Meera Subramanian
  • Home
  • Books
  • Writing
  • Bio
  • Blog
  • Photos
  • Events
  • Speaking
  • Contact

Climate Change as Threat (& Opportunity) Multiplier

May 26, 2020 By meerasub Leave a Comment

My year at Princeton University is coming to a close, although the second half of the spring semester was disrupted, as everything has been, by the COVID-19 pandemic. But I still wanted to share the syllabus for the class, which includes the adaptations I made given the shifting situation. After spring break in March, we all transitioned to Zoom, and our planned trip to a local farm to learn about carbon farming had to be cancelled, but the class remained a great series of discussions, inquiries, tough questions, thoughtful answers, exciting possible solutions, and more.

Here’s the description for ENV 381, which was cross-listed in journalism and urban studies:

The US Department of Defense has called climate change a “threat multiplier,” referencing military bases inundated by sea level rise and increased global political instability from extreme weather events, especially in vulnerable countries already struggling with poor governance and impoverished populations. Likewise, among conservation biologists and urban designers, farmers and social justice activists, there is acknowledgement that perennial challenges are all exacerbated because of a rapidly warming planet for these same reasons. Every aspect of life on earth, for humans and other living creatures, is changing. This class will explore everything from the state of songbirds to the national security concerns of war hawks to agriculture to urban design to storytelling to social justice. The aim is to understand how, while climate change aggravates existing struggles, innovative climate action solutions might also help ease them.

As always, feel free to reach out to me with your suggestions or to let me know if you’ve adapted it for your own class. Here’s the full syllabus:

ENV381_SYLLABUS_ClimateChangeAsThreatMultiplier

Filed Under: climate change, journalism, teaching Tagged With: A River Runs Again, biodiversity, climate change, COVID-19, girl power, human migration, military security, organic farming, pandemic pedagogy, pollution environment, Princeton University, syllabus, teaching, water

upcoming talks: MIT, BU & Harvard

February 2, 2017 By meerasub Leave a Comment

             

Eco Swaraj: Can India’s Model of the Micro Transform Development for the 21st Century?

It’s been a year and half since A River Runs Again was published and my answer to the above question continues to morph. If you’re in the Cambridge, Massachusetts area in the next couple of months, you’ll have a chance to join me as I think out loud about what I found while researching the book over three years and what recent world events make me think now. (You can read a little more on that at the KSJ blog post, here.)

e4Dev student group of the MIT Energy Initiative (MITei)
Tuesday, February 7, 2017
5:30 pm – 6:30 pm
MIT, Building E18, Room 304
50 Ames Street, Cambridge MA
You can find more information and RSVP here. 

Harvard STS Circle
Monday, March 27, 2017
12:15 pm – 2:00 pm
Harvard University, K262, Bowie-Vernon Room, CGIS
1737 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA
You can find more info and RSVP here. 
(To get a free sandwich, be sure to RSVP by Wednesday at 5:00 pm the week before!)

I’ll be showing lots of photographs and here’s a description of the talk:

In this exploration of life, loss and survival in modern-day India, Subramanian shares findings and photographs from her book, A River Runs Again: India’s Natural World in Crisis from the Barren Cliffs of Rajasthan to the Farmlands of Karnataka. Using the five elements (earth, water, fire, air, and ether) as a framework, she traveled across India to seek out the ordinary people and micro-enterprises determined to guide India into a more sustainable future. Could India be the perfect place to shift from an outdated model of the macro — big dams, industrial agriculture, nuclear power, all developed in the West — to a new model of the micro? Should it choose this path, India could create a sustainable model of development that could be implemented elsewhere, from industrializing China to electrifying sub-Saharan Africa, to drought-stricken America, with its crumbling infrastructure.

Spread the word!

AND….

…I’ll also be joining a great panel hosted by Boston University Institute for Sustainable Energy & Union of Concerned Scientists:

Science & Environment: A Journalist’s Perspective
Thursday, February 16, 2017
4:00 pm – 5: 30 pm
The Westin Copley Place Hotel
10 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA 02116
Panel Discussion followed by cocktail reception and hors d’oeuvres.
This event is free & open-to-all.

