Kimberly R. Moffitt, dean of UMBC’s College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences, speaks about the inspiration for and journey of her career in an interview with mastersincommunications.com, which offers research-based data on graduate programs in media and communication studies nationwide along with insights from leaders in the field.

Moffitt shares that one of the key inspirations for her work in media and communication studies is her children. Her research and discourse on colorism, her Black hair syllabus website, and her criticism of Disney’s programming have come from observing how her children and other children of color are perceived and talked about in media. She also analyzes the major challenges with feminism and her identity as a womanist.

“I do not consider myself a feminist. I do embrace and consider myself a womanist, as Audre Lorde discusses it, however. I believe in seeing the uplift of African Americans in this nation,” says Moffitt. “I think it takes all of us to make that happen, and I am not really interested in privileging or prioritizing my own existence as a Black woman over that of a Black man.”

Leadership and communication

The scholarship that fueled Moffitt’s career paved a path to leadership as a dean during a worldwide pandemic and global calls for social justice. Moffitt credits her skills and knowledge of media and communication in helping her navigate these challenges, with grace and patience.

“The beauty of being in a discipline like communication is that we have space to engage a set of theoretical frameworks and concepts that other disciplines cannot,” says Moffitt. “Some of that is because we are a much younger discipline than most, but it is also because we are dealing with a number of contemporary issues that allow us to speak back to society about things as they are currently going on.”

Learn more about Dean Moffitt’s additional work with the Mellon Foundation-funded Global Asias Initiative. 

Written by Erle C. Ellis, professor of geography and environmental systems, UMBC.

When people talk about the “Anthropocene,” they typically picture the vast impact human societies are having on the planet, from rapid declines in biodiversity to increases in Earth’s temperature by burning fossil fuels.

Such massive planetary changes did not begin all at once at any single place or time.

That’s why it was controversial when, after over a decade of study and debate, an international committee of scientists – the Anthropocene Working Group – proposed to mark the Anthropocene as an epoch in the geologic time scale starting precisely in 1952. The marker was radioactive fallout from hydrogen bomb tests.

On March 4, 2024, the commission responsible for recognizing time units within our most recent period of geologic time – the Subcommission on Quarternary Stratigraphy – rejected that proposal, with 12 of 18 members voting no. These are the scientists most expert at reconstructing Earth’s history from the evidence in rocks. They determined that adding an Anthropocene Epoch – and terminating the Holocene Epoch – was not supported by the standards used to define epochs.

To be clear, this vote has no bearing on the overwhelming evidence that human societies are indeed transforming this planet.

As an ecologist who studies global change, I served on the Anthropocene Working Group from its start in 2009 until 2023. I resigned because I was convinced that this proposal defined the Anthropocene so narrowly that it would damage broader scientific and public understanding.

By tying the start of the human age to such a recent and devastating event – nuclear fallout – this proposal risked sowing confusion about the deep history of how humans are transforming the Earth, from climate change and biodiversity losses to pollution by plastics and tropical deforestation.

The original idea of the Anthropocene

In the years since the term Anthropocene was coined by Nobel Prize-winning atmospheric chemist Paul Crutzen in 2000, it has increasingly defined our times as an age of human-caused planetary transformation, from climate change to biodiversity loss, plastic pollution, megafires and much more.

Crutzen originally proposed that the Anthropocene began in the latter part of the 18th century, as a product of the Industrial age. He also noted that setting a more precise start date would be “arbitrary.”

According to geologists, we humans have been living in the Holocene Epoch for about 11,700 years, since the end of the last ice age.

Human societies began influencing Earth’s biodiversity and climate through agriculture thousands of years ago. These changes began to accelerate about five centuries ago with the colonial collision of the old and new worlds. And, as Crutzen noted, Earth’s climate really began to change with the increasing use of fossil fuels in the Industrial Revolution that began in the late 1700s.

The Anthropocene as an epoch

The rationale for proposing to define an Anthropocene Epoch starting around 1950 came from overwhelming evidence that many of the most consequential changes of the human age shifted upward dramatically about that time in a so-called “Great Acceleration” identified by climate scientist Will Steffen and others.

