For the University of Iceland’s 2026 Hugvísindaþing (Humanities Conference), a double-session featuring the Climate Change and Affect Network introduced new and ongoing research by its members.
Organised by Ole Martin Sandberg, the sessions commingled research contexts from network members based in the University of Iceland's Research Centres in Þingeyjarsveit and in Höfn, University of Bifröst, Iceland Academy of the Arts, as well as independent scholars. There was a strong subcurrent presenting climate and affect pedagogical approaches. This double panel surfaced a robust and lively network in its infancy but with promise for future collaboration. The session should become a staple of future Hugvísindaþing.
Topics presented over four hours included soil mutuality (Helga Ögmundardóttir), vegetal community (Gunndís Ýr Finnbogadóttir and Mariana Lucia Tamayo), glacial relations (Þorvarður Árnason and Angela Snæfellsjökuls Rawlings), just transition (Jean-Rémi Chareyre), sketching despair and radical hope in more-than-human constellations (Ólafur Páll Jónsson and Rán Flygenring), as well as ecofiction and speculative curation (Bergsveinn Þórsson and Thomas Pausz). On behalf of the research project Fókus: Centering Families in Iceland’s Just Transition, Dr. Rawlings introduced the in-progress manuscript “Just Ice: Econarratives of Kin Relations in a Time of Deglaciation” they are co-writing with Auður Aðalsteinsdóttir. The manuscript explores eighty years of rapid eco-familial transformations in Iceland through the lens and pen of literary and film fiction.
