BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 METHOD:PUBLISH PRODID:-//Telerik Inc.//Sitefinity CMS 15.4//EN BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:Eastern Standard Time BEGIN:STANDARD DTSTART:20251102T020000 RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYDAY=1SU;BYHOUR=2;BYMINUTE=0;BYMONTH=11 TZNAME:Eastern Standard Time TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 END:STANDARD BEGIN:DAYLIGHT DTSTART:20250301T020000 RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYDAY=2SU;BYHOUR=2;BYMINUTE=0;BYMONTH=3 TZNAME:Eastern Daylight Time TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 END:DAYLIGHT END:VTIMEZONE BEGIN:VEVENT DESCRIPTION:The Moynihan Institute’s South Asia Center presents \;Mabel Denzin Gergan from \;Vanderbilt University.Drawing on research in Sik kim\, India\, with the Lepcha-led Affected Citizens of Teesta and geoscien tists across the Himalaya\, this talk examines the crisis temporalities th rough which disasters become legible.Centering the 2023 South Lhonak Glaci al Lake Outburst Flood\, which destroyed the Teesta Stage III dam\, I trac e how state geology renders Himalayan landscapes as extractable terrain an d as inherently disaster-prone. Reinforced by alarmist climate narratives\ , this framing obscures infrastructural decisions that make hazards catast rophic while justifying renewed hydropower and critical mineral extraction . Yet critiques of geology as an imperial discipline do not exhaust the po litical possibilities of geoscientific practice. Placing scientific foreca sts of the flood and Himalayan geological research more broadly\, alongsid e Lepcha and Buddhist prophecies and sacred landscape narratives\, I show how Indigenous cosmologies and geoscientific approaches read the earth\, o ffering a shared refusal of this state logic. Without equating these knowl edge systems\, I argue that their fidelity to place and attention to deep temporalities can loosen the grip of short horizons through which disaster s register only as crisis or catastrophe. Their encounter opens geosocial futures (Clark and Yusoff 2017) attentive to long histories and obligation s without diminishing the urgency of present harm. \;Mabel Denzin Gerg an\nis assistant professor of Asian studies at Vanderbilt University. She is a\nscholar of environmental justice\, indigeneity and race. Her researc h and\nteaching are grounded in the Indian Himalayan region and attend to the racial\nand colonial logics underlying Indigenous communities’ disprop ortionate\nexposure to environmental risk and vulnerability. DTEND:20261201T220000Z DTSTAMP:20261112T005625Z DTSTART:20261201T203000Z LOCATION: SEQUENCE:0 SUMMARY:Lecture| ‘Crisis Temporalities and Geo-Social Futures in the Himala ya’ UID:RFCALITEM639300237859746435 X-ALT-DESC;FMTTYPE=text/html:

The Moynihan Institute’s South Asia Center presents \;Mabel Denzin Gergan from \;Vanderbilt Univ ersity.

Drawing on research in Sikkim\, India\, with the Lepc ha-led Affected Citizens of Teesta and geoscientists across the Himalaya\, this talk examines the crisis temporalities through which disasters becom e legible.

Centering the 2023 South Lhonak Glacial Lake Outburst Flo od\, which destroyed the Teesta Stage III dam\, I trace how state geology renders Himalayan landscapes as extractable terrain and as inherently disa ster-prone. Reinforced by alarmist climate narratives\, this framing obscu res infrastructural decisions that make hazards catastrophic while justify ing renewed hydropower and critical mineral extraction. Yet critiques of g eology as an imperial discipline do not exhaust the political possibilitie s of geoscientific practice.

Placing scientific forecasts of the fl ood and Himalayan geological research more broadly\, alongside Lepcha and Buddhist prophecies and sacred landscape narratives\, I show how Indigenou s cosmologies and geoscientific approaches read the earth\, offering a sha red refusal of this state logic. Without equating these knowledge systems\ , I argue that their fidelity to place and attention to deep temporalities can loosen the grip of short horizons through which disasters register on ly as crisis or catastrophe. Their encounter opens geosocial futures (Clar k and Yusoff 2017) attentive to long histories and obligations without dim inishing the urgency of present harm. \;

Mabel Denzin Gergan\nis a ssistant professor of Asian studies at Vanderbilt University. She is a\nsc holar of environmental justice\, indigeneity and race. Her research and\nt eaching are grounded in the Indian Himalayan region and attend to the raci al\nand colonial logics underlying Indigenous communities’ disproportionat e\nexposure to environmental risk and vulnerability.

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