Acknowledgments
The chapters collected in this volume were, for the most part, first presented at a hybrid conference organized under the auspices of the research network Nature-Time-Responsibility (NTR) in October 2021. The event (we call it NTR 6) took place on unceded Indigenous lands at Concordia University in Tiohtià:ke/Montréal. Accordingly, the conference organizers and volume editors would like to recognize the Kanien’kehá:ka Nation as the custodians of the lands and waters on which the in-person participants gathered, and which continues to serve as host to some contributors. We wholeheartedly agree with the words of the Indigenous Directions team at Concordia: “Tiohtià:ke/Montréal is historically known as a gathering place for many First Nations. Today, it is home to a diverse population of Indigenous and other peoples. We respect the continued connections with the past, present and future in our ongoing relationships with Indigenous and other peoples within the Montréal community.” In this context, we also wish to express our deepest gratitude to Mona Polacca, who generously opened the conference with her teachings as a member of the International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers, and as a member of the Secretariat of the Indigenous World Forum on Water and Peace.
We would like to add some reflections upon the special significance the territorial acknowledgment holds for the conference and for this volume. As the major sponsor of both, the research network NTR understands itself as a forum for the intercultural exchange of ideas around the intersection of the themes of nature, time, and responsibility. This exchange of ideas, including Indigenous ideas, needs to avoid a self-interested extractivism of knowledge vis-à-vis Indigenous teachings. There is the worry that, initially, land is taken from Indigenous peoples; when careless use of that land destabilizes it, the dispossessors then try to mine Indigenous knowledge with which to fix it and learn how to live more sustainably. Further, we should not assume that the space for the exchange of ideas is neutral, when in fact, of course, access to such space is not the same for all. In addition, embodied minds need land upon which to live and breathe: land that has a history, which, in this case, is one of colonial dispossession and ongoing marginalization. This history needs to be acknowledged, including the limitations this may pose for access to the exchange of ideas. Another reason for the special significance of the territorial acknowledgment is the great significance of land and the environment to intergenerational justice, which is the theme of both this volume and the conference from which it has emerged. Many of the benefits and harms the current generation will leave for future people, in particular those affecting the long term, pass by way of the land. Future people, whatever they will be, will be of us as well as of the land, and of the earth. Like us, they will not only have to confront the legacy of climate and land destabilization, but their links with the history of colonialism.
Given the contributions of the conference to the volume, the coeditors wish to thank all those whose funding or support made the hybrid event possible: the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, with special thanks to Professor Jing Iris Hu for serving as Principal Investigator and Professor Matthias Fritsch as Coapplicant; the Alexander-von-Humboldt Foundation, Germany, which has been supportive of our activities over the years and indirectly helped fund the conference and this publication by giving NTR the Award for Innovative Networking Initiative; the Consulate General of the Federal Republic of Germany, Montréal, for hosting a wonderful reception; the Workgroup Representations of and Rights for the Environment of Earth Systems Governance (with special thanks to Sandy Lamalle); the Canadian Commission for the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization; and, at Concordia University, the Department of Philosophy, the Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies in Society and Culture; the Social Justice Centre, 4th Space (with special thanks to Anna Waclawek and Doug Moffat), and the Next-Generation Cities Institute (thank you, Ursula Eicker). We also thank all the conference participants and graduate student organizers, including Rebecca van der Post and Joëlle Dubé.
As with the previous NTR volume (Environmental Philosophy and East Asia: Nature, Time, Responsibility, edited by Hiroshi Abe, Matthias Fritsch, and Mario Wenning; Routledge, 2022), Rebecca van der Post has been a superb copy-editor and collaborator, whose keen eyes detected many faults the reader would otherwise have encountered. Doctoral student Tobias Bartneck, at Kyoto University, has created the index for the volume, and we are most grateful for his work. Last but not least, we express our special gratitude to the contributors to this volume, while looking back and forward in thanks to previous and future NTR conferences.
A previous version of Krushil Watene’s chapter in this volume was first published as part of Reimagining the Human–Environment Relationship: Indigenous Philosophy and Intergenerational Justice (United Nations University, 2022), which appeared at this website: https://unu.edu/cpr/project/reimagining-human-environment-relationship. We, and Professor Watene, greatly appreciate the permission to include this revised version.
