
I was lucky enough to have a wonderful conversation about possible climate futures, not through a lens of disaster and doom but gritty possibility, radical hope and extraordinary courage.
Castlemaine local Alex Kelly and Melbourne academic John Wiseman joined me recently to talk about their futuring practices. John has just published a book called Hope and Courage in the Climate Crisis and Alex is a co-creator of The Things We Did Next.
You can watch this interview on YouTube

John is a Senior Research Fellow, Melbourne Climate Futures, University of Melbourne and is on the board of The Next Economy. He also takes beautiful, serene photos that you can see here. You can find links to his published work at his website which of course links to his most recent publication Hope and Courage in a Climate Crisis.
Alex is also very prolific and some of her projects and endeavours include the current audio experience called The Planting, which is part of The Things We Did Next. Locally she is involved in West End Resilience Group, The Orchard Keepers and the local women’s footy team The Falcons. She was a collaborating director and impact producer for the film In My Blood It Runs.
Links to references made in this episode:
- This Changes Everything
- The Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination
and their book - Tim Hollo essay “There’s no time left not to do everything”
- Jennifer Mills –Dyschronia
- Nancy McDinny – digging up parliament house Darwin
- Victor Steffenson
- N.K. Jemison – The Broken Earth Trilogy
- Kim Stanley Robinson – Ministry for the Future
- Refuge
- Robin Wall Kimmerer – Braiding Sweetgrass
- Rebecca Solnit – A Paradise Built in Hell
- “Hope with teeth” China Miéville
- “New stories” George Monbiot
- Claire G Coleman
- Occupy Sandy
- Station 11
This episode was created in 2022 as part of a series called Saltgrass: Turning the Goldfields Green, which was created with support from MAINfm and the Community Broadcasting Foundation.