ClimateScapes: Imaginative Geographies of Bangladesh

• In Event: ICA Plenary Interactive Paper/Poster Session II
  In Interactive Paper Session: Global Communication and Social Change Interactive Paper Session

Abstract

Through the repetition of images depicting flooding, cyclones, and climate refugees, Bangladesh has become a primary signifier of the threats of global warming. Apocalyptic imaginations of Bangladesh, however, are increasingly being counteracted by indigenous perspectives through the power of blogs. This study examines the discursive strategies enacted within the blogosphere to displace narratives that speak for Bangladesh in its struggle to adapt to a changing climate. Through a critical discourse analysis of two blogs that focus on community-based adaptations to climate change in Bangladesh, this study engages perspectives that highlight the resiliency of the Bangladeshi people. Using Appadurai’s five dimensions of transnational exchange, or “scapes,” this study focuses on how transnational digital activists are using blogs (mediascapes) through the power of new technologies (technoscapes) to produce postcolonial discourses (ideoscapes) that seek collective action against climate change, and give voice to climate refugees, a new class of transnational migrants (ethnoscapes).

Author

• Gyuri Kepes, U of Massachusetts - Amherst