Learning outcomes
Environmental emergencies and the climate crisis are among the great political, scientific, social, and economic challenges of the 21st century. Thus, the course aims at fostering the acquisition of a historical and critical awareness of the complex relationships between "history, environment and society" in the contemporary age, by focusing both on some emblematic historical case studies and on the issue of emergency from a historical and cultural perspective. The course also addresses the intersections between environmental issues, mass media and culture in the 20th century.
The student will thus be able to acquire cognitive and methodological tools to better understand, from a historical perspective, some environmental issues - such as, for instance, pollution, energy, waste, and climate change - that are currently relevant and have a strong impact on contemporary society.

Learning outcomes:
- knowledge of some of the main issues of both the contemporary ecology/environment debate and the social conflicts that this debate can trigger;
- knowledge of historical and social research methodologies applied to the study of the environment;
- ability to promote an appropriate culture of the environment by means of history and storytelling;
- ability to gain basic scientific knowledge (in an interdisciplinary perspective) and learning related "storytelling strategies";
- public speaking ability, communication and analytical skills.

Prerequisite
No prerequisite is required

Course content
The course consists of two main parts, which are complementary. The first preparatory part focuses on the issues and problems of an environmental history of the contemporary age (about 6 hours), also discussing the recent notion of the Anthropocene. The second monographic part (about 62 hours) attempts to shed light on the historical relevance - as responsible for deep social transformations - of some environmental emergencies that have distinguished trends in contemporary history. The historical reconstruction of some case studies, with an emphasis also on the Italian context, provides an opportunity to deal with crucial issues that have fuelled the social, political and scientific debate on emergency and environmental management from the second half of the 20th century to the present. The energy issue is also discussed.
The main topics of the course are examined by dealing with some main focal points of analysis:
- the conflict over resources;
- the opposition between the State and civil society;
- the role of information and the mass media;
- the importance of remembrance.
In this part, the following topics are analysed:
- The emergence of the environmental question in the years of the "economic boom"
- Italy's environmental emergencies during the "economic boom"
- Love Canal, Rachel Carson and "Silent Spring"
- The environmental question in the 1970s: the limits to growth, the environmental policy of the United States and in Europe, the rise of environmentalism
- The Seveso disaster
- Environmental justice, ecological conflicts and civil rights
- The energy crisis of the Seventies and nuclear power
- The Chernobyl accident
- The Fukushima accident and the second Italian referendum on nuclear power
- Climate change and its role as potential trigger of crises (wars, famines, migrations, epidemics)
- The climate crisis: political and social history
- Climate denialism from the 1970s to Donald Trump
- The Green New Deal and the youth climate movements
- Climate wars and environmental refugees
- Wars and energy resources in the 20th and 21st centuries
- The East and the environmental transformations of the 20th century
- History of sustainable development
- Environment and imagery in twentieth-century culture.

Mode of delivery
The course is scheduled in 68 hours of lectures and seminars. Students are also encouraged to interact with each other and with the teacher during class. Seminars and workshops are provided in order t