Laboratory for Environmental Narrative Strategies

Ursula Heise, is the Marcia H. Howard Chair in Literary Studies at the Department of English and the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability at UCLA.  She spoke with Voices of America about LA’s birds, urbanization and managing wildlife in cities. 

Jon Christensen, founder of the Laboratory for Environmental Narrative Strategies, write about a recent public lands act that passed in the house and senate.

UCLA’s Jon Christensen spoke with my news LA about a recent measure by LA county on increasing funding for park-poor neighborhoods. “The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously Tuesday to allocate at least 30 percent of parks funding generated by a parcel tax approved in 2016 to communities deemed to be high-need. The...

Jon Christensen is an adjunct assistant professor in the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, the Department of History, and the Center for Digital Humanities at the University of California, Los Angeles. In this AP article, Christensen explains why Nebraska may be hesitant to adopt a climate change plan: “The reluctance in Nebraska may be...

Ursula K. Heise is the Marcia H. Howard Chair in Literary Studies at the Department of English and the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability at UCLA. Brad Shaffer is the UCLA La Kretz Center Director and Distinguished Professor. In this article: “Is the Urban Jungle the Answer to Helping Some Endangered Species?” Heise and Shaffer...

Jon Christensen is an adjunct assistant professor in the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, the Department of History, and the Center for Digital Humanities at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is a journalist-in-residence at the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, a founder of the Laboratory for Environmental Narrative Strategies in the...

Jon Christensen is an adjunct assistant professor in the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, the Department of History, and the Center for Digital Humanities at UCLA.  In this LA Times article, Christensen talks about the narrative surrounding California wildfires. 

Concerns about gentrification in Los Angeles have reached the point where it’s not just art galleries and coffee shops that trigger alarm bells — parks and bicycle paths are in the crosshairs. Things are so bad that a proposal to improve bike safety and pedestrian access to parks along the Los Angeles River was recently...

"[W]hat if we deliberately offered sanctuary to endangered species in our cities—those that are native, of course, but also those that are not?" - Ursula Heise, in CityLab.

"Parrots are not uncommon around Los Angeles. More than a dozen different species have established wild populations in the area, descendants of pet birds that escaped at some point and managed to make a home for themselves in some part of the sprawling metropolis," Ursula Heise writes in Elemental.

Brad Shaffer, a biology professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, notes that cities not only destroy habitat, but also create new living spaces for animals and plants. (Wired)

Published as part of an environmental storytelling partnership with the Laboratory for Environmental Narrative Strategies (LENS) at UCLA, with extensive contributions from faculty and MFA students in UCLA’s documentary film program in the School of Theater, Film and Television. The second storyline considers how Los Angeles has inadvertently become a sanctuary city for non-native animal species that are sometimes...