Gus

CONVERSATION with Thea Riofrancos: “The term ‘critical minerals’ can trick us into thinking something is scarce” Read a sneak preview from Issue #2 — out 22 September ⛏️🌱

CONVERSATION with Thea Riofrancos: “The term ‘critical minerals’ can trick us into thinking something is scarce”
open.substack.com/pub/breakdow...

Very happy to be included in the new issue of @gliamericanhistory.bsky.social History Now, with @mkn.bsky.social, @catherinemcneur.bsky.social, Keith Pluymers, Lauret Savoy, and Sara Dant www.gilderlehrman.org/history-now/...

**CALL FOR PAPERS** It’s been a hot minute! We are seeking proposals for another new stream on “Critical Minerals and Media Technologies,” edited by @siobhanangus.bsky.social and @gustavelester.bsky.social. The deadline for submissions is November 15, 2025. mediaenviron.org/post/3478-ca...

Home, Petrodelphia: America's First Petrochemical Corridor This website provides you—and others who care about the past and future of Philadelphia—a rich collection of sources about the South Philadelphia refinery complex and other petrochemical sites along t...

Very excited to see the launch of the digital history project "Petrodelphia: America's First Petrochemical Corridor," showcasing Philadelphia’s relationship to petrochemical industries. I co-authored the entry "Pennsylvania Coal and Philadelphia,” for anyone interested: petrodelphia.org

Screenshot of the Uppsala Declaration

Screenshot of the European Declaration

The Swedish UPPSALA DECLARATION now has 2,557 signatories. The EUROPEAN DECLARATION is catching up with 2,458 from EU/EEA/UK/CH. All signatories refuse to collaborate with Israeli institutions complicit in illegal occupation, apartheid, genocide, and other violations of international law.

Yellowknife’s Giant Mine: Canada downplayed arsenic exposure as an Indigenous community was poisoned Colonialism, corporate greed and lax regulation led to widespread pollution, particularly affecting Yellowknives Dene communities.

Want a preview of our book, The Price of Gold, with @mcgillqueensup.bsky.social ? Check out our article in @theconversation.com today:

theconversation.com/yellowknifes...

I’m in @financialtimes.com on Trump’s recent move to make the Pentagon the top shareholder in the US only rare earths mine. This is the “worst of all worlds” resource nationalism: a toxic mix of environmental harm, militarism, Big Tech, financial de-risking, and asset appreciation. Link below ⬇️

YouTube video by Democracy Now! James Earl Jones Reads Frederick Douglass Speech "What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?"

youtube.com/watch?v=xX-A...

I haven't seem these mentioned yet, so: Kris Lane's Potosí (2019); Brian Leech's The City That Ate Itself (2018)

Signatories 2009–2016.

#uppsaladeclaration now has more than 2,000 signatories. We refuse to collaborate with Israeli institutions complicit in illegal occupation, apartheid, genocide, and other violations of international law. Faculty and staff in Swedish higher education and research can sign at uppsaladeclaration.se

Carbon footprint of Israel’s war on Gaza exceeds that of many entire countries Exclusive: The climate cost is more than than the combined 2023 emissions of Costa Rica and Estonia, study finds

By me: Climate cost of Israel’s war on Gaza will exceed the annual greenhouse gas emissions of >100 countries - exacerbating planetary catastrophe on top of the horrific death toll and suffering of Palestinians

www.theguardian.com/world/2025/m...

SO 3431 - Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History | U.S. Department of the Interior SO 3431

The Secretary of the Interior has ordered the National Park Service and other agencies under his jurisdiction to produce "official" versions of American history. It is, in effect, a propaganda order--and is shameful.
www.doi.gov/document-lib...

List of signatories

#uppsaladeclaration now has more than 1,300 signatories. We refuse to collaborate with Israeli state institutions complicit in human rights violations including illegal occupation, apartheid, and genocide. Faculty and staff in Swedish higher education and research can sign at uppsaladeclaration.se

Trump officials take steps toward a radically different NSF Efforts to shrink staff, budget, and focus have alarmed members of Congress

NSF grant terminations are disproportionately affecting underrepresented scientists. 58% of canceled grants have women PIs, despite making up only 34% of awards. 17% of canceled grants have Black PIs (versus 4% of the pool). Hispanic and disabled PIs are twice as likely to have NSF grants canceled.

