Beyond Whole Earth
Planetary Mediation and the Anthropocene
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 5041124 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Tobias Boes (University of Notre Dame, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2014 |
| Volume | 5 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 155-170 |
| Publication date | 2014-05-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Environmental Humanities (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2201-1919 • E-ISSN: 2201-1919 |
| Publisher | Duke University Press (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1215/22011919-3615460 |
| OpenAlex | W2189218053 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 7 |
| References cited | 14 |
This article examines the hermeneutic and poetic operations by which we as human beings turn our very planet into a signifier for our collective existence as a species, a process which I refer to as "planetary mediation." I identify the so-called Whole Earth images first generated by the Apollo Space missions as the characteristic form of planetary mediation during the late twentieth century, and argue that our current emergence into a new geological epoch, the Anthropocene, calls for radically different representational strategies. Whole Earth images draw their strength from their iconographic and indexical qualities-in other words, their seeming ability to ground symbolic discourse in something that is undeniably and materially real. In the Anthropocene, however, physical nature itself has become a medium for the inscription of human messages, and effective planetary mediation can now take place only in virtual environments such as those of Google Earth and advanced climate modeling systems. I analyze the work of Soviet biologist Evgeni Shepelev as a starting point for this form of planetary mediation and discuss the multimedia installation The Place Where You Go to Listen by American composer John Luther Adams in order to show the challenges that contemporary environmental art will still have to overcome if it wants to illuminate our current planetary condition
Aesthetics · Anthropocene · Astrobiology · Astronomy · Constellation · Environmental ethics · Epistemology · Indexicality · Mediation · Social science · Sociology · Climate Change Communication and Perception · Ecocriticism and Environmental Literature · Geographies of human-animal interactions · History · Philosophy
Imperial Eyes
The Anthropocene
An Attempt at a “Compositionist Manifesto”
The Order of Things
Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor
From Spaceship Earth to Google Ocean
Becoming-media
Earth sound earth signal
Contested Global Visions
Sense of Place and Sense of Planet
Earthrise; or, The Globalization of the World Picture
Postcolonial Studies and the Challenge of Climate Change
| Citations per year | 0.7 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2016 - 2021 (6) |
| Highly cited | No |