Nuclear Geographies and Nuclear Issues

Abstract

Nuclear geographies and geographers contemplate the significance of nuclear technologies and issues for humans, nonhumans, and ecologies in the past, present, and future. This definition highlights how radiation interacts across different scales and mobilities by considering the significance of their relations to humans, nonhumans, ecologies, and materialities. The field brings together diverse geographical approaches to understand nuclear medicine, warfare, energy, and other nuclear technologies. With its focus on social, political, cultural, economic, and ecological consequences, nuclear geographies trace the way that nuclear legacies intersect with contemporary and future challenges. While a process of decolonization of knowledge has begun, more work is needed to highlight how and why the benefits and risks of nuclear technologies are unevenly distributed across lines of race, class, and gender, presenting threats to vulnerable human and nonhuman communities and perpetuating spatial inequalities. This definition provides a toolkit with which to approach key themes – landscapes, zones, and communities; materialities, culture, and the more‐than‐human; politics, activism, and postcolonialism – and with which to consider future directions.