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The Atlas of Disappearing Places: Our Coasts and Oceans in the Climate Crisis - Hardcover | Diverse Reads

The Atlas of Disappearing Places: Our Coasts and Oceans in the Climate Crisis

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A beautiful and engaging guide to global warming’s impacts around the world

Our planet is in peril. Seas are rising, oceans are acidifying, ice is melting, coasts are flooding, species are dying, and communities are faltering. Despite these dire circumstances, most of us don’t have a clear sense of how the interconnected crises in our ocean are affecting the climate system, food webs, coastal cities, and biodiversity, and which solutions can help us co-create a better future.

Through a rich combination of place-based storytelling, clear explanations of climate science and policy, and beautifully rendered maps that use a unique ink-on-dried-seaweed technique, The Atlas of Disappearing Places depicts twenty locations across the globe, from Shanghai and Antarctica to Houston and the Cook Islands. The authors describe four climate change impacts—changing chemistry, warming waters, strengthening storms, and rising seas—using the metaphor of the ocean as a body to draw parallels between natural systems and human systems.

Each chapter paints a portrait of an existential threat in a particular place, detailing what will be lost if we do not take bold action now. Weaving together contemporary stories and speculative “future histories” for each place, this work considers both the serious consequences if we continue to pursue business as usual, and what we can do—from government policies to grassroots activism—to write a different, more hopeful story.

A beautiful work of art and an indispensable resource to learn more about the devastating consequences of the climate crisis—as well as possibilities for individual and collective action—The Atlas of Disappearing Places will engage and inspire readers on the most pressing issue of our time.

ISBN-13: 9781620974568

Media Type: Hardcover

Publisher: New Press - The

Publication Date: 07-20-2021

Pages: 224

Product Dimensions: 7.90(w) x 10.10(h) x 0.80(d)

Marina Psaros is a sustainability expert and has led climate action programs across public, private, and nonprofit organizations for over a decade. She is one of the creators of The King Tides Project, an international community science and education initiative. An amateur cartographer and ocean advocate, she lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. Christina Conklin is an artist, writer, and researcher whose work investigates the intersection of natural systems and belief systems, often using the ocean as both site and metaphor. Her essays, exhibitions, and installations consider our cultural responses to the intersecting ecological and social crises of our time. She holds an MFA from California College of the Arts and has exhibited internationally. She is currently working with thought leaders and activists around the world to help communities create regenerative cultural systems. She lives with her husband and two children in Half Moon Bay, California.

Table of Contents

Foreword ix

Introduction xi

Part I Changing Chemistry 1

Kure Atoll, Hawai'I: Plastic, Plastic Everywhere 6

The Arabian Sea: Regime Shift 14

Camden, Maine: Salt, Fat, Acid, (No) Meat 22

The Cook Islands: Feeding the Fever 28

San Francisco Bay: Seven-Layer Dip 34

Part II Strengthening Storms 41

Houston: We Have A Problem 46

Hamburg, Germany: River City At Risk 54

New York, New York: Capital of Capital 60

San Juan, Puerto Rico: Poder, Despacito 68

Kutupalong Camp, Bangladesh: Human Tides 74

Part III Warming Waters 85

The Arctic Ocean: When the Ice Melts 90

Pisco, Peru: Enso and the End of Fish 98

The North Atlantic: in Deep 106

Kisite, Kenya: Coral Collapse 114

Pine Island Glacier: What Happens In Antarctica Doesn't Stay In Antarctica 122

Part IV Rising Seas 129

Shanghai, China: Sink, Sank, Sunk 134

Hampton Roads, Virginia: Bye, Bye, Birdies 142

Ben Tre, Vietnam: Doing More With Less 150

The Thames Estuary, Britain: From Gravesend To Allhallows 158

Ise, Japan: Tradition For the Future 166

What's Next? by Marina Psaros 173

Toward Transilience by Christina Conklin 176

Acknowledgments 179

Notes 181

Image Sources 207

Index 210