Black livingness and insurgent ecological politics: Thinking across Black geographies / Atlantics / ecologies

Abstract

Geographical scholarship on the agency and practices of peoples of African descent now flourishes across a diverse range of frameworks and approaches. This article highlights three salient trajectories: Black geographies, geographies of the Black Atlantic and Black ecologies – subfields that, despite considerable overlaps, have developed with little direct dialogue or collaboration. We begin by summarizing their respective methodological and theoretical contributions, then explore points of convergence that hold promise for future work and finally culminate by thinking with political–ecological struggles for land and life across the Black diaspora. Placing these fields in conversation, we reflect on the analytical avenues that open when studies of the Black knowledge and agency embedded in Atlantic landscapes and livelihoods meet the commitments to Black livingness and insurgent ecological politics made visible by Black geographies and Black ecologies.