NeMLA 2026 will be held in Pittsburgh, PA from March 5-8

In this panel, we explore the meaning of landscape regeneration. This has become a buzzword in environmentalism, but what does it imply? To re-generate something points to a return to a previous state. What is generated is what has already been (re-). But what is this previous state? Is this the “original”? But landscapes have changed so much over the Earth’s 4.5 billion year history that this idea of an “original” cannot properly function. The re- is put in parentheses to indicate that re-generation is often simply a generation tied to an ideological belief in originariness. What this panel explores is the relationship between generation, regeneration, and re-. Is regeneration possible or do we only ever generate? If landscape regeneration is just a process of generating anew, then why are we generating this new landscape? What marks one state of a place as in need of remediation, improvement, or regeneration and another as not? And if all regeneration is generation, then what motivates it? What is the point of this transformation of place? This panel explores these and other questions as they relate to a broad array of phenomena such as desertification, de-extinction, or the manufacture of islands.

Submit an abstract of up to 300 words and a short bio at: https://cfplist.com/nemla/Home/S/21580