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Writer's pictureNaomi Duncan-Todd

Geopolitics, Apocalypse and Climate Change: An Interview with Dr Tristan Sturm

Last week, I had the pleasure of interviewing Dr Tristan Sturm, Senior Lecturer of Geography at Queen's University, Belfast. In this interview, we discuss why Tristan believes Geography matters, his journey to becoming a Geography lecturer as well as his new and upcoming book projects. We also discuss the modules Tristan teaches throughout the Undergraduate Geography degree and Masters in Geopolitics here at QUB.


Dr Tristan Sturm

Q1. Why do you think Geography matters and why should people study Geography?


I would take this in two directions: vocation and academia. To start with vocation, few degrees are vocational. If you did a degree in Politics, History or Anthropology, none of them have an obvious transition to a place of employment. Such classical degree subjects, Geography included, are academic and cumulative of their disciplinary research. But what I think sets Geography apart is that it isn't simply humanities, social sciences, sciences or technology and technological techniques. Rather, it encompasses all those things. In the United States, you might call it a kind of liberal arts degree, where you take sciences and social sciences at the same time. What does that mean for transitioning into the workplace? Employers want somebody who's going to hit the ground running when they ask you to do something: Write a critical policy brief for me; Do some statistical analysis; etc You’re going to need some GIS skills. So, with a Geography degree you go into the workforce with an incredible breadth of all these different skills that you can

present and have this full CV that allows you to sell yourself in a competitive marketplace. And we've seen that success with our students. You know, they do very well in the marketplace, and Geography is well situated.


To add to that: what are the two things I think humanity should be most concerned about at this very moment? It is Climate Change and Geopolitics! To begin with climate change, how has the penny not dropped for all University disciplines? Climate change is the most important question of our time. The one that has the most implications for new generations in the future. And Geography has always been interested in environment, nature and society relations. Our students, therefore, are well situated and trained to tackle these new industries arising around Climate Change not only because of those skills they have learned in writing, critical thinking, technological skills, but also the science-based skills. All of themes and skills are transferable to the workplace within a theme of human-environment relations, and I think that sets us apart to be on the cutting edge of what employers want.


The other big question of our time is Geopolitics. For the first time since WW2, we have a state invading another state in Europe for territorial gains. This question of Geopolitics is front and center within our society, I would argue the second largest threat after Climate Change. And what do we have at Queen's University? Well, we have two master programmes; one in Climate Change and another in Geopolitics. These are the two most important questions of our time.

Secondly, the academic track. Geography is a fascinating discipline. And in many ways, I have the latitude to do almost whatever I want within the confines of how I define Geography, which is structured around the questions of space and the way that the world is divided up. And I love that. I love that at any given moment, I can transition to a new topic. It feels like an open world to me rather than a closed off one. And many disciplines feel like silos, where they only study and reference what happens within them. Geography is not like that. We are not precious about our disciplinary boundaries. We're very open to having conversations across boundaries, and it's a fascinating place to be. And I couldn't be happier in a place like Geography at Queen's University, Belfast.


Q2. If you had to describe your journey in becoming a Geography Lecturer, how would you describe it and how did you get to where you are now?


It is probably not the one you would expect. I am Canadian, I moved almost every year of my life from the age of 5. I've lived in Belfast longer than anywhere else. I've lived here for eight years and the second longest period I've lived somewhere was five years in a place called Medicine Hat, Alberta, Canada. I graduated High School in Medicine Hat, and I became a welder at a Garbage Truck Company, but found, as one would expect, welding not to be the most intellectually stimulating vocation.


Then I decided to enroll in Medicine Hat Community College in an accountancy programme. Whilst doing this, I took one elective, and that elective was Geography. And that teacher, his

name was Ben Moffat, opened my eyes to this brilliant subject. I then enrolled in the University of Victoria, Canada to finish my degree in Geography and Political Science.


After that I went to teach English in Japan for a year. I was in a city called Matsue, the capital of Shimane Prefecture, and I enjoyed that. I would start teaching at 12pm and finish at 8pm. I knew no one and spent my time reading the disciplines of Geography and International Relations. I just devoured everything about Geography. Then I enrolled in a master's degree at Carleton University in Ottawa. I worked with a scholar named Simon Dalby, who coined the term Critical Geopolitics. During that Masters, I published my first academic paper, which made a big difference for me and allowed me to get scholarships to do a PhD.


I did a PhD at UCLA, which is the University of California, Los Angeles. It was a great experience; I taught there for a while and worked with a well-known scholar named John Agnew who works in Geopolitics. During my PhD, I also lived in Jerusalem for a year where I did my fieldwork. After that, I went to the University of British Columbia in Vancouver to do a postdoctoral degree. I taught there for a little bit as well. Then I went to York University, which is in Toronto, and I taught there for two years. I then ended up in Belfast and have been loving it ever since.


