Paper short abstract:

The presentation proposes two extensions of 'critical temperature studies'. The first argues for research to analyse how thermal regimes modify temporal trajectories, while the second suggests mobilising the concept of environmentality to capture the design and modulation of thermal 'milieus'.

Paper long abstract:

Over the past decade, scholars in STS, sociology, anthropology, geography and media studies have proposed to attend to the cultural and social dimensions of temperatures and how they are implicated in particular strategies of power. These 'critical temperature studies' (Starosielski, 2021: 8) are characterised by three important features. Epistemologically, CTS challenge the dominant positivist understanding of the thermal as a pre-social and neutral force. Instead, they examine 'temperature' as a historical and social entity. Empirically, they cover the full spectrum of cold and hot, ranging from a 'cryopolitical analysis' (Radin and Kowal, 2017: 4) to 'critical heat studies' (Hamstead and Coseo 2020). Analytically, CTS conceive of heat and cold as technologically mediated, and their modulation offers new forms of social, biological and environmental control.

In my presentation, I would like to suggest two extensions of this research perspective. First, while the analytical focus in CTS has been on spatial configurations, geographical regions and architectural arrangements, it is worth exploring how thermal regimes also modulate and modify temporal horizons and trajectories. Second, while research interest has focused on the biopolitical effects of thermal technologies - from infrared camera surveillance, to the colonial legacy of Western temperature norms, to new regimes of making life and death available through practices of cryopreservation (Radin and Kowal 2017; Beregow 2019; Starosielski 2021; Hobart 2023) - it might be useful to mobilise Foucault's concept of environmentality to capture how humans and non-humans are governed through the design and modulation of thermal 'milieus' (Lemke 2021).