Open thread
Geographers at work: mobility and (socio)nature

Linking mobility and nature

In class we discussed how mobile technologies like the car and the plane make more of the world, more of "nature," accessible to people, and also encourage a sense of separateness between people and nature. The following stories provide examples of other ways of connecting mobility and nature. Feel free to discuss either or both in comments.

  • This report at Quartz is about the northward "drift" of Australia. How does Australia's drift demonstrate that places are more-than-human? What are the implications of this drift for what people do, particularly in the context of practicing mobility?
  • This article at The Atlantic reports on "climate change refugees." Again, how does this example demonstrate that places are more-than-human? How does the article link what humans do in terms of mobility and what happens in nature? How can climate change, in particular, be used to demonstrate how culture and nature are always intertwined - or hybridized - in the making of places?

Comments

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Matt Herbert

The Atlatnic article on "climate change refugees" describes how nature often forces people to be mobile because of natural disasters and climate changes. When people's houses are destroyed and they lose everything they have, they then have to seek different living conditions (requiring them to move from their homeland). Nature can also affect people's mobility by causing them to choose to move before a natural disaster hits. Climate change is more-than-human because it shows how nature can directly affect humans. The recent hurricanes Harvey and Irma are examples of how nature impact the lives of humans and cause them to be mobile.

Jiayue Wang

The report at Quartz mentioned that the Australia’s movement is caused by the shifting tectonic plates that make up the earth’s surface. Due to many people use GPS to realize their move nowadays, just a few inches changes can make a real difference to the efficiency of GPS-operated systems, influence people's mobility. Hopefully, Australia’s longitudes and latitudes will be formally adjusted, so that GPS can keep careful track of the country.

Yifan Lu

The Atlantic reports on "climate change refugees" mentions " The gap in the international framework might not cause chaos now, while the effects of climate change are still ramping up." Climate change and nature disasters are more-than-human because they show how people will influenced by the nature. Nature disasters and climate changes destroy people's house and put them in danger. People are forced to leave their home.

Mack Little

Agreeing with Matt, natural disasters and weather changes can cause families to move within a matter of hours. If a tsunami is about to hit your town, city, or home, you aren't just going to stay there. You are going to pack all that you are able to up and get the heck out of dodge. Weather plays a huge role in everyone's lives.

halie korff

The article about Australia moving is crazy, and also funny, that is messes up the GPS. Even though GPS is a huge thing, and even more so with the advancement of technology and cars that are starting to be able to drive themselves that can really screw some people over.

Crystal

I also read the article about Australia and it is interesting how a whole continent can move, and even-though its a little bit, later on can be a bigger problem than just messing up the GPS system. I can't imagen how is it going to be like in many years from now.

Christian Hammerich

Agreeing with Matt, climate change and natural disasters have a big role forcing people to be mobile. Preventing natural disasters is pretty much impossible. Also with what Mack said, there is no way that I would be staying in my house or where ever I was living at that time if I knew something bad was going to happen. I would pack up as much as I can and leave.

Maria Regalado

it is very interesting how Australia keeps moving 2.7 inches every year and how our GPS is based on Australia, which this affects peoples mobility. i hope as technlogy advances so does the GPS and they do something about it and make it more efficient.

Blake Egli

I agree with matts perspective on how natural disasters can cause a culture to migrate to another living environment. But also a natural disaster also has the power to cause a halt to mobility. For example, now a days we have the luxury of our homes, and if it is icy and hardcore blizzard out, it's very dangerous to be mobile. So 9/10 times the culture will opt out of the danger of mobility to stay safe. Risk can cause Stagnant behavior.

Moe Tobiyama

I read the article about The Atlantic reports on "climate change refugees". Through reading it, I could know that how big the power of nature is and that it stands outside of human power. No matter how human is very smart at discovering new technology, there are a lot of things which are more than human all over the world.

Ana Bautista

In the article Quartz it talks about the mobility of Australia. They talk about how the earth is always moving and our gps does gets out of date every once in a while. An interesting thought is if we are ever going back to now big continent Pangea. Anyways since the plates are traveling it causes the people to be able to adapt. Mobility becomes harder and longer.

Kamalei P.

I read the report about the northward drift of Australia, by Quartz. It was interesting to me, since the article said that Australia has moved almost 5 feet (4.9 to be exact) since 1994. It may not be a lot but the movement is caused by the shifting tectonic plates that make up the earth’s surface. Some may say that its global warming, but it also proves demonstrates how the environment or places are more-than-human. This is because Australia is moving itself, humans aren’t moving it. However, it does affect what people are able to do, since the movement is messing up the GPS systems. Especially now when people rely on their GPS systems more than they did in the past.

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