The Third Biennial Robin-Griffiths Lecture in Environmental History, ANU Centre for Environmental History

Reception: 5.30–6.30pm | Lecture: 6.30–8pm

From the seventeenth century on, European thinkers developed - often from religious principles - theories of human supremacism that eventually flourished in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries as full-fledged ideas about humans being the master of nature, ideas that influenced anti-colonial modernisers in other lands as well as an integral part of the idea of progress. Marx, for instance, was a clear instance of such thinking in the 1850s. 

In this lecture, which coincides with the 80th anniversary celebrations of the ANU, Professor Chakrabarty (PhD ’84) will build on the distinction that earth-system science allows us to make between “the globe” and “the planet” to argue for a secular, non-religious basis for a renewed spiritual sense of reverence for the planet Without such a shared sense of reverence, whether sourced from religious ideas or scientific ones, it will be difficult for humanity to deal with planetary environmental problems while also striving for world peace. 

Delivered biennially, The Robin-Griffiths Lecture in Environmental History honours the Centre's founders, Emeritus Professors Libby Robin and Tom Griffiths, who have so generously fostered the field of environmental history and cultivated a community of scholars in Australia and further afield.  Previous lecturers include Professor Katie Holmes (La Trobe University) and Sandra Swart (Stellenbosch University).

About the Speaker

Dipesh Chakrabarty is the Lawrence A. Kimpton Distinguished Service Professor of History and of South Asian Languages and Civilisations at the University of Chicago and Honorary Professor at the School of History in the College of Arts and Social Sciences at ANU. A founding member of the Subaltern Studies Collective and Postcolonial Studies, he is the author of a number of books and articles. These include Rethinking Working Class History (1989), Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference (2000), The Climate of History in a Planetary Age (2021), and One Planet, Many Worlds: The Climate Parallax (2023).