Vegetalities

This seminar examines the "vegetal turn" in the humanities through the lens of Black studies, Indigenous studies, and  feminist/queer studies approaches to science and technology. Beginning with Suzanne Césaire's 1942 definition of Caribbean being as fundamentally vegetal, the course reads across plant science, multispecies ethnography, critical race theory, queer ecologies, and plantation studies to ask what plants know, who knows them, and what vegetality offers as an analytic for thinking about racialized and gendered life in the Anthropocene. Students produce an annotated bibliography, a vegetal fieldwork exercise, and a seminar paper suitable for development toward publication. They also maintain a living plant throughout the semester.