New study finds that plant biodiversity collapsed in landscapes where arable production was abandoned during and after the Black Death era.
05.03.2026 16:34
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New study finds that plant biodiversity collapsed in landscapes where arable production was abandoned during and after the Black Death era.
Screenshot of a paper abstract in Area by Caitlin Jones, Eliza Breder & Tyler McCreary (2026) entitled: 'Alligator Alcatraz and the Production of Environmental Carcerality in the Everglades' with a black banner at the top. In June 2025, the state of Florida opened 'Alligator Alcatraz', a federal immigration detention centre, in the Florida Everglades, weaponising animals and landscapes to construct racialised geographies of fear and rationalise multispecies environmental injustice. In this paper, we examine the symbolic and material conditions of Alligator Alcatraz, pulling apart how what appears to be a novel use of landscape and species for immigration enforcement, is in fact, a deeply historical logic that draws on long-standing settler colonial tropes of emptiness, danger and disposability. We illustrate how both the American alligator (Alligator mississippiensis), and the Everglades itself, are conscripted into carceral geographies that reflect both ecological degradation and racialised state violence. The alligator becomes conscripted as a federal immigration officer, touted by federal and state officials as a mascot of environmental carcerality. Meanwhile, the Everglades is deployed as an empty, deterrent landscape, reviving a settler imaginary that has long justified its destruction and casts Indigenous land, life and knowledge and the more-than-human beings living within it as expendable. Alligator Alcatraz pushes us to consider what carceral geographies of US immigration policy reveal about the disposability of certain bodiesβhuman, ecological and more than human. Ultimately, existing in this spectacle of the racialised past and present are the real human costs of detention development in the Everglades, which is damaging local ecologies and Indigenous and migrant lives.
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'Alligator Alcatraz and the production of environmental carcerality in the Everglades' by Caitlin Jones et al.
This paper explores the weaponising of animals & landscapes to construct racialised geographies of fear in the U.S.
doi.org/10.1111/area...
An historic black and white illustration of a paper nautilus floating on the ocean. There are boats, a city and hills in the background.
π Huge news for BHL: The Field Museum is taking over the hosting of BHLβs website, servers & infrastructure, ensuring long-term stability and access for its 63+ million pages of open biodiversity literature. Learn more:
blog.biodiversitylibrary.org/2026/02/tran...
#BHLTransition #ILoveBHL π π π§ͺ
This issue of @routesjournal.bsky.social features an editorial from my colleague Jasmine Roberts, introducing the fantastic work she is doing building networks for underrepresented geography students in the 'Geography for All' programme at @rgs.org - well worth a read β¬οΈ
We're delighted to begin Volume 5, Issue 1 with an essay from Jasmine Roberts, coordinator of the Geography For All programme at the @rgs.org.
Jasmine's editorial introduction offers a guide for making geography more accessible, regardless of background
routesjournal.org/2026/02/26/g...
Our Geography for All Coordinator, Jasmine Roberts, reflects on the Geography for All initiative and what supporting underrepresented students means to her in this new @routesjournal.bsky.social editorial π
Read her thoughts on community-building, curated support, and ways to get involved.
More info on 'Geography for All' here on our website:
www.rgs.org/choose-geogr...
This issue of @routesjournal.bsky.social features an editorial from my colleague Jasmine Roberts, introducing the fantastic work she is doing building networks for underrepresented geography students in the 'Geography for All' programme at @rgs.org - well worth a read β¬οΈ
WEβRE HIRING! Please spread the word π£
Prof. Cheryl McEwan is looking for a 30-month Postdoctoral Research Associate to support βPlants out of place: entanglements with βinvasive weedsβ in the Anthropoceneβ. Start date 1 September. Application deadline 6 April durham.taleo.net/careersectio...
Snow-capped mountain peaks illuminated under a dark, cloudy night sky.
Can the Himalayas speak when brands make them a stage?
Yana Wengel and Ling Ma explore how the 2025 Arcβteryx campaign reveals the problematic implications of framing mountains as passive backdrops for spectacle.
Read more in the full Geography Directions blog post π
https://ow.ly/uxfW50YgK5N
Good news for academic readers - LSE Press books are now available on @jstor.bsky.social open access! π π
LSE Pressβs recent partnership with @thoth-metadata.bsky.social has helped the Press extend its presence on a broader range of discovery platforms.
π Read more: blogs.lse.ac.uk/lsepress/202...
A graphic publicising a new Special Section in Area called 'Map Room Conversations'. There are six tiles with the names of papers and authors as follows: 1) Map Room Conversations Stephen Legg, Katherine Parker 2) Mapping Indigeneity in the RGS-IBG map collections Peter R. Martin, Katherine Parker 3) Mapping Language: Names, Speakers and Voices Beth Williamson, Philip Jagessar 4) Map Room Conversations: Mapping Objects George Tobin, Jane Wess 5) Mapping Disjuncture: Internationalism and Palestine Zena Agha, Jake Hodder 6) Maps and Diaspora: Affect, Agency and Epistolary Praxis Rohini Rai, Iqbal Singh
A black tile publicising the new 'Map Room Conversations' Special Section in Area. There is a quote from Stephen Legg & Katie Parker's introduction. It reads: "This Special Section breaks down a false equation of active/passive to outdoor/indoor, or digital/paper, maps. Instead, the papers included show how the map collection is also a space of becoming and creation".