Radioisotopes like plutonium from hydrogen bomb tests conducted around this time left clear traces in soils, sediments, trees, corals and other potential geological records across the planet. The plutonium peak in the sediments of Crawford Lake in Ontario, Canada – chosen as the “golden spike” for determining the start of the Anthropocene Epoch – is well marked in the lake bed’s exceptionally clear sediment record.

The Anthropocene Epoch is dead; long live the Anthropocene

So why was the Anthropocene Epoch rejected? And what happens now?

The proposal to add an Anthropocene Epoch to the geological time scale was rejected for a variety of reasons, none of them related to the fact that human societies are changing this planet. In fact, the opposite is true.

If there is one main reason why geologists rejected this proposal, it is because its recent date and shallow depth are too narrow to encompass the deeper evidence of human-caused planetary change. As geologist Bill Ruddiman and others wrote in Science Magazine in 2015, “Does it really make sense to define the start of a human-dominated era millennia after most forests in arable regions had been cut for agriculture?”

Discussions of an Anthropocene Epoch aren’t over yet. But it is very unlikely that there will be an official Anthropocene Epoch declaration anytime soon.

The lack of a formal definition of an Anthropocene Epoch will not be a problem for science.

A scientific definition of the Anthropocene is already widely available in the form of the Anthropocene Event, which basically defines Anthropocene in simple geological terms as “a complex, transformative, and ongoing event analogous to the Great Oxidation Event and others in the geological record.”

So, despite the “no” vote on the Anthropocene Epoch, the Anthropocene will continue to be as useful as it has been for more than 20 years in stimulating discussions and research into the nature of human transformation of this planet.

This article was updated to clarify that a new attempt at an official Anthropocene Epoch declaration is unlikely soon. It is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article and see more than 250 UMBC articles available in The Conversation.

Meet Lisa Nissley ‘01, political science. Lisa is a legislative liaison at the Department of General Services, as well as the chair of the mominating committee on the UMBC Alumni Association Board of Directors. In her spare time, you can find her at the ice rink (her two children are involved in figure skating and ice hockey), the pool (swim team), or the lacrosse field. Lisa also enjoys reading, cooking (when it’s not required), walking, and being creative. Take it away, Lisa!

Q: What’s the one thing you’d want someone who hasn’t joined the UMBC community to know about the support you find here?

A: It truly is a community, and that is a feeling that stays with you. I have worked in the political world of campaigns and government relations and always seem to connect with UMBC grads, some I knew and others who were there before or after me. Also, the community is diverse, so there is always someone to connect with and learn from. 

Q: Where did you find support when you were here?

A. When I came to UMBC, I was eager to find community and feel like I belonged and I wanted to build my career. The interesting thing is how those two goals aligned. I joined student organizations, interned in Annapolis, and made friends in class. Some of those very people have been in my corner ever since.

Q: Who is someone in the community who has inspired you or supported you?

A: Dr. Tom Schaller—I always enjoyed his classes and he was involved in the political world, so I would see him out in the world doing what he talked about in class. He assigned long research papers we worked on throughout the semester, and what seemed daunting at first turned out to be very interesting. I was lucky to assist in his research. We have stayed in touch over the years and he has shared advice and guidance throughout my career.

Q: Tell us more about your journey from UMBC to your current role.

A: I actually transferred to UMBC and didn’t expect to stay, but I loved it! I eventually graduated in 2001 with a political science degree. Over the years since graduating, I have been a state employee working in the legislative branch and various state agencies doing policy and government relations. Recently, I started at the Department of General Services in the legislative office. I am enjoying being back in Annapolis full-time and being part of the legislative process.

Q: How have you given back?

A. I serve on the UMBC Alumni Association Board of Directors (AABOD) as chair of the nominating committee. I really enjoy giving back to the UMBC community in this way. We work to have a diverse board that represents the alumni community, and I’m always impressed by the exciting things our alumni are doing out in the world. I also give annually to the Alumni Endowed Scholarship Fund. Through the Alumni Endowed Scholarship, the AABