The Centre for Environmental History was honoured to host Prof Christof Mauch during his visit to Canberra in February, 2016.
Professor Andrea Gaynor (University of Western Australia) and Associate Professor Dolly Jørgensen (Luleå University of Technology, Sweden) were also special guests at the Centre. All had recently participated in the Foreign Bodies, Intimate Ecologies conference, held in Sydney from 11-13 Feb, 2016.
Christof presented in the Australian National University’s School of History Seminar Series, on his environmental history research on the United States. His project ‘Travels into America’s Nature and History,’ focuses on ten different places in the United States. Mauch zooms in and out of these places and explores each case over the longue durée — from deep geological time to the present. The project features sites that are ‘diverse, representative, iconic, and ambivalent.’
He also spent time talking to students from the School of History and the Fenner School of Environment & Society, attended a special Centre for Environmental History breakfast, and toured some of Australia’s obscure rural towns and places.
Photos by Cameron Muir, Diane Erceg, Christof Mauch, Libby Robin, and Tom Griffiths.
Christof Mauch is Director of the Rachel Carson Center for Environment and Society, Chair in American Cultural History at LMU Munich, and an Honorary Professor at Renmin University, China. Mauch holds a Dr. Phil. in literature from Tübingen University (1990) and a Dr. Phil. Habil. in history from the University of Cologne (1998). A past President of the European Society for Environment, he has held visiting professorships in Edmonton, Kolkata, Seattle, Vienna, Washington D.C., and Warsaw. Mauch is the recipient of multiple awards including the Leadership in History Award of the Society for State and Local History and the 2015 Planetary Award of the Institut für Zukunftskompetenzen.