Science and policy issues in energy and the environment have become a rich source of material for authors and journalists across the media spectrum.  In particular, both the science of climate change and the reportage on that science have both become heavily politicized, posing unique challenges for journalism.

This panel discussion explores the evolving role of authors and journalists who work in the energy and environment fields.  Each panelist will discuss the evolution of their professional experience and the challenges of writing and reporting in this field, especially in the wake of the 2016 presidential election.

Panelists

  • Joe Romm, acclaimed author, Center for American Progress Senior Fellow, and science advisor to the National Geographic series “Years of Living Dangerously” and named by Rolling Stone as one of “The 100 People Who Are Changing America”
  • Naomi Oreskes,  award-winning and widely-cited science historian and Harvard University professor, co-author of Merchants of Doubt  (2010, Bloomsberry Press) 
  • Seth Borenstein, award-winning national and international science writer for the Associated Press
  • Meera Subramanian, award-winning journalist and MIT Knight Science Journalism Fellow whose work has been published around the world and author of A River Runs Again: India’s Natural World in Crisis from the Barren Cliffs of Rajasthan to the Farmlands of Karnataka(2015, PublicAffairs)

Moderator

  • John Rogers, Senior Energy Analyst at the Union of Concerned Scientists, and co-author, Cooler Smarter: Practical Steps for Low-Carbon Living (2012, Island Press)

More info here.

Filed Under: A River Runs Again, readings Tagged With: A River Runs Again, book tour, Boston, Cambridge, energy, events, india, Knight Science Journalism, pollution environment, readings

A River Runs Again Orion Book Award finalist

October 14, 2016 By meerasub Leave a Comment

screen-shot-2016-10-14-at-8-18-17-am

Orion Magazine just announced its annual Book Award finalists and A River Runs Again was on the list! Could I be in better company? I think not. Sy Montgomery’s Soul of an Octopus, Summer Brennan’s The Oyster War, and Helen Macdonald’s wildly acclaimed H is for Hawk.

Thank you, Orion. When I lived in NYC, I used to go to the annual Orion Book Award events at the Cynthia Reeves Gallery way over on the West Side in Chelsea and would fawn over the authors, the chance to meet them and get books signed, but more importantly, to get inspired. Seems that it worked. Just to have made the list is the greatest of honors.

The winner will be announced Monday.

UPDATE: Huge congrats to Sy Montgomery for winning the award!

Filed Under: A River Runs Again, awards, News Tagged With: A River Runs Again, awards, New York City

Can Delhi save itself…

June 20, 2016 By meerasub Leave a Comment

…from its toxic air?

by Meera Subramanian

by Meera Subramanian

In A River Runs Again, I explored the devastating effects of cook fires on human and climatic health, but they are just one part of what is causing New Delhi to claim the worst air quality of any major city in the world. Since January, I’ve been researching what it is that makes Delhi’s air so toxic and what steps the city is undertaking to try to improve it. Here’s the start of the piece just published in Nature:

On winter nights, New Delhi burns with innumerable fires. Flames flicker along pavements and street corners, where the destitute huddle to stay warm and cook their suppers, while night watchmen stand guard next to their own small blazes outside private homes. The rising plumes of smoke mingle with exhaust and dust stirred up by overloaded trucks that rumble down roads blanketed in fog. The mixture melds into a nearly opaque substance that leaves a metallic taste on the tongue. Overhead, there is not a single star to be seen.

Read the rest of “Can Delhi save itself from its toxic air?” here.

As for action, encouraging news came a couple weeks ago, with the announcement of a plan to spend almost $3 billion to reduce traffic congestion in New Delhi, although it still needs to be approved and some of the measures are ones that have failed in the past, such as Bus Rapid Transit systems. But a move for more buses, and more pedestrian crossways, and to actually make parking on a footpath an offense, is an excellent start. Increased attention to the issue is a hopeful indicator of more action to come.

If you want to know more, nonprofits such as the Centre for Science and the Environment and Care For Air both are work to inform the public about the city’s air quality, UrbanEmissions brings together concise graphics and scientific information to help understand a complicated issue, and the Air Quality in Delhi Facebook group connects concerned citizens.