Read the below article, watch this panel, Environment and War: Historical Perspectives and Modern Challenges - niche-canada.org/2025/03/19/r...

#envhist #environment #war #militarism

Fossil fuel companies ‘poisoned the well’ of public debate with climate disinformation. Here’s how Australia can break free The US has obstructed climate action for decades – largely due to damaging actions by the powerful fossil fuel industry. But Australia has a chance now to lead.

Fossil fuel companies ‘poisoned the well’ of public debate with climate disinformation. theconversation.com/fossil-fuel-...

Resources for Federal Historians - AHA The American Historical Association supports historians employed by the federal government. We appreciate the important work they do every day to preserve, chronicle, and interpret American history. T...

The AHA recognizes that our colleagues in the federal government are facing unprecedented workforce reductions & has compiled resources in support, & are offering one year of free membership in the AHA to former employees of the federal govt. who have been terminated or resigned since January 20. 🗃️

The Big Myth “An immense scholarly feat.”-New Yorker * “[A] scorching indictment of free market fundamentalism . . . and how we can change, before it's too late.”-EsquireWit…

happy to announce the paperback edition of #TheBigMyth is out today!
www.bloomsbury.com/us/big-myth-...
Only $21.59 from publisher, or at your local independent book store or via the great bookshop.org
bookshop.org/p/books/the-...

Legal Avulsions: River Rights on the Upper Mississippi in the 1830s NEHN February: Karl Nycklemoe will speak on Legal Avulsions: River Rights on the Upper Mississippi in the 1830s

Looking forward to this exciting talk next week from Karl Nycklemoe on 'Legal Avulsions: River Rights on the Upper Mississippi in the 1830s'. Join us 11/02 at 1400 GMT.

www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/1227572023...

Where the Language Changes | Bathsheba Demuth | Granta ‘I am on the hunt for the Russian Empire, or what traces might still exist of its colonial enterprise.’ Bathsheba Demuth travels the Yukon river, following the history of the fur trade and the Nulato ...

I have been loving people’s posts of their writing from this year, so here is a thread of things I published in 2024. Starting with this piece on pasts seen and unseen along the Yukon River in @grantamag.bsky.social

granta.com/where-the-la...

We have posted two tenured positions as assistant professor in #Anthropocene history at our centre, please help share widely:
www.kth.se/lediga-jobb/...

www.kth.se/lediga-jobb/...
One is in #envhist and one is in history of science.

Even George Washington Was a Tyrant We don't need to find heroes in our past presidents. We need to try to understand that tyranny has always been part of American freedom.

Thanks to everyone who read and commented on or contacted me about this piece on George Washington and the overriding tyranny of slavery. I appreciate folks who wanted to talk further either to agree or disagree! I heard 2 issues, both of which I discuss in the piece. 1/ time.com/7173647/geor...

It has been the greatest honor of my career to write a Foreword for the Harv Law Rev. I am grateful to be able to tell this story and tell it from the heart in such a prominent forum. As always, I dream of a day when words can change minds and hearts—and worlds: harvardlawreview.org/wp-content/u...

Cover of book The Republican Reversal. Asphalt gives way to ocean.

Richard Nixon created the EPA by executive order in 1970. Now Donald Trump wants to dismantle it. What happened?

That is the story Drew Isenberg and I tell in our 2018 book, The Republican Reversal: Conservatives and the Environment from Nixon to Trump.

www.hup.harvard.edu/books/978067...

Happy to share that my article, "Land, Fur, and Copper: The Union of Settler Colonialism and Industrial Capitalism in the Great Lakes Region, 1815-1842," was selected as this year's Ronald Rainger Early Career Award in History of the Earth and Environmental Sciences by the History of Science Society

As part of my ongoing effort to attend as many talks by LHL fellows (past & present) as possible, I’ve relocated back to the Fiesta Americana for @gustavelester.bsky.social’s talk on efforts to assess global yields of various mineral resources & historicize the “critical minerals” concept. #HSS24

Big State and Local Wins for Climate and Conservation in the United States Twelve state and local ballot initiatives were passed by voters in the 2024 U.S. elections, providing more than $18 billion for climate and conservation action.

Here's a list of seven nature- and climate-positive U.S. state ballot measures that were passed in yesterday's federal election -- in California, Washington, Rhode Island, Maine, Minnesota, Louisiana and Colorado.

Well if you set aside the first 90 years of the South, and then another seven or eight decades after that