This is the fifth event of the 2022-23 Mellon Sawyer Seminar Precarious Ecologies: Science and Social Justice in the Production of Environmental Knowledge.

Nearly a century after it was encased in concrete for flood control, the LA River has in recent years become a source of hope for a renewed urban ecology, as well as a site of controversy over how to achieve this vision. Artists, activists, landscape designers and others have worked to imagine what the river might become, whether for green space starved Angelenos or for our city’s nonhuman inhabitants. This panel, part of our Mellon Sawyer series on "Precarious Ecologies," brings together a range of thinkers to examine the possibilities and constraints of a revitalized LA River. 

Our panelists include artist Lauren Bon, landscape architect Jessica Hanson, activist mark! Lopez, anthropologist Sayd Randle, and Kizh-Gabrieliño tribal biologist Matthew Teutimez. USC historian William Deverell will serve as moderator. 

This event is co-sponsored by the USC Center on Science, Technology, and Public Life and the USC Center for Latinx and Latin American Studies with support from the Mellon Foundation’s Sawyer Seminar Program.