This chapter uses the specific case of Antarctica to think more broadly about how the treatment of animals can reveal colonial attitudes and logics, but also whether, in the absence of an Indigenous human population, animals have been (or can be) mobilised as subjects of human domination in a manner with parallels to colonialism. After a discussion of the relationships among imperialism, colonialism and capitalism, the chapter asks what wider structures facilitated the exploitation of animals by visitors to Antarctica, and contrasts the view of animals as objects for exploitation with the occasional invocation of penguins as Antarctic ‘citizens’. The chapter considers Greenpeace’s use of penguins in its 1980s campaigns for an Antarctic World Park as an example of how animals could be mobilised as representatives of the Antarctic environment, which proved an effective tactic even if it raised questions about who spoke for Antarctica and its animals. The chapter concludes that while it is problematic to cast Antarctic animals as colonial subjects, the underlying logics and attitudes of colonialism can be regarded as having potentially shaped actions in Antarctica towards animals.

This paper seeks to further heritage theory and practice by considering decay as a transformative process contributing to heritage formation and value. Informed by our expertise in a variety of fields bordering heritage studies, we highlight the interplay of generative and degenerative aspects in different modes of decay and suggest that partnering with decay epistemologically, artistically, academically, practically, and democratically would allow heritage to be understood not as a rearguard action against loss but rather as a creative and generative process. To explore these ideas, we draw on several cases in geographical locations with unique socio-political and socio-environmental conditions, namely South Africa, Japan, Brazil, and Antarctica. We investigate different domains including archives and museums, heritage practices, landscapes, indigenous knowledge, environmental history, and nature conservation. We argue that decay is tightly linked to the concept of authenticity and acts as a code that holds a key to both past, present and future values of heritage, depending on the positionality and institutionalisation of the interpreter.

Although many scholars date the onset of the Anthropocene to the Industrial Revolution or the post-1945 ‘Great Acceleration’, there is growing interest in understanding earlier human impacts on the earth system. Research on the ‘Palaeoanthropocene’ has investigated the role of fire, agriculture, trade, urbanisation and other anthropogenic impacts. While there is increasing consensus that such impacts were more important than previously realised, geographical variation during the Palaeoanthropocene remains poorly understood. Here, we present a preliminary comparative analysis of claims that pre-industrial anthropogenic impacts in Japan were significantly reduced by four factors: the late arrival of agriculture, an emphasis on wet-rice farming limited to alluvial plains, a reliance on seafood rather than domesticated animals as a primary source of dietary protein, and cultural ideologies of environmental stewardship. We find that none of these claims of Japanese exceptionalism can be supported by the archaeological and historical records. We make some suggestions for further research but conclude that the Japanese sequence appears consistent with global trends towards increased anthropogenic impacts over the course of the Palaeoanthropocene.

For reasons yet unknown, Soviet nuclear planners wanted to build an NPP in Estonia, encompassing Leningrad, the Baltic Republics, Kaliningrad, Belarus and parts of Western Russia. On a planner’s map, Võrtsjärv looked like a promising location to host such a plant. Nevertheless, it became soon clear that Võrtsjärv had too little of the right water available. However, while Võrtsjärv had the wrong water for the NPP, it had the right for another important and in this case competing use of this liquid resource: the establishment of a high-value eel fishery. The act of blocking an NPP construction was part and parcel of a major shift in Soviet Estonia’s fisheries management – one that redefined water and fish as a resource to be protected and valued rather than exploited. Ultimately, no NPP was built at Võrtsjärv.