Sounding the alarm: Notes from the Editor-in-Chief Alexandrine Boudreault-Fournier

I n the fall of 2023, we launched a special call for papers titled "Sounding the alarm" for Anthropologica's newest section, "Seedings," a section dedicated to planting and growing ideas related to current events and debates.Even though we launched our call to "sound the alarm" over a year ago, it is frightening to realize how relevant it is today, perhaps even more so than it was then.Let's look back.Summer 2023 was officially the hottest on record everywhere in the world.In Canada, the 2023 wildfire season was the most destructive remembered, "like no other year, by a stupendous margin" 1 with more than 6,500 wildfires reported by the beginning of September.But Canada was not the only country with these terrifying figures.Unparalleled wildfires in the northern hemisphere destroyed millions of acres of boreal forests, including in Russia, Greece, Portugal and Maui, Hawaii.As we write these lines, thousands of firefighters are still battling the flames in densely populated Los Angeles County.Wildfires are now anticipated calamitous events that the government, people, and survivors must, sooner or later, prepare to fight.Yet, wildfires are striking evidence-a clear alarm bell-that we are losing ground in this quickly and dramatically changing world.