About the researcher

Mat’s a writer, visual artist and MA lecturer in Falmouth School of Art. His research is currently focused on co-curating the Ecological Citizenship peer-learning experiment seeded at Falmouth University in summer 2023. 

External links

Mat Osmond headshot
Mat Osmond

PhD abstract

Thesis title

Coming Unstuck: How might poetic practice foster adaptive response-ability to the metacrisis?  

Abstract

A Necessary Interruption  

Returning to the PGR school after a one-year interruption I’m bringing a sample of journalling practice related to the Ecological Citizenship (Eco-Cit) project that I’ve been engaged with throughout that time. This engagement has been closely informed by the critical perspective of the Gesturing Towards Decolonial Futures (GDTF) research and arts fellowship, whose work I’ve therefore foregrounded here.  

There are four sections to this submission: 1. Spaces for Knowing provides a short contextual overview of the connectivity between Eco-Cit and my wider research project. Section 2. Slow Down to Grow Up reflects on Eco-Cit’s work with reference to the GDTF’s reflexive praxis of ‘depth education’. Referred to elsewhere by GDTF as ‘climate education otherwise’, depth education includes but is not limited to a necessarily interruptive role, for instance when confronted by misleading or even wilfully deceptive narratives at play within mainstream climate education, within some iterations of climate-focussed activism, and within our own lived experience.  

While neither this project nor Eco-Cit itself is defined by an adversarial stance, the latter’s proximity since its inception with recent student and alumni activism has brought this element of its work to the fore, as a dilemma worthy of an honest - and ongoing - reckoning. This question is spoken to in Section 3. Meeting the Demand, and again in Section 4. Response-ability.  

Interests, honours & awards

Key research interests

  • Climate & ecological emergency (CEE)
  • Ecological grief
  • Eco-spirituality
  • The Anthropocene
  • Creative writing
  • Authorial illustration  

Honours and awards

  • Michael Marks award for Poetry Illustration, 2015