We are a learning community asking big questions. Because life feeds on life, death is indispensable to the healthy functioning of ecosystems and even evolution itself. One species, however, has developed the capacity to anticipate (and therefore dread) death and commandeer other species in service to increasing its numbers and its material consumption. Humanity is now operating well outside the planetary boundaries that characterized the Holocene, the interglacial “sweet spot” during which civilization emerged. The implications are profound: not only are we facing the end of “nature” as something separate from human culture, we also face the potential death of civilization as we know it.

We therefore ask ourselves: what are the political and ecological consequences of how individuals and societies approach death? And what can the current pandemic teach us about the political ecology of death? While death is a fact of life, questions of who lives, who dies, who decides, and with what consequences are also political ones. Our discussion is therefore informed by themes of justice, equity, power and authority, and political agency. At the same time, because mortality is also an intensely personal reality, we are deepening our self-inquiry through poetry, videos, contemplative practices, and personal exploration.

As we stand at the threshold of the Anthropocene, we hope our inquiry helps to inspire your own inquiry!