New Special Section in Area!
'Map Room Conversations' guest edited by @stephenlegg11.bsky.social, @kparkerhistorian.bsky.social & Jason Liu
Read the fully #OpenAccess collection here β¬οΈ
rgs-ibg.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/toc/10.1...
Shout out for the learned societies keeping a beady eye on the state of the disciplines that university senior managers are so swiftly dismantling. Keep an eye on the state of UK university Geography with the help of the @rgs.org 's new report, published this week.
New in TIBG:
'Pandemic geographies of home: Domestic thresholding in response to COVID-19' by Alison Blunt et al.
This paper introduces the concept of 'thresholding' to explore how internal & external thresholds are materialised through embodied practice.
doi.org/10.1111/tran... #geosky
π¦ Book cover reveal
Geography and a Geographer: Reimagining the discipline after Ron Johnston brings together contributors whose work speaks to the geographies Johnston helped shape.
This book will be published as part of the @rgs.org monograph series #OpenAccess. Coming soon.
#RonJohnston
Useful new report from @rgs.org on the state of geography in HE based on a snapshot survey. Most striking for me are textual responses which suggest larger/Russell Group institutions expect to face similar pressures in the coming year already felt by smaller institutions
www.rgs.org/about-us/our...
Another book from the @rgs.org Book Series due to be published #OpenAccess later this year β¬οΈ
Our new piece out today in Times Higher Education about the threats to Geography in the UK - particularly fieldwork - please do share. It links to a recent snapshot survey on the challenges being faced in UK HE, which highlights the inequities of the challenges, but also fears of what is yet to come
@fridaylast.bsky.social
In Gothenburg, theyβve designed a playground thatβs better when it rains:
What happens when you put experts, prescient topics, engaged audiences, and #maps together? A Map Room Conversation!
Our Area special section is now available #openaccess
#geography #skystorians ποΈ
Close up photo of some snowdrops with blurry trees in the background.
Close up photograph of some snowdrops with a bit of sun lighting them up.
Congratulations to @georgeburdon.bsky.social for his wonderful paper 'Displaced attention: Bergson, attentive habits and Tony Conradβs drone music' which has been highly commended as part of the Cultural Geography Study Groups annual paper prize award! rgs-ibg.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....
New in The GJ:
'Past carbon emissions and future targets for the Olympic Games' by David Gogishvili & Martin MΓΌller
As the 2026 Winter Olympics Opening Ceremony takes place today, this commentary reflects on the sustainability targets for the Games.
doi.org/10.1111/geoj... #geosky
Crowd waving Venezuelan and American flags.
What does Maduroβs capture reveal about the limits of traditional anti-imperialist thinking when it comes to supporting democratic change?
Francisco LlinΓ‘s Casas and Erick Moreno Superlano unpack this in a new Geography Directions blog post. Check it out here πhttps://ow.ly/1Fob50Y4Ka5
Today on Edge Effects, we take our first dive into Botanical Imaginations with our Spring 2026 Faculty Favorites! Faculty across academic disciplines recommend plant-y books and poems they're excited to read/teach this semester πΏ π
Climate Hegemony: Confronting the Politics of Environmental Impasse by @laurieparsons.bsky.social is out May 2026.
This book will be free to read and download via #OpenAccess publishing. @rgsibg.bsky.social
A close-up photograph of a purple dwarf iris in a pot, covered with raindrops
First spring bulb has flowered & the sun will set after 5pm this Saturday π
Screenshot of an intervention abstract in Transactions by Jay JD Todd & Felicity Callard (2026) entitled: 'A Critical Response to the UK's βSullivan Reviewβ Into Sex and Gender in Research and Data' with a red banner at the top. This intervention argues that the UK Government-commissioned independent review of data, statistics and research on sex and gender (the βSullivan Reviewβ) implicitly promotes the erasure of trans and gender diverse people from research and data collection protocols and carries worrying implications for the inclusion of trans people within UK institutions and for critical social science research. Set in a context where trans and gender diverse people's rights are being rolled back in the United Kingdom and elsewhere, the Review attempts to install a singular model of binary, immutable, βbiologicalβ sex as incontrovertible across data gathering on sex and gender across public bodies including government, universities, the health service and research organisations. It does so via appeals to science and to βclarityβ, and by proposing to limit or even in certain cases remove default ethical review processes. The intervention argues that the Review can be situated within broader attempts to erase critical inquiry into the complex, intersectional production of social categories including sex, gender and sexuality, as well as inquiries that extend what ethical principles and governance involve. In sum, we contend that the Review carries deleterious consequences for geography and other social scientific disciplines and call upon scholars to refuse its vision and implications.
New Intervention in TIBG:
'A critical response to the UK's "Sullivan Review" into sex and gender in research and data' by @jaytoddgla.bsky.social & @felicitycallard.bsky.social
doi.org/10.1111/tran...
Outside the Level 2 Reading Room in @bodleian.ox.ac.uk there is a wellbeing display. Here are some it's little zines that genuinely made me smile.