Mobilities, Disruptions and Reconnections: joint T2M & MoHu hybrid conference

Govind Gopakumar, Concordia University, Montreal

In recent days, since the mobility pause from enforced COVID-19 lockdowns, there has been interest and speculation in an urban transition to low-carbon mobilities (Sheller 2020; Cresswell 2021; Adey, Hannam, et al. 2021). This renewed scholarly interest has built upon an upwelling of scholarship that, riding the mobilities turn, inquires into theories and logics embedded within interventions for a low-carbon world (Temenos et al. 2017; Nikolaeva et al. 2019; Adey, Cresswell, et al. 2021).

Such an approach, though, sits uneasily with the preeminent multi-level perspective in sustainability transitions to mobility (Geels et al. 2012). From a critical mobility perspective, such a formulation naively posits a static world of macro-level landscapes extraneous to mobility regimes and niche innovations. A key differentiator of a critical mobilities approach to transition, at least in the Global North, has been a justice orientation that attends to histories and politics of systemic inequalities (Sheller 2015; Sheller 2018). How can the critical mobilities approach re-imagine mobility transitions in global Southern contexts?

Two directions within critical mobility studies are relevant. First, the long attention to politics and systemic effects of mobility (Sheller and Urry 2000; Urry 2004; Cresswell 2010) allows us to appreciate the widespread embedding of automobility politics at the street-level in Southern contexts (Gopakumar 2020; 2021). Second, the consideration for historical frictions in the constitution of mobility constellations (Cresswell 2010; 2016; see also Schipper, Emanuel, and Oldenziel 2020), emphasize how urban mobilities are outcomes of multiple pre/post/colonial displacements (Gopakumar 2022).

Against this growing interest in a mobilities approach to mobility transition, we seek abstracts exploring a range of topics related to the practices, meanings, and politics of low-carbon moving in the Southern street. Please send abstracts of 250 words with a short biosketch of 100 words to Govind Gopakumar (govind.gopakumar@concordia.ca) by April 1, 2022. More details in the attached proposal.

Transition

Les recherches sur la transition s'intéressent aux processus de modification radicale et structurelle, engagés sur le long terme, qui aboutissent à une plus grande durabilité de la production et de la consommation. Ces recherches impliquent différentes approches conceptuelles et de nombreux participants issus d'une grande variété de disciplines.

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