Humus Economicus: Soil Blindness and the Value of ´Dirt´ in Urbanized Landscapes

A vital necessity for the continuation of life on earth, soil is an underexplored feature of today’s planetary challenges in need of creative intervention. The life-sustaining skin of topsoil is disappearing rapidly on a global scale.

This is a severe challenge to sustainability and near-future generations of people in the world, also in SwedenThe project inquiries into the value and future of soil in urbanized landscapes and attends to soil as a collaborator, with potential to trigger synergistic effects across several SDGs.

Through an environmental humanities approach, it answers a call for novel transdisciplinary approaches to societal challenges in the face of climate change, at the intersection of research, civil society, integrative learning, and art/aesthetics.

In addition, it taps into the understudied potential of taking art seriously for achieving Agenda 2030The project mobilizes a team of artists, environmental-, urban-, gender-, and heritage scholars, and connects with a growing number of soil stewards and key stakeholders, from farmers to planners, to counteract soil blindness; map synergy effects; decolonize conceptualizations of nature; transform public knowledge and imaginaries of soils; and catalyze societal change.

Key outcomes include e.g. new methods for work on the SDGs for stakeholders; transdisciplinary environmental art and humanities events, and strategically published peer-reviewed articles that establish soils´ critical role in achieving Agenda 2030