Settler colonialism originates ‘replacement’: Sarah Bracke, ‘The subject of population “replacement” anxieties and the spectre of coloniality’, Patterns of Prejudice, 2026

12Sep26

Abstract: Bracke’s article revisits population ‘replacement’ ideologies from an analytical vantage point of coloniality and takes this as a point of departure for a psychosocial exploration of ‘replacement’ anxieties. The article first attends to three prominent instances in the modern genealogy of population ‘replacement’ thinking: Le Grand Remplacement by Renaud Camus in the 2010s; the notion of Umvolkung in Nazi ideology in the late 1920s; and the concept of ‘race suicide’ in the United States at the turn of the twentieth century. For each of these distinct articulations of ‘replacement’ ideology, the question of European (settler) colonialism is further investigated and its significance for population ‘replacement’ anxieties demonstrated. This significance is subsequently brought to bear on the subject of ‘replacement’ anxieties, that is, subjects who fear they are being replaced. These subjects can be approached as ‘dethroned’ (Wendy Brown), that is, shaped by a sense of losing power to which they feel entitled. Studies of the far right, moreover, have consistently noted the ‘victim-perpetrator reversal’ (Ruth Wodak) in which these subjects engage. By considering the significance of coloniality, this reversal can be understood, with Frantz Fanon, as a projection of violence on to the Other inflicted by the Self, a projection fuelled by imperial paranoia (Anne McClintock) that pertains to an inaugural scene of colonial conquest.


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Blackberries as agents of settler coloniality: Carl-Jan Dihlmann, ‘Ontological security under invasive life conditions: Thinking With a blackberry on Canada’s Sunshine Coast’, EPE: Nature and Space, 2026

12Sep26

Abstract: The Sunshine Coast of southern British Columbia, Canada, is extensively populated by Himalayan blackberries (Rubus armeniacus), a species introduced to North America in the late nineteenth century. In their coexistence with other species, humans often categorize nonhuman life forms as either beneficial or detrimental. Yet the Himalayan blackberry challenges this binary classification: while widely recognized as an invasive species that threatens local biodiversity, it also serves as a valuable source of food for birds, mammals, and humans. Moreover, the city of Powell River celebrates this plant as a local emblem through its annual Blackberry Festival. At the same time, the city is engaged in a public debate about renaming itself, due to the controversial legacy of IsraelWood Powell, British Columbia’s first Superintendent of Indian Affairs, who the city is named after. Based on ethnographic fieldwork and qualitative interviews, this paper examines three human–blackberry entanglements, representing contrasting approaches to handling multispecies relations that are embedded within the legacies of settler colonialism and its extractive infrastructures. Conceptualizing present-day Powell River as the “Powell River Patch”, i.e., the outcome of imperial and industrial infrastructures, the analysis brings the concept of invasive life into conversation with the theory of ontological security. In doing so, the paper argues for understanding multispecies cohabitation not only as an ecological condition but also as a critical lens for examining contemporary political and societal challenges in the Anthropocene.


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Trout as agents of settler coloniality: Rune Flikke, Cecilia Salinas, Javier Ciancio, Juana Aigo, ‘Remodeling nature: Trout, borders, and the ongoing colonization of Argentine Patagonia’, EPE: Nature and Space, 2026

12Sep26

Abstract: This article examines the introduction of trout from the northern hemisphere as part of the colonial ordering of Argentine Patagonia. Since 1904, trout have been mobilized not simply as ecological interventions but as tools of state-building that have reshaped rivers and lakes and contributed to the displacement of indigenous peoples. Stocking programs initially provided strategic food during border conflicts with Chile and later anchored projects that aimed to modernize and ‘whiten’ the Argentine nation, through elite tourism and conservation initiatives such as the establishment of Nahuel Huapi National Park in 1934. We argue that these practices reinforced a mode of life that cast Mapuche-Chewelche indigenous communities as outsiders to the nation. Through episodes spanning the so-called “Conquest of the Desert” (1878–1885) to recent disputes over Lago del Desierto, we show how human–trout relations give material form to ongoing asymmetries of power, belonging, and dispossession. By treating trout as agents of coloniality the article demonstrates how ecological change has been inseparable from strengthening national borders, practices of exclusion and the enduring erasure of indigenous sovereignty in Patagonia since the region’s military conquest.


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Expropriation, inequality, settler colonialism (in the long run): Jeremy Bowles, Gabriel Koehler-Derrick, Michael Olson, ‘”To Hell or to Connacht”: Expropriation, Inequality, and Local Legacies of Settler Colonialism’, International Organization, 2026

10Sep26

Abstract: Violent upheavals in landownership following conquest often change not only the concentration of land across individuals, but also the inequality of its distribution between groups. We argue that variation in landowners’ group identity has important implications for the provision of local public goods. We test this claim by studying the aftermath of the Cromwellian Settlement in seventeenth-century Ireland. Leveraging the lottery-based allocation of expropriated Catholic land to distinct groups of English Protestants, we find significant local variation in the extent of Protestant landownership. Drawing on rich original data, we find fewer local public goods in the long run in areas with more Protestant elites, with the largest reductions in goods that were either directly elite-funded or disproportionately benefited the Catholic majority. The results illustrate how conquest reshapes not just institutions but also long-run local inequalities, and highlight the distinct consequences of between-group inequality for the provision of public goods.


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Data centres settle the land: Megan A. Carney, ‘”No One Drop for Data”: Restoring Metabolic Relations amidst Parasitic Settler Colonialism’, Antipode, 2026

09Sep26

Excerpt: Data centers are at the heart of metabolic injustices proliferating across much of the periurban and rural United States. Amidst this data center boom and its concomitant AI revolution, it is no surprise that the people and places most vulnerable to their myriad harms are the same people and places that have resisted centuries of colonization, extractive capitalism, land and livelihood dispossession, and environmental injustice. Tech billionaires and their allies at various scales of government argue that the expanding data-industrial complex is necessary to support the insatiable appetites of AI into the future. But at what and whose cost?


