a new Open Access article published in the journal Buildings and Cities on ‘Social justice implications of smart urban technologies: an intersectional approach’. The article demonstrates how, despite claims that ‘smart urban technologies’ will solve multiple urban crises, narratives around ‘smart urbanism’ (SU) often end up reinforcing and deepening existing inequalities by prioritizing market interests and data monetization over the rights and interests of marginalised groups. The article calls for a comprehensive analysis of social justice concerns in SU and develops a novel intersectional approach for doing so. It uses this approach to map and analyse 70 cases of opposition, alternatives, and glitches with smart urban technologies from around the world.

Clara Kubler

I am a CDCC programme PhD student at the School of Environmental Sciences, funded by the Leverhulme Trust. I am part of the Science, Society, and Sustainability (3S) Research Group and the Tyndall Centre. My research explores how politicians and the public shape each other’s climate change attitudes and behaviours, what role the media plays…

New PhD on the establishment of Environmental Science at the University of East Anglia   

Elliot Honeybun-Arnolda has successfully defended his PhD entitled “Scientising the ‘environment’: The School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, 1967-1990”. His research looks at the history of the School of Environmental Sciences (ENV) at UEA to explore how the ‘environment’ became an object of knowledge to be made known through scientific interdisciplinarity. Through four…

Enabling Water Smart Communities Project 

Dr Tom Hargreaves is involved in an exciting new research project funded by the Ofwat Innovation Fund. Led by Anglian Water, the Enabling Water Smart Communities Project is a 4-year, £5.5m project that will involve novel collaborations between water companies, housing developers, local authorities, universities and more. The aim of the project is to develop…

Planetary Portals: Diamond Power

3S member Casper Laing Ebbensgaard joins Kathryn Yusoff, Kerry Holden, and Michael Salu on a lecture-performance moderated by Helen Pritchard on Thursday 2nd February, 5pm GMT. The lecture-performance explores how ‘diabolical architectures’ of colonial materialism hold open Africa as a continent for extraction. Based on research in the Rhodes archives, this collaborative work responds to…

The Museum of the Anthropocene moves online

The Museum of the Anthropocene is an annual pop-up exhibition created by students on Dr Martin Mahony’s 3rd year module ‘Human Geography in the Anthropocene’. Students chose a range of objects whose stories can help us make sense of the historical, political and cultural forces that have led us into the proposed new ‘age of humans’: from beef to Barbie, plastic bags to punk rock, cricket…

An observatory for public engagement with energy and climate change

3S researchers have published a briefing note introducing the Public Engagement Observatory which is housed in 3S as part of the UK Energy Research Centre. It accompanied the launch of the Observatory’s new dedicated website and open access database.  The Public Engagement Observatory The UKERC Public Engagement Observatory maps the many different ways that people are engaging with…

Olivia Thompson

I am an ARIES-associated PhD researcher in the Science, Society, and Sustainability (3S) Research Group, funded by the Science Faculty at the University of East Anglia. My current research as part of the UK Energy Research Centre’s Public Engagement Observatory expands upon techniques for mapping participation through digital methods in energy, climate change and net…

A PhD student’s reflections on making the most a policy secondment

Harriet Dudley, a third year PhD researcher at the University of East Anglia reflects on her recent secondment with the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology: “I study the conditions under which policymakers will (not) use expert climate policy advice to shape policy. I recently returned from a Research Fellowship at the Parliamentary Office of…

Sean Irving

I am a SeNSS DTP programme PhD researcher in Norwich Business School and the Science, Society & Sustainability (3S) Research Group. My research explores the role of alternative and diverse economies in transitions to low-consumption social systems, using the Norwich Sharing City project as a case study. I am particularly interested in the more radical…

Chiara Ruggieri-Mitchell

I am an ARIES-associated PhD student in the Science, Society, and Sustainability (3S) Research Group. My current research interests lie in understanding how colonial rule has shaped environmental science practices and how these might be addressed through a decolonial lens to ensure the safeguarding of the environment, whilst also dismantling the social inequalities, often steeped…

Has climate change escaped colonialism? A panel discussion with V. Damodaran, M. Mahony, and S. Schaffer

3S member Martin Mahony joins Professor Vinita Damodaran (University of Sussex) and Professor Simon Schaffer (University of Cambridge) on a special panel discussion on climate change and colonialism. The panel discussion is organised by the Cambridge HPS Anthropocene (Climate Histories) reading/seminar group and will take place on Thursday 26th May at 2pm BST. The hybrid…