November 09, 2022 | Monica Barra on Alternative Restorations

Environmental restoration is typically understood as a means of returning a damaged ecosystem to a previously healthy, sustainable state. Yet the extent to which we consider restoration as an ecological and socio-cultural process connected to human politics and desires is largely underexplored across disciplines. Drawing from ethnographic research among scientists and frontline communities of color confronting large scale wetlands restoration in coastal Louisiana, this work-in-progress seminar explores ways of thinking about restoration as an ongoing process of reparation and repair that centers the needs and desires of Black and Indigenous coastal communities. Grounded in Black feminist science studies, Indigenous ecologies, and critical geographies of restoration, it asks: What does it mean to approach ecological restoration as a practice tied to cultivating self-determination for frontline communities? How can science and the restoration of natural geologic processes become an ally—as opposed to an obstacle—in securing the empowerment for these groups? What can we learn about the meaning of restoration from Black and Indigneous ecological practices?