Conference Agenda

Mainstream environmentalism has a reputation as gloomy, nostalgic, or self-righteous, but environmentalist work outside these modes has potential to be more inclusive and effective. Nicole Seymour’s Bad Environmentalism (2018) makes this case through an examination of ecological art and performance that use what she calls “bad affects” to advance an alternative green politics. Inspired by Seymour, this roundtable gathers scholars to engage in “bad ecomusicology” and consider music and sound art that mobilize irreverence, mundanity, queerness, playfulness, or sexiness as part of environmental discourse.

Presenter 1 examines Stevie Wonder’s 1979 album Journey Through the Secret Life of Plants, arguing that its marginalization reveals narrow cultural expectations about environmental sound and who can create it. Panelist 2 explores an Aotearoa New Zealand competition for saxophone compositions designed to get the endangered kākāpō “in the mood,” sounding out how humor, romance, finance, and conservation intertwine through biopolitical investments in “amatonormativity” (Brake 2011). Panelist 3 critiques the pursuit of “novel sonics” in field recording, highlighting how the search for unheard sounds can romanticize environmental difference and overlook the creative potential of familiar soundscapes. Panelist 4 examines Tom Lehrer’s subversive 1950s and 60s comedy, demonstrating how his songs offered audiences humorous yet provocative ways to confront environmental and existential crises while operating within the mainstream. Panelist 5 analyzes Annie Sprinkle and Beth Stephens’s 2024 audio installation “Forest as Lover” to show how their ecosexual approach uses intimate, typically private sonic practices to transform the forest into a playful and erotic site.