jayson m porter

Mule Power Unpacking empires and diaspora in Mexico and the United States.

Grateful to @bunkhistory.bsky.social for highlighting my essay "Mule Power" with @sciencehistory.org!!

www.bunkhistory.org/resources/mu...

Today is the 70th anniversary of Rosa Parks' arrest. Six myths: 1) She wasn't old or tired. 42 years old that day, she had a "life history of being rebellious" & had spent two decades helping to turn the Montgomery NAACP into a more activist branch alongside ED Nixon and Johnnie Carr.

Interested or know someone interested in doing a PhD on environmental histories/materialities of zoonotic or infectious animal disease as part of Transformative Humanities @durham.ac.uk Then please get in touch by Dec 8th! @pollenetwork.bsky.social @emilywebz.bsky.social @rgs-agwg.bsky.social

I can read two things in my grad students' writing: they respect themselves and they respect me, too.

Not me randomly seeing research on agrochemicals in Latin America on my trip to London

I have no black men mentors, and I’m finally not sad about it. Just angry and bummed to see how black men with influence move. I don’t want that for myself.

Hey y’all! Where should I go to in Southeast London for fun and food? We’re hoping for something Black—Caribbean or West African. Tomorrow is our last full day in London.

What Zohran can learn from Latin America's Pink Tide

Season 7 launches 🔥 by reflecting on "What Zohran Can Learn from Latin America's Pink Tide" - with some insightful analyses on the challenges for the Zohran administration , and what leftist-governed cities in Mexico, Venezuela, Brazil +Ecuador have to teach us open.spotify.com/episode/75Oo...

"...in every curving beach, in every grain of sand there is the story of the earth.” Rachel Carson

If coal tar is the elemental "mother of organic chemistry," what is elemental mother of inorganic chemistry? Arsenic?

Writing thoughts: nominalizations can become stories by asking who, what, when, where, & why? Nominalizations are verbs masquerading as nouns. Take modernization. Where & when: the word modernization was coined in rural Mexico after the Mexican Revolution. But why? Who & what was modernizing & how?

#art #indigenous #blacksky #climateaction

I'm opening up a Black & Indigenous environmental art gallery
@umterps.bsky.social to help students navigate climate anxiety & other stresses that come with learning about environmental injustice & environmental racism. Please consider donating & coming to our fundraiser @framebridge.bsky.social!

"Does the world get poorer when a hundred-dollar bill falls down a sewer? For that matter, does the world get richer when we strike gold or cut down trees?"
Richard Powers in Gain (1998)

I’m grateful for Drs. Dana Cypress and Justin Hosbey Elleza Kelley, Maurice Wallace, Carlyn Ferrari, as well as Helen Ganiy for bringing this special cluster of Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment. Link to the intro: doi.org/10.1093/isle...

New Master in Public Environmental Humanities 2-year masters program for students who want to study today’s environmental challenges as deeply rooted in culture and history

New Master in Public Environmental Humanities - @greenhouseuis.net

2-year masters program for students who want to study today’s environmental challenges as deeply rooted in culture and history

Info sessions on November 11 & 21

niche-canada.org/2025/11/01/n...

#envhum #envhist #envstudies

Jacobin: The Labor Movement Needs a Collective Anti-Trump Strategy

When fascism rises, the labor movement decides whether democracy survives.

CTU Vice PresidentJackson Potterand UTLA’s Alex Caputo-Pearl write that unions must lead a national anti-Trump strategy, one that’s rooted in collective power, community solidarity, and the courage to disrupt.

Thinking of Dr. Imani Perry’s work on blue, I wonder if there’s a black environmental history of the color maroon?

I had no clue Darwin wrote a whole book on earthworms. Rachel Carson with them gems.

Women in Mexico step up to protect ancient Aztec farms and save a vanishing ecosystem In Mexico, traditionally women did not inherit chinampas, island farms first built by the Aztecs thousands of years ago.

Women farmers in Xochimilco and San Gregorio are restoring chinampas (high-yield island farms) using canal-mud fertiliser, biofilters and invasive-fish barriers. The program has certified 16 producers and buffers floods, cools the city and shelters the axolotl. buff.ly/0gIJjxl
#ShareGoodNewsToo

Hurricane Melissa strengthens to category 5 as communities in Jamaica warned of ‘potentially unimaginable impact’ – live Jamaicans urged to seek shelter immediately, and Cuba, Haiti and Dominican Republic also threatened

www.theguardian.com/world/live/2...

Book cover with people working in fields

Join me & @mmuscolino.bsky.social discussing his book Remaking the Earth, Exhausting the People: The Burden of Conservation in Modern China tomorrow (Monday, 27 October 2025) at 4pm Central European / 11am Eastern / 8am Pacific
Live talk details:
newnatures.org/greenhouse/e...
#envhum #envhist

Honored! Thank you for reading and engaging with the work!

I’m excited to read Rick A. López’s new book Rooted in Place!

Talking Records: Pollution in the Archive (in person) Explore histories of pollution, contamination, and environmental damage in the archive at this one-day symposium at The National Archives.

Talking Records: Pollution in the Archive is now open for registration! 🏭🌊

In person symposium at The National Archives on 4th December: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/talking-re...

Afternoon of online talks on 5th December: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/talking-re...

#envhum #envhist

RIVERS IN TIME, RIVERS IN WORDS - Freeflow Institute An experiential deep dive into the history + evolving narrative of the Yukon

In case you’re free in July and want to spend a week on the Yukon…

freeflowinstitute.com/product/rive...

Maryland officials sound alarm on data centers’ $100B power grid suck The rapid rise of data centers is hitting the region’s power grid. Maryland lawmakers are concerned that utility ratepayers will pay the $100 billion price for them.

It's starting to occur to state lawmakers that utility customers aren't super keen on paying for all these data centers that are straining the grid, via @briaovers.bsky.social @thebaltimorebanner.com
www.thebanner.com/economy/pjm-...

Watchdog report says American e-waste is causing a 'hidden tsunami' in Southeast Asia A report by an environmental group says millions of tons of discarded U.S. electronics are being shipped overseas each month — much of it to Southeast Asian countries not prepared to safely handle hazardous waste.

A report by an environmental group says millions of tons of discarded U.S. electronics are being shipped overseas each month — much of it to Southeast Asian countries not prepared to safely handle hazardous waste.

“People of African descent played critical roles in Guerrero and the rest of New Spain as plantation laborers, mine workers, coastal militiamen, and arrieros. As a common pathway for formerly enslaved afrodescendientes, arrieros were also connected to emancipation and social mobility.”

“Globally and historically, most mules respond to calls from arrieros. As of 2021, over half of the world’s mules lived in Spanish America, with a third calling Mexico home. How this happened has everything to do with the Spanish empire, slavery, and racial capitalism.”