In her talk for the OEHN, Sarah S. Elkind will present a segment of her new project which aims to investigate the global history of resource conservation, its environmental justice consequences, and their implications for managing global climate change.

Sarah S. Elkind is a Professor of History teaching environmental, technology, political and urban history at San Diego State University. Between 2010-2011 she was a Fulbright Distinguished Chair in American Studies at the University of Southern Denmark. Her publications have investigated environmental policy-making in U.S. cities. In How Local Politics Shape Federal Policy (2011), she used case studies from Los Angeles’s energy, flood control, air pollution and water resources history to explore business influence in twentieth century American politics. Her first book Bay Cities and Water Politics (1998) examined regional public works and political reform in the late-nineteenth and early twentieth century cities. As a public historian, she has curated exhibits on twentieth century tourism economics, the nineteenth century Pacific ceramics trade, and the environmental history of the military in Southern California. She teaches courses on the history of water resources policy and development in the U.S. West; the history of current environmental crises, the environmental history of warfare, and the role of the media in shaping environmental politics.

Tea and coffee will be available from 10:00.