From Nature ecology & evolution:
Perspective
Published: 24 May 2021
Decoloniality and anti-oppressive practices for a more ethical ecologyChristopher H. Trisos, Jess Auerbach & Madhusudan Katti
Nature Ecology & Evolution (2021)Cite this article… Fig. 1: The fingerprint of colonialism on ecology today.
Map showing the minimum estimate for each country of the number of bird species for which the Latin binomial name is based on a European person. Hundreds of bird species have been named after European surnames, with most of these species occurring outside Europe in formerly colonized countries. Taxonomy is used to organize the world into recognizable units, and taxonomists frequently name species after colleagues or wealthy patrons from the Global North.
Do you ever get the impression that the goal is to spread ignorance? For example, printing a choropleth map with the South on top makes everybody feel more virtuous, but it’s cognitively exhausting to get any information out of it. It’s easier to make sense of it even with the scale turned upside down:
