New Books Network podcast: Black climates. Notes on race, our environment, and visions for equitable futures

In this podcast brought to you by the BISA Environment and Climate Politics Working Group we are meeting Selina Nwulu who has published her book Black Climates. Notes on Race, Our Environment, and Visions for Equitable Futures (Chatto & Windus, 2025). We haven't had the chance to share it yet, so are doing so today. 

In Black Climates: Notes on Race, Our Environment, and Visions for Equitable Futures (Chatto & Windus, 2025), Selina Nwulu reframes the crisis to encompass our disconnection from each other and the world around us. She argues that the root of climate change lies in historical colonial violence and ongoing exploitation, making it inherently racist.

Nwulu, former Young People's Laureate for London, uses her poetic and skilful voice to directly address Black British readers who have been previously ignored in mainstream environmental conversations. She includes interviews with a wide range of creatives and campaigners to explore a variety of subjects, including air pollution, prison ecology, disability justice, migration, food, nature, community care, and radical imagination.

This is an essential and empowering read for anyone who wants to fully understand the connections between Blackness and the climate crisis, providing the tools to envisage more equitable futures. 

Selina Nwulu is a well-known poet and her work has featured in Vogue, i-D and ES Magazine amongst others, and she has been commissioned by many different cultural institutions such as Southbank, Somerset House and Wellcome Trust. Selina was a Young Poet Laureate for London 2015-6, a prestigious award that recognizes talent and potential in the capital. Her debut chapbook, The Secrets I Let Slip, was published by Burning Eye Books in 2015 and is a Poetry Book Society recommendation. In 2019, she was shortlisted for the Brunel International African Poetry Prize and was a 2021 Arts Award Finalist for Environmental Writing.

Pauline Sophie Heinrichs is a lecturer in Climate and Energy Security. Her research focuses on global environmental politics with a particular focus on climate and energy security, climate justice grievances, international orders and questions concerning security and existential risks in a warming world. She currently holds a British Academy Knowledge Frontiers Grant working to develop a field critical actuarial science and climate justice. She co-directs the Centre for Integrated Research in Risk and Resilience (CIRRR) and the Environmental Security Research Group.