Environmental Humanities Center Amsterdam

In the lecture ‘On How Emotions Matter in Climate Transitions: Emotional Dynamics and Decision-Making in Zoöps Through an Embodied and Politicized Lens’, Anne Jesuina will explore how the systemic denial of the embodied dimension hinders moving into constructive and meaningful climate transitions and how challenging emotions often end up reinforcing the systems we need to change. By combining decolonial multi-species perspectives, embodied social justice, tools from Western psychology, and intergenerational insights, Anne Jesuina is developing a methodology to foster collective emotional and relational responsibility in order to support much needed (climate) transitions.

This lecture marks the start of the project: Emotional dynamics and decision-making in Zoöps, funded by the Klimaatonderzoek Initiatief Nederland (KIN) Transformative Practices and Processes in Climate Transitions fund. This project evaluates the role of emotional dynamics  within organizations that are transitioning into Zoöps. Using Zoöp Amstelpark as a case study, the project combines artistic and qualitative research to validate sensitizing methods that reveal the crucial role of emotional dynamics in climate transitions. The findings will be integrated into the zoönomic method and shared with scientific and societal stakeholders, contributing to a broader reevaluation of emotions in climate transition and climate justice. The project is a collaboration between Zone2Source, the Zoönomic Institute and the Environmental Humanities Center at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.  

Project Context: 

In a Zoöp, the interests of other-than-human beings are actively represented in decision-making, in order to create a way of being with the world where all life can thrive. Becoming a Zoöp is a commitment to a process of (un)learning: exploring what it means to view human participants and the organization itself as integral parts of the ecosystem. 

Zoöp Amstelpark is the world’s first public and municipal Zoöp in the Netherlands (more are likely to follow soon). Adopting a zoönomic mindset challenges not only which subjects are politically recognized as political subjects but also deeply rooted historical assumptions: ‘our’ place in the world, who is included in or excluded from this ‘humanity,’who has a voice in decision-making, what collaboration truly means, what type of knowledge is valued as part of the professional domain. Embracing other ways of being and speaking requires humans in a Zoöp to cultivate sensitivity to alternative forms of coexistence. 

Anne Jesuina who shares the  “speaker for the living” role in Zoöp Amstelpark with Theun Karelse,  argues that moving beyond the “human-nature” binary requires more than just listening to and ‘including’ ‘nature’. A multi-species lens demands acknowledging the narrowness of the modern perception of “human” and recognizing the many ways of being human that colonial, individualistic, and rationalistic humanism has historically erased from respectability. 

The speaker:

Anne Jesuina Tobias de Andrade (all pronouns/no pronouns) (1989), is a decolonial anti-disciplinary artist of Northern Dutch and Afro-Carioca descent based in Utrecht, The Netherlands. Their work lives between post-activism, multispecies justice and somatic abolitionism. Through written word, music, voice, moving images and performance, Anne aims to uncover the invisibilized socio-somatic aspects of white ‘supremacy’ culture in order to heal individual and collective wounds and reclaim sources of power. Anne teaches at Minerva Academie in Groningen, is Speaker for the Living at Zoöp Amstelpark, works on an installation that deals with the affective dimension of the climate crisis together with the Embassy of the Northsea, works on the project Amelisweerd: Towards Multispecies Justice and has a coaching practice in what they call Politicized Emotional Literacy and is part of the queer Brazilian Club Night BIXARIA.