Photo of Geissler, Beate

Beate Geissler

Associate Professor

College of Architecture, Design, the Arts

Contact

Office Phone:

7736779855

Email:

beate@uic.edu

About

Areas of Expertise

  • Adolescents
  • Adults
  • Criminal Justice
  • Heroin
  • Interprofessional Collaboration

I'm an artist, I'm trying to understand substance dependencies in the Anthropocene.

Research Currently in Progress

Category: Research
Source of Funding: Max Planck for the History of Science, Has der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin

My project reflects on humanities situation in the Anthropocene through the metaphor of addiction. I want to study addiction and its impact through a trajectory of experience and knowledge that links together the biological, the social, the medical, the chemical, the legal, the cultural, the political and the technological. The metaphor of addiction is used here in two ways. First, as a speculative term through which to demonstrate and understand the substance ecologies existing in our environment, and, second, as an actual situation that humans establish in the material world. My goal is to harness the allegorical potential of addiction towards enriching the public debate and improving our understanding of ourselves.