Paper short abstract:

This paper makes the original and bold claim that thinking with islands establishes the core methodological and conceptual framework for contemporary Anthropocene thinking more generally.

Paper long abstract:

This paper makes the original and bold claim that thinking with islands establishes the core methodological and conceptual framework for contemporary Anthropocene thinking more generally. Thus, we go beyond the more obvious point that Anthropocene scholarship regularly engages islands as the emblematic figures of transforming planetary conditions (rising sea levels, global warming, intensifying hurricanes and nuclear radiation). Instead, we examine how Anthropocene scholarship conceptually draws upon the relational affordances, feedback effects and intensification of relation which have long been associated with island life in particular. Examining the power of thinking with islands in the Anthropocene we heuristically categorise today's leading debates according to the key paradigms of 'Resilience', 'Patchworks', 'Storying' and 'Sensing', and conclude with a new critical agenda for islands studies in the Anthropocene.