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Paper short abstract:

I would like to share and test my reflections on what recreating UK universities as sustainable pluriversities would require in light of Indigenous cosmovisions and knowledges, based on my encounters and engagement in three projects combining research and arts relating to socio-natures.

Paper long abstract:

This paper shares the author's reflections on what recreating UK universities as sustainable pluriversities would require from encounters and engagement in three projects combining research and arts relating to socio-natures: a training process led by a professional storyteller on converting political-ecology research into short, spoken 10-minute stories, the co-production of a role-playing game on 'sustainable' value chains, and the artistic and transdisciplinary research process producing an immersive audio-visual exhibition on 'Can we fly-less?'.

On this basis, the author argues that defining and then moving the academic space towards genuine 'sustainability' would be predicated on a reflective, self-critical engagement with the politics and ethics of research in the Anthropocene. This includes, but is not limited to firstly acknowledging colonial pasts, including the harmful, abiding roots of 'sustainability' imaginaries in colonial thinking, and the coloniality of conventional knowledge production as critiqued by feminist and decolonial scholars. It secondly involves overcoming extractive presents, including the Global North and the wealthy within it displaying an imperial mode of living which goes against researchers' commitments to 'doing no harm'. Finally, it proposes reimaging universities as 'pluriversities' which appreciate diversities of knowledges and prioritise equitable, sustainable co-production, including through collaborations with the arts.