Mapping fossil colonialism
Start: September 2024. Department of History, University of Warwick.
Supervisors: Dr Thomas Simpson (Warwick), Dr Sarah Evans (RGS-IBG), Dr James Poskett (Warwick), and Dr Catherine Souch (RGS-IBG).
Overview
This project develops the innovative hypothesis that ‘fossil colonialism’ in Asia was inspired by, but also crucially departed from, ‘fossil capitalism’ in the Euro-Western world. A major focus here will be the influence of Asian knowledges and practices on colonial representations and assessments of fossil fuels.
Using visual sources from the Society's archive along with a range of other British archives and collections in India and Southeast, Central, or East Asia, the project will bring largely overlooked source material to bear on a set of pressing historiographical and environmental questions. These concern how images of fossil fuels drew on the expertise of multiple agents, playing crucial roles in making subterranean resource appear exploitable and useful; and how the colonial extraction and deployment of fossil fuels should inform public and policy understandings of environmental and climate crises today.
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