ABSTRACT

Academic conferences have a large carbon footprint due to long-distance travel by participants and contribute to increased consumption in other ways. With reference to Stephen Sterling’s distinction between education about sustainability and education for sustainability, the aim of the article is to address the question of in what sense and to what extent was the NGM 2019 conference on sustainable geographies sustainable in practice? Accordingly, the author draws on her own experience as a conference participant, information about a carbon budget provided by the host institution, and e-mail correspondence with both the head of the organizing committee of NGM 2019 and the environmental manager of the host institution, NTNU. The author argues that while the conference was about and for sustainability, sustainability in practice was not achieved to an extent that the conference could be described as sustainable in Sterling’s terms. In conclusion, the article’s contribution is to initiate a conversation within Nordic geography about sustainability as a scholarly aspiration and how to conduct sustainable geography conferences in the future.

摘要

由于参加者的长途旅行，学术会议的碳足迹很大，并以其他方式增加了消费量。关于斯蒂芬·斯特林（Stephen Sterling）关于可持续发展的教育与促进可持续发展的教育之间的区别，本文的目的是解决在实践中可持续发展的NGM 2019可持续地理会议在什么意义上以及在何种程度上可持续发展的问题？因此，作者借鉴了自己作为会议参与者的经验，与主办机构提供的碳预算有关的信息以及与NGM 2019组委会负责人和主办机构环境经理的电子邮件往来， NTNU。作者认为，尽管会议是关于可持续性的，实践中的可持续性没有达到一定程度，以至于会议可以用英镑的术语描述为可持续性。总而言之，本文的贡献是在北欧地理学领域内发起了关于可持续性的对话，这是学术上的抱负，以及未来如何举办可持续性地理学会议。