Helios 3: Rebecca Sharp's Rough Currency

12 Min Read

August 23, 2021

Helios is an EH interview series about new research in the energy humanities and the creative processes that bring it to life.

Our third installment features Scottish poet and playwright Rebecca Sharp, whose interdisciplinary work explores ideas of landscape and place across artforms. In her new poetry pamphlet, Rough Currency, Sharp plumbs our personal and collective entanglements with fossil fuels with an eye for the mythic and the magical. A selection of her work is featured in The Art of Energy exhibition at the Centre for Energy Ethics, where it won second prize in the inaugural Art of Energy Award.

EH editors Imre Szeman and Caleb Wellum sat down with Rebecca over Zoom on June 25 to talk about her poetic process during a pandemic, why she wanted to write about oil, and how poetry can help us to see the world differently so that we might change it.

Click the download link below to read the full interview.

Download the interview
Thank you! Your submission has been received!
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.

Read More

September 7, 2023

Elizabeth Carolyn Miller

In her review of Victor Seow's groundbreaking recent book, "Carbon Technocracy: Energy Regimes in Modern East Asia" (University of Chicago Press, 2021), Elizabeth Miller notes the shared features of modern extractivism that are evident across states and geographies.

Read
July 30, 2024

Scott Stoneman and Thomas Davis

Recent reports reveal that Google's greenhouse gas emissions surged by 48% from 2019 to 2023, attributing the increase to the energy demands of AI technology. Despite promises of future decarbonization, AI currently consumes vast amounts of energy and water, with significant ecological impacts. Thomas Davis and Scott Stoneman critique AI's resource-intensive nature, emphasizing its role in perpetuating capitalist exploitation and environmental degradation. They argue for a critical examination of AI's material needs and its socio-economic impacts, urging a move towards more equitable and environmentally-conscious AI practices within a post-capitalist framework.

Read
all articles