Hydronarratives

Description

The story of water in the United States is one of ecosystemic disruption and social injustice. From the Standing Rock Indian Reservation and Flint, Michigan, to the Appalachian coal and gas fields and the Gulf Coast, low-income communities, Indigenous communities, and communities of color face the disproportionate effects of floods, droughts, sea level rise, and water contamination.
In Hydronarratives Matthew S. Henry examines cultural representations that imagine a just transition, a concept rooted in the U.S. labor and environmental justice movements to describe an alternative economic paradigm predicated on sustainability, economic and social equity, and climate resilience. Focused on regions of water insecurity, from central Arizona to central Appalachia, Henry explores how writers, artists, and activists have creatively responded to intensifying water crises in the United States and argues that narrative and storytelling are critical to environmental and social justice advocacy. By drawing on a wide and comprehensive range of narrative texts, historical documentation, policy papers, and literary and cultural scholarship, Henry presents a timely project that examines the social movement, just transition, and the logic of the Green New Deal, in addition to contemporary visions of environmental justice. Focusing on creative responses to intensifying water crises in the United States, Hydronarratives explores how narrative and storytelling support environmental justice advocacy in Black, Indigenous, and low-income communities. Matthew S. Henry is an assistant instructional professor in the Honors College and an affiliate in the School of Energy Resources at the University of Wyoming. List of Illustrations
Introduction
1. Decolonizing Drought: Indigenous Collective Continuance in the Lower Colorado River Basin
2. Freedom Dreams for Flint: Imagining a Just Transition Beyond Racial Capitalism
3. Extractive Fictions and Post-Extraction Futurisms: Energy, Water, and Environmental Justice in Appalachia
4. On the Wrong Side of the Levee: Sea Level Rise Narratives in the Decade of the Green New Deal
Conclusion: Imagining a Community-Led Just Transition in Wyoming
Acknowledgements
Notes
Bibliography
Index