Thinking with Water

Irene J. Klaver, Ph.D., Director, Philosophy of Water Project, University of North Texas.

Through Heraclitus, Wittgenstein, and contemporary efforts of cities to re-think their relation to the river that runs through them, Professor Klaver will present how an element like water surfaces in philosophy and the cultural imagination. She will place the developments of the Trinity River in this context.

To think about water as element or natural resource represents a different cultural framework. She will deal with the question: How to think towards a new environmental mentality? This is a question of enhancing people’s engagement, participation, and interest in their environmental surroundings. Rivers have been anchors of civilization and bones of contention. They are rich ecological and cultural corridors. She will connect these qualities with anthropologist Arjun Appadurai’s notion, the “capacity to aspire,” which functions as a capacity of culture to navigate to a desirable future.

Information from the official website