In the global North, discussions of climate change often carry an undercurrent of fear in terms of anxiety around an “inundation” of rich countries by so-called climate refugees. At the same time, much of the discourse is based on finding financial solutions to the vulnerabilities exposed by climate change, leading to a form of technocratic essentialism.
Sunil Amrith is the Renu and Anand Dhawan Professor of History at Yale University. His work puts global migration at the heart of environmental history, bridging those two fields in new ways. At Falling Walls, Amrith argues that in order to understand environmental justice, we need to understand the history of migration and empire in the Global South. In his talk, he seeks to re-insert these perspectives into the discourse by magnifying voices from the Global South as he discusses the nature of “home” in the context of a changing climate.