Q3. What kind of research projects are you currently working on?


Since my Master’s degree, I have been interested in the relationship between geopolitics and religion and specifically the relationship between geopolitics and apocalyptic thought. We're living in a time where I think it's very debilitating for students and the public alike, academics even, to think far into the future when everything seems to be so set up as catastrophe.

And so, my interest is in studying the various groups who either believe the apocalypse is upon us or refute it. And so, I have two books coming out. One I am editing is called, 'The Bloomsbury Handbook of Apocalypticism and Millennialism'.. The other is called, 'Apocalyptic Conspiracism', which is about the ways in which cultures of American evangelicalism, apocalyptic theology and rightward conspiracism have formed a kind of constituency. This is what me and my co-author call 'Apocalyptic Conspiracism', that is productive of alternative truths concerning Climate Change and COVID-19. It's a fascinating piece and it'll probably take me a year to write, but that's my focus now.


So, I'm interested in Geopolitics, Apocalypse and Climate Change, and the intersection of those three things, which I think are very well suited to the questions of our time and what we offer in Geography at QUB.


Q4. What sort of modules do you teach in levels 2 and 3 of the Undergraduate Geography Degree?


For second years, we are running three fieldtrips this year: Malta, Belgium and the Netherlands. I coordinate the Malta module, which is our Human Geography focused module. Malta is great. It's a small island, the airport runs almost half the length of the island, and this is brilliant for

fieldwork, right? because it's very difficult for students to get lost, but they feel comfortable enough to go out into these villages, where people speak enough English that they can get by. But it feels foreign enough for students to feel unsettled by it. And they practice all those skills they've learned in the last year and a half of their degree. It's always the highlight of our students' career. If they can find the money to do it, I highly recommend any of the fieldwork modules. Of course, I'm biased towards Malta. I like the way that we structure it. We give you a lot of room to explore your ideas and to create your own content and do your own studies. Each night we do a set of presentations and those students who did the Malta field trip, I noticed in the third year, are always the best presenters because we've really pushed them to be excellent. You know, they speak from the heart, are not concerned about all the details and just give compelling presentations and that is what we want to see.


In third year, I teach a very popular module called “Environmental Geopolitics.” Most of our Climate Change modules are science-based, taught by Andrew, Al, Donal, Helen, Graeme and Jenny. However, I take a political perspective on Climate Change, and I look at the ways in which Climate Change is also a geopolitical issue. Of course, it is a geopolitical issue in the ways in which Climate Change and the gases that we've produced in different countries are unequal, but also the ways that those gases affect different countries is unequal. And so, remember that Geography at its base, is about inequality. It is about borders between different people and different spaces. And those inequalities are crucial to the division between my space, your space, more things and less things. But also, the ways in which those gases flow over borders. They don't consider borders or boundaries when they're flowing over spaces. But the ways we decide to combat Climate Change are done geopolitically too. It's up to different states. We live in a sovereign territorial state system, where each state decides what's going to happen within that state parameter. And there's very little incentive for them to make big decisions around Climate Change, whether donating money to those precarious states or reducing the emissions of greenhouse gases. The quagmire there is that very little has been done and yet it is the states that are charged with solving our Climate Change problem. In this module, we go through all sorts of issues. We look at geoengineering as well as the history of Climate Change and the history of Geopolitics within Climate Change. It's a fascinating module. I really love teaching it every year. Within it, we do a COP Model UN, where each person becomes a state and must argue with each other with incentives to limit global heating to 1.5C. Students love it and it brings out the best and worst in them. It's good for them to understand the implications and how difficult it is to solve the problems we have in the state system.


Q5. What modules do you offer throughout the Geopolitics Masters?


The master's degree is run in collaboration with the Politics degree in the School of HAPP. The introductory module is called Critical Geopolitics. We introduce students to the history of the concept and how it is employed in current affairs. Then the students take two elective modules in Politics and that can be on anything from political economy to gender, and feminism. This year, I taught a module focusing on religious geopolitics. Thinking about the ways in which religion is

embedded within geopolitical thought. But also, the ways in which certain religions have their own geopolitics and try to make the world into the image of their own maps. The other core module taught in the MA in Geopolitics concerns territory and sovereignty. So, hard geopolitical thinking that would be more concerned with issues like the war on Ukraine. In sum, there is both culturally centered geopolitics, but then also much more practical based International Relations. It's proven to be very popular. You know, every year about half the students are Geographers. But this year we have everyone from Journalism to Sociology to Anthropology, because Geopolitics is such a current and interesting topic, students want to learn and engage with the topic.

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