Tracey Heatherington - K. Sivaramakrishnan Reflection

Tracey Heatherington
University of British Columbia

Hello to Shivi and friends! 

I wish I could be with you all to celebrate Shivi’s many and marvellous contributions, and participate in the wonderful community of students and colleagues whom he has brought together. I am writing from Sardinia, where I am back doing some research into energy futures in the Mediterranean. Much has changed since I came here for my dissertation fieldwork thirty years ago, but the ethnography is still just as frenetic and overwhelming as it is transformative. 

Shivi, I want to thank you with all my heart for your informal mentorship to me when I was writing my first book. The time you took to engage with me made so much difference to my writing, to my understanding of the field, and to my own success as a young scholar. As the editor of the Culture, Place and Nature book series at the University of Washington Press, you stood by me when my manuscript got some tough critiques, and helped me work through how to address them, until I had the basis for an award-winning ethnography. Thank you for inviting me to push the boundaries of what it means to be a Europeanist and to think about my research in globally comparative terms. I have always been proud to be part of your wonderful series. 

Thank you especially for inviting me to get to know some of your own students at the workshop on Comparative Ecological Nationalisms in 2008. My fondest memory of it was the day when you were late to the workshop and everyone was wondering what had happened to you. When you arrived at last, word got around that you had stopped on the way there to rescue a cat from up a tree. I just smiled to myself, and thought that it wasn’t the first time. 

May you enjoy all the richness of time for more research and good company in your retirement! The best is yet to come.

With joy and affection, 
Tracey