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Living and naming: Yacoub Al-Qasasfa, ‘Colonialism, the Politics of Naming and Lived Toponymy: Identity Struggle and Symbolic Erasure in Palestine’, Journal of Holy Land and Palestine Studies, 25, 2, 2026, pp. 215-247

09Sep26

Abstract: This article examines toponymic transformations in Palestine, exploring how naming practices shape spatial identity in contested geographies. Moving beyond viewing renaming solely as top-down dominance, the research adopts a comparative approach situating Palestine alongside Ireland and South Africa to unpack mechanisms of ‘Memoricide’ and symbolic resistance. Utilising qualitative methodology integrating historical discourse analysis with in-depth interviews, the study proposes the original concept of ‘Palestinian Lived Toponymy’. This framework explores how the relationship between name and place is continuously reshaped through daily mobility and inherited memory, rather than remaining a static map inscription. Findings indicate that toponymic change has evolved into ‘Digital Colonialism’ through navigation algorithms, while revealing community responses ranging from cognitive resistance to functional adaptation. The study concludes by emphasising ‘toponymic literacy’ as a vital tool for steadfastness (Sumud) against symbolic erasure, offering a critical assessment of how new technology and language generated global solidarity with Palestine and its lived toponymy.


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De-growing settler colonialism: Elena Gomez, ‘Degrowth and the Indigenous ecopoetics of dg nanouk okpik’s Blood Snow’, Textual Practice, 2026

09Sep26

Abstract: This article considers the ways poetry can attend to the tensions and compatibilities between degrowth and Indigenous sovereignty within a broader ecopoetics framework. Both Indigenous sovereignty and degrowth movements reject growth-based economic models and propose alternative future models that reimagine social and economic systems for planetary survival. At the same time, Indigenous activists are suspicious of settler-led ecological proposals that reproduce the violent hierarchies of settler colonialism. This article considers the distinctions and connections of these spheres through the Indigenous standpoint in contemporary lyric poetry. Through an analysis of key poems from the 2022 collection Blood Snow by Iñupiaq-Inuit poet dg nanouk okpik, this article finds that Indigenous subjectivity constructed within a place-based ecopoetic mode emphasises not only the specificity of natural environments but also the complex and multivalent relations that link social, economic and ecological spheres. Such a construction provides an essential intervention into degrowth discourse that might move towards a decentring of Western perspectives.


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The crime of settler indigenisation: Olivia Meier, ‘Playing Pretend: Why Indigenous Identity Fraud Demands a Crime’, UBC Law Review, 59, 2, 2026, pp. 465-508

09Sep26

Excerpt: This paper argues that Canadian law inadequately addresses Indigenous identity fraud, failing to prevent individuals from falsely claiming Indigenous status for personal or professional gain. It advocates for legal reform by proposing a stand-alone offence that incorporates Indigenous-led verification and proportionate penalties to prevent fraud, while upholding Indigenous cultural integrity and judicial fairness.


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Settler colonialism from the cities: Jiaxiang Liu, ‘The Japanese Paradigm of Settler Colonial Urbanism: Imperial Hokkaidō, Korea, and Manchuria’, Geography Compass, 2026

07Sep26

Abstract: This study examines Japanese settler colonialism through a comparative analysis of Hokkaidō, Korea, and Manchuria. Rather than treating these cases as a unified model of Japanese settler colonial practice, it suggests a potential paradigm, characterized by state-led colonial expansion and land appropriation, non-displacement exclusion of natives, and the reorganization of pre-existing social relations into new settler colonial orders. This formulation highlights the specificity of Japanese settler colonialism in Asia in relation to dominant Western models, while also showing how its practices varied across the cities of Sapporo, Seoul, and Anshan under different political-economic and ideological conditions. Drawing on the broader global transition in settler colonial forms from the 19th to the twentieth century, this study also reveals a historical transformation within Japanese settler colonialism, from the Hokkaidō model characterized by a settler majority, to the later colonial formations of Korea and Manchuria, where Japanese settlers remained privileged minorities ruling over much larger local populations. Meanwhile, this article underscores the significance of Indigenous agency in settler colonies by showing how Indigenous peoples contested, negotiated, and compromised within urban space. It is hoped that this paper will serve as a foundation for future geographers to apply a settler colonial perspective in more extensive studies of Japanese colonialism in Asia.


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The settler colonial archetype: Hanine Shehadeh, The Thousand-Year Crusade for Palestine: Zionist Christianity and the Settler Jew, University of California Press, 2027

07Sep26

Description: The Thousand-Year Crusade for Palestine traces how Europe’s conversion to Christianity—a religion foreign to its geographical core—forged the continent’s identity around a single fixation: the reconquest of Palestine. From crusading violence through the Protestant Reformation to French Republican nationalism, Hanine Shehadeh shows how Christian Europe built its idea of sovereignty, honor, and belonging by casting Jews and Arabs as its constitutive opposites—a redemptive formation that gradually racialized Western Christianity itself. Shehadeh argues that this Zionist Christian formation is the foundation of Western modernity. It is from within this history of Zionist Christian formation, not against it, that Jewish Zionism emerges at the close of the nineteenth century. Reading the French Revolution alongside Napoleon’s campaign to conquer Palestine, Shehadeh argues that Jewish Zionism absorbed the colonial-racist terms of European modernity—accepting the diasporic Jew’s alleged degeneracy and proposing redemption through empire in Palestine. The State of Israel emerges, in this light, not as a refuge from European history but as its most durable export.


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