David Farrier
Professor of Literature and the Environment
- English Literature
- School of Literatures, Languages and Cultures
Contact details
- Tel: +44 (0)131 650 3607
- Email: David.Farrier@ed.ac.uk
- Web: Edinburgh Research Explorer profile
Address
- Street
-
Room 2.52
50 George Square - City
- Edinburgh
- Post code
- EH8 9LH
Availability
Office Hour: Mondays 11.00am - 12.00pm
Background
David Farrier studied at the University of Leeds (BA, MA, PhD). Before being appointed at Edinburgh in 2010, he was Lecturer in Postcolonial Literature for four years at the University of Leicester (where he was awarded a University Teaching Award in 2008). In 2017 he held a Leverhulme Visiting Fellowship at the University of New South Wales.
Research summary
David's most recent books consider the new reality of the Anthropocene. Anthropocene Poetics: Deep Time, Sacrifice Zones, and Extinction (Minnesota Press, 2019) is a study of contemporary environmental poetry, and Footprints: In Search of Future Fossils (4th Estate/Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2020) explores what traces of present societies will persist in the deep future. Footprints won the Royal Society of Literature's Giles St Aubyn award for unpublished non-fiction in 2017. David is particularly interested in how literature, especially poetry, responds to the challenges of the Anthropocene.
Past research interests
David is also the author of Postcolonial Asylum (Liverpool University Press, 2011), and Unsettled Narratives (Routledge, 2007).Project activity
David convenes the Edinburgh Environmental Humanities Network.
He spent three months as a visiting scholar at the University of New South Wales in 2017, courtesy of a Leverhulme Fellowship.
In 2016 David was an expert advisor on 'Deep Time,' the 2016 Edinburgh International Festival opening evet, seen live by over 25,000 people.
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On lyric shame and extinction
In:
Green Letters: Studies in Ecocriticism, vol. 26, pp. 145-156
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/14688417.2022.2079546
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Deep time and domestication in Vahni (Anthony Ezekiel) Capildeos' 'Dog or Wolf'
(7 pages)
In:
Worldviews: Global Religions, Culture, Ecology, vol. 26, pp. 260-266
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1163/15685357-tat00001
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
The dust of ancient suns: Making art and meaning from the depths of deep time
In:
Lit Hub
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
When the asteroid hit
In:
Prospect Magazine
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Book/Film/Article review (Published) -
Why we are living in an era of unnatural selection
In:
BBC Future
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
We're gonna carry that weight a long time
In:
Emergence Magazine
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
How Cities will Fossilise
In:
BBC Future
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
How great art can help you travel through time
In:
The Daily Telegraph
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
Opinion: Our greatest libraries are melting away
In:
The Washington Post
Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article (Published) -
A tale told to the future
Research output: › Chapter (Published)
In the press
Selected Media Appearances:
BBC Radio 3 Free Thinking: Deep Time and Human History
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000h09v
ABC Nightlife: The Death of Cities - Fossilized Remains of the Future
Little Atoms: Footprints by David Farrier
https://shows.acast.com/littleatoms/episodes/littleatoms639-davidfarriersfootprints
Luis Q interviews David Farrier
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LbEwfO13LkU
Washington Post Opinion: Our Greatest Libraries are Melting Away