I also wrote a couple of pieces specifically about the odd-even traffic reduction plan that was underway when I was in Delhi in January. “New Delhi car ban yields trove of pollution data” was in Nature and the piece with the (mildly overblown!) title “Amazing Things Happened When New Delhi Halved the Number of Cars on the Road” ran in Vice News.

Measuring air quality is incredibly tricky business. The 122 micrograms per cubic metre [Read more…]

Filed Under: journalism Tagged With: A River Runs Again, air, air pollution, air quality, Elemental India, india, New Delhi

Will Modi Colonize his Country or Enact EcoSwaraj?

March 20, 2016 By meerasub Leave a Comment

NEW DELHI/INDIA, 16NOV08 -Narendra Modi, Chief Minister of Gujarat, India, speaks during the welcome lunch at the World Economic Forum's India Economic Summit 2008 in New Delhi, 16-18 November 2008. Copyright World Economic Forum (www.weforum.org)/Photo by Norbert Schiller

Photo by Norbert Schiller via Wikimedia Commons

I am a half-daughter of India. I have watched the South Asian nation develop since I first visited Madras as a young girl, my Indian father bringing his fair-skinned American wife and my brother and me from America on multiple trips to visit dozens of relatives along the shores of the Bay of Bengal.

In the forty years since that first visit, the country has undergone a whole-scale transformation. Never have there been so many humans with so much elemental need for healthy food, clean water, and dependable energy systems. How will India bring these basics to her citizenry?

In recent years, I have visited as an environmental journalist and Fulbright scholar to seek out the answer to this question, investigating the state of India’s natural world and exploring how the elements – earth, water, fire, air and ether – are faring. I found a subcontinent in crisis, but I also found individuals and organisations reinventing their landscapes and lives.

Whether they will receive support from the government remains to be seen.

Read the rest at TheDailyO.

Filed Under: A River Runs Again, elemental india, journalism Tagged With: A River Runs Again, Elemental India, india, journalism, opinion

Elemental India tour continuing south…

February 9, 2016 By meerasub Leave a Comment

 

2016.01.31-27

More events coming up for Elemental India. Specific details here. Hope to see you and do share the word with others you know in the following cities:

Pune:
• 11 Feb: Fergusson College
Chennai:
• 15 Feb: MIDS
• 16 Feb: IIT-M Research Park
Bengaluru:
• 19 Feb: Azim Premji University
• 19 Feb: IISc Centre for Ecological Sciences
Hyderabad:
• 26 Feb: University of Hyderabad

Filed Under: A River Runs Again, elemental india Tagged With: A River Runs Again, book tour, Elemental India, events, india, pollution environment

UChicago Center/EPIC presentation: New Delhi

January 21, 2016 By meerasub Leave a Comment

Epic
I’ll be giving a full multimedia presentation about Elemental India at The Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago- India (EPIC India), an interdisciplinary research group at U.Chicago on energy and environmental policy and economics. Join us!
Thursday, January 28, 2016
6:00 PM
UChicago Center
DLF Capitol Point
Baba Kharak Singh Marg
New Delhi
RSVP here.

Related show

  • Author: Meera Subramanian
  • Tour: A River Runs Again / Elemental India Book Tour
  • Date: January 28, 2016
  • Time: 6:00pm
  • Venue: UChicago Center in Delhi
  • City: New Delhi
  • Address: DLF Capitol Point, Baba Kharak Singh Marg, Connaught Place
  • Country: India
  • Notes: Elemental India: The Natural World at a Time of Crisis and Opportunity. Multimedia presentation

Filed Under: A River Runs Again, elemental india, readings Tagged With: A River Runs Again, book tour, Elemental India, energy, events, india, readings

The Dogs: an excerpt

January 20, 2016 By meerasub Leave a Comment

IMG_7716

Bikaner carcass dump, Rajasthan. Photo by Meera Subramanian.

An excerpt from Elemental India / A River Runs Again, featured in The Caravan.

