Eco-Fascism, Public Lands Attacks, and the Power of Narratives, with Professor Sarah Wald

My guest today is University of Oregon professor and longtime activist, Sarah Wald.  Sarah is the author of multiple books, and as you’ll hear today, a profound thinker on a wide variety of issues concerning the conservation and environmental justice communities.

This is one of my favorite conversations I’ve ever had on this show, in part because Sarah was so game to explore some really complicated points of tension within our movements. I definitely learned a lot, and was happy to have some of my beliefs and understandings challenged. 

The show email is [e-mail], please reach out anytime with guest ideas, feedback, your harshest criticisms, or if you’re interested in helping make this show!

Research Links/Show Notes:

Referenced: 

• Tradeoff Denialism: https://scholarship.law.columbia.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4885&context=faculty_scholarship
• Bill McKibben on tradeoffs and the promise of renewables: https://www.earthisland.org/journal/index.php/articles/entry/wind-and-solar-will-require-mining-but-not-as-much-as-fossil-fuels-bill-mckibben-sun-day

Sarah's Recommendations:

• The Anti-Creep Climate Initiative’s zine, Against the Ecofascist Creep.
• Olivia Aguilar, A Latine Outdoor Experience: Remembering, Resisting, and Reimagining (2025)
• Carolyn Finney, Black Faces, White Spaces: Reimagining the Relationship of African Americans to the Great Outdoors (2014)
•  Jessica Hernandez, Fresh Banana Leaves: Healing Indigenous Landscapes through Indigenous Science (2022)
• Tao Leigh Goffe, Dark Laboratory: On Columbus, the Caribbean, and the Origins of the Climate Crisis (2025)
• Tiya Miles, Wild Girls: How the Outdoors Shaped the Women Who Challenged a Nation (2023)
• Alexander Menrisky, Everyday Ecofascism: Crisis and Consumption in American Literature (2025)
• Kyle Powys Whyte “Against Crisis Epistemology” in Handbook of Critical Indigenous Studies (2021)
• Kyle Powys White, “Our Ancestors’ Dystopia Now: Indigenous Conservation and the Anthropocene” in the Routledge Companion to the Environmental Humanities (2017)

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