Marking the boundaries of stratigraphy: Is stratigraphy able and willing to define, describe and explain the Anthropocene?

Abstract

This paper investigates the involvement of the stratigraphic community in the endeavour of defining the Anthropocene. Although much of the debate about the Anthropocene takes place outside of stratigraphy, the concept of the Anthropocene derives its distinctiveness and popularity from its geological dimension. In this context, the epistemic authority of stratigraphy is extended from ratifying geological epochs to verifying the Anthropocene more generally. The paper conceptualises this authority and examines the published stratigraphic literature to determine to what extent the stratigraphic community is able and willing to assume it. In doing so, the paper demonstrates how stratigraphy co‐produces its epistemic authority in regards to the Anthropocene.

The ‘Anthropocene Proposal’: A Possible Quandary and A Work-Around

“…In terms of the geological naming convention for suffixes including '-cene', the term 'Anthropocene' may pose a problem, at least within geological sciences, if it is used for the 'geologically contemporary' without referring to a geological epoch. However, the term seems to be established as a cross-disciplinary shorthand for our times, and geoscientists can do little about it [8]. As observed by Lorimer: "Regardless of what the International Commission on Stratigraphy decides, the genie is out of the bottle" [29] (p. 123).…”

“…That said, the term 'Anthropocene' is already extensively used in a wider non-geoscience sense across a variety of scholarly and public settings. Rolling back these wider usages may not be a realistic ambition, given that this is not a matter entirely within the control of chronostratigraphers [8] (p. 4).…”

“…When understood in that sense, the proposed re-naming of contemporary geological times is a paradigmatic shift in the perception of how to situate humans within nature (for examples, see [3][4][5][6][7]). That paradigmatic shift makes the proposal to amend the geological time scale an 'extra-geoscience' undertaking too, from which the chronostratigraphy of the Quaternary, and indeed "stratigraphy's epistemic authority over the Anthropocene" [8] (p. 1), cannot escape. Although mutually entangled, the two suggestions-to amend the geological time scale, and/or to name the unfolding times of anthropogenic global change the 'Anthropocene'-are not the same.…”

“…Consequently, chronostratigraphic methodologies are taken in this essay 'as given'. Thus, drawing on the first postulate of this essay, it is anticipated that the chronostratigraphers will do their scientific work thoroughly, notwithstanding that it is laden with societal constraints [7,8,[27][28][29][30]. Likewise, it is taken as a background assumption for the purposes of this essay that discussing anthropogenic global change requires engagement with issues like how to account for its history, environmental justice, social justice and system change [31][32][33][34].…”

The Anthropocene Working Group and its (inter-)disciplinarity

“…It systematically explores the content of a text by detecting themes in the material and specifying what is said about these themes by creating subcategories. I initially followed themes from a previous review of the published stratigraphic literature (Lundershausen 2018). In addition, I used an inductive approach to coding, following the concepts that emerged rather than applying pre-existing theoretical concepts to the material.…”