The vultures are gone, but the livestock carcasses they once consumed by the millions remain. Many are collected and deposited at carcass dumps like the one called Jorbeer on the outskirts of Bikaner, where dogs run wild amid an endless supply of food.

As I travelled around India, I kept hearing about aggressive dogs. Soon after I arrived in Bikaner, someone told me about two local girls, eight or nine years old, who were attacked by dogs at night, while they were sleeping. They were such easy prey. “They were hurt so badly, but not killed,” the man told me.

“The police came and took the dogs away, but I was so astonished…how can there be dogs like this?”

Read the rest at The Caravan. 

Filed Under: A River Runs Again, elemental india Tagged With: A River Runs Again, book tour, Elemental India, india, vulture

Now, ACT.

December 10, 2015 By meerasub Leave a Comment

Many people have asked me, after presentations or via email, What can I do? Stories should be sparks and the listeners/readers, tinder. The last thing I want is for you to set A River Runs Again/Elemental India down and walk away wiping your hands clean. So, if you’re so inspired….

Here are some of the organizations I focused on in the book as well as others whose efforts I’ve come across in my research. No organization is perfect. I write and explore the efforts, successful and struggling both. So don’t consider this list an endorsement, necessarily, but an excellent starting point for you to make your own explorations and decide to become a member, send a donation, get involved, or simply learn more. [Read more…]

Filed Under: A River Runs Again, elemental india Tagged With: A River Runs Again, conservation, Elemental India, india

Recorded, live!

December 9, 2015 By meerasub Leave a Comment

Working on a reported book has had three distinct phases. The on-the-ground reporting, a time of movement and questions, cameras slinging and notebooks filling. Then there was the isolation chamber of writing, dissecting the notebooks and photos, diving into research, writing, writing, re-writing, re-writing.

And now I’m in the third stage — of heading out into the world to talk about what I found. Can 1.3 billion people in India live sustainably? Can the planet? What’s working? What’s not? What can everyone learn, within India and around the world, from the successful models and the cautionary tales?

In case you weren’t able to make it to any of the events on my book tour, here are a few archived recordings of some of the presentations.

In New York City, I sat down with acclaimed author and good friend Suketu Mehta at my alma mater, New York University, for an evening hosted by the Literary Reportage concentration of the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute:

At the World Affairs Council of Northern California, I had great conversation with Linda Calhoun, Executive Producer at Career Girls. Before the talk, I met with World Affairs student ambassadors and fielded some of the toughest questions I heard on tour. (Providing great hope for the future!)

Here’s another video from the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, DC, where I’m in conversation WWC’s Meaghan Parker, American journalist Lisa Palmer, (who’s working on her book Feeding a Hot Hungry Planet: Agriculture, Climate Change, and Population) and Indian journalist Priyali Sur:

I was honored to join a long legacy of presenters at the University of Virginia’s Medical Center Hour, (though it was tough to figure out how to follow up a professional skateboarder!). The audio is a little tricky, but nice shots of photographs I’ve been showing along the way. The event was produced by the Center for Biomedical Ethics and Humanities in partnership with Historical Collections of the Health Sciences Library.

And also in New York City, I spoke with Steven Weiss of The Jewish Channel’s Up Close:

Enjoy.

Filed Under: A River Runs Again, elemental india, readings Tagged With: A River Runs Again, book tour, Elemental India, events, photography, pollution environment

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • Next Page »

Join Meer’s Mailing List

for the very occasional bit of news.

Please enter a valid email address.
Subscribe

Thanks for subscribing! 

Something went wrong. Please check your entries and try again.

Categories

Tags

Alaska anthology A River Runs Again Art awards birds of prey books book tour Cambridge cape cod climate change conservation dissent Elemental India energy events Fulbright india InsideClimate News journalism kenya Knight Science Journalism middle east Nature New York City organic farming peregrine falcon pesticides photography plastics politics pollution environment Princeton University radio readings religion reviews science Society of Environmental Journalists teaching Texas travel USA vulture water

Archives by Month

Connect

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Twitter

© 2023 Meera Subramanian | All Rights Reserved. | Mastodon | Links | Website design by Sumy Designs, LLC