Wild Nature in Urban Edgelands with Christopher Brown

Program Number: 3831

Our urban landscape is dotted with abandoned lots. We’ve all noticed them—or not noticed them. These seemingly derelict spaces are often filled with left-behind concrete slabs and littered with old tires, broken-down and rusting washing machines, and other detritus of our throwaway culture. If you stop and look past the trash, you’ll notice grass and vines are slowly reclaiming these marginal spaces. In that reclaiming, wildlife is eking out a healthful existence outside the human realm. These abandoned places where wild nature collides with the rubble of human domination hosts a surprising number of species. Here Brown explores his experiences of urban nature and helps to illuminate the ways that social and economic justice are inextricably intertwined with environmental justice as we explore these urban edgelands. (hosted by Justine Willis Toms)

Bio

Christopher Brown is an accomplished lawyer who has worked on two Supreme Court confirmation hearings. He has also been general counsel for several technology companies. His varied experiences span from restoring prairies to reporting from Central American war zones. He’s author of three award-nominated science fiction novels. His current nonfiction book explores the natural world in urban settings.

Christopher Brown is the author of:

• Failed State: A Novel (Eos 2020)
• Rule of Capture: A Novel (Eos 2019)
• The Tropic of Kansas: A Novel (Harper Voyager 2017)
• The Natural History of Empty
• Lots: Field Notes from Urban Edgelands, Back Alleys, and Other Wild Places (Timber Press 2024)

To learn more about the work of Christopher Brown go to www.christopherbrown.com

Topics explored in this dialogue include:

• Brown shares his background growing up in controlled urban environments and his search for natural spaces
• What is the practice of finding abandoned spaces that are teaming with a diversity of non-human life
• What is the importance of paying attention to urban wild places
• How Brown met a tracker of wildlife at a Subaru car dealership who became his teacher in tracking urban wildlife
• Brown’s observations as he walks wild old industrial zones
• What was the shift in culture in neolithic times with the advent of agriculture
• How Brown built his home on an industrial brownfield
• How Brown coped with a colony of Harvester ants while building his home
• How to mitigate the encroaching urban tendency to pave over and destroy edglands
• What is the importance of organizing an advocacy group to speak for wild spaces in the city and voiceless creatures who live there
• How the rights of citizens can have access to legal reports on zoning and future urban planning decisions
• What the Conservative government in the UK in 2024 that developers have to demonstrate that there is a 10% net gain in biodiversity after completion of a project
• How easy it is for a small advocacy group to hold local governments accountable for the preservation of urban wild places

Host: Justine Willis Toms    Interview Date: 12/2/2024   Program Number: 3831