Turning the tide

: shining a light on climate change culpability through Cli-Fi

Abstract

The thesis examines how fiction can interrogate guilt and culpability for climate change through the conventions of crime fiction. Drawing on analyses by Trexler, Johns-Putra, Goodbody and Schneider-Mayerson, the critical piece reviews the challenges Goodbody and Admussen identify for climate change fiction (cli-fi) and posits an additional challenge of depicting the combination of misinformation, toxic inequality and human susceptibility to emotive messaging which impedes effective climate action. While rejecting reductive depictions of capitalism as the climate crisis’s sole cause, the thesis argues for capitalism’s pre-eminence as a factor lying towards one end of Dimick’s continuum of culpability. A range of novels are assessed against the challenges posed for cli-fi, including works categorised by Stewart as crimate fiction for their exploration of climate guilt and culpability. Marshall’s assessment of the psychologies of climate change scepticism, in combination with Schneider-Mayerson’s empirical work on the impact of cli-fi and McTaggart’s analysis of the impact of Edward Abbey’s The Monkeywrench Gang, is used to examine how cli-fi pedagogy can extend its messaging beyond the already converted. The thesis posits that cli-fi should eschew tropes of individual heroes, technological salvation and a reliance on empathy as a primary emotional vector for reader engagement and instead seek to stimulate emotions of hope and anger through narratives that privilege collective action over individual heroism.

The creative piece, Turning the Tide, is set in a flooded far-future where a capitalist corporation has an effective hegemony over a world of fragmented micro-nations. Beneath its superficial functionality the future society has dystopian elements. The protagonist is a detective from the island nation of Down collaborating with an officer from the rival nation of Antrim in investigating the murder of a corporate executive. The protagonist’s initial pro-corporate anti-protester mindset is positioned to appeal to conservative climate change sceptic readers intrigued by the ludic puzzle of the murder mystery. The narrative leads protagonist and the reader to an appreciation of the corporation’s culpability for toxic inequality and undermining of democracy. The novel’s ending aims to foster hope and anger, while illustrating the contemporary world’s risk of transitioning to such a future.

Date of Award	Jul 2024
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	Queen's University Belfast
Sponsors	Northern Ireland Department for the Economy
Supervisor	Andrew Pepper (Supervisor) & Oliver Dunnett (Supervisor)