Elliott M. Reichardt

UNBC Visiting PhD & Researcher
PhD Candidate, Anthropology
Stanford University

Thursday, March 23, 2023
5:00—7:00 pm
UNBC Rm. 7-238 
Or
 Zoom Webinar: 

https://unbc.zoom.us/j/65459697567?pwd=RjNYd2ZiMTlpa1piVUlSYWZJa0tsQT09
ID:  654 5969 7567                   Passcode:  407879

Forestry is the largest industrial process transforming the landscape of northern British Columbia. Through interviews and fieldwork in Northern BC, I explore and describe how residents of forested regions experience industrial forestry. In this talk, I place my participants’ experiences and stories of life in post-industrial forests in social and cultural context. I focus my analysis on participants who have lived and worked for decades in post-industrial forests, either through trapping, ranching, or logging. My participants encouraged me to imagine and cherish the future forests that would eventually regrow, the wood products from the fallen trees, and the economic benefits to the region. These narratives valued extraction even as they would express sadness, anger, and grief over lost trees, species, and ways of life in asides. These stories served to valorize extraction and minimize their own discomfort even as they moved through old clear-cuts. I conclude my talk with a reflection on “extractive imaginaries” and their relationship to the cultures of extraction that anthropologists have described and observed elsewhere.