Universities, Climate Resilience, and Future-Worlding: An Ethnographic Exploration of Knowledge Networks in the Pacific and Caribbean Region

Universities can be at the forefront of the international
collaborative effort necessary to address climate change
issues. In this study, I aim to explore climate knowledge
networks within Pacific universities and their wider information
communities. I will investigate situated knowledges on climate
risk and food resilience within urban coastal communities and
the flows of knowledge between universities and community based
organisations. Probing sites of creative tension and
disjuncture in the knowledges produced and disseminated by
universities and the lived, vernacular knowledge of climate in
these communities will provide a more nuanced view of how
climate knowledges are formed and given authority. Through
highlighting the ways in which knowledge networks are
entangled in the pre-established institutional and social milieu,
I will track pathways attempting an equitable virtual knowledge
network across Pacific and Caribbean universities. This
research will support the Association of Commonwealth
Universities Climate Resilience Network promoting
endogenous modes of sustainable development in small island
developing states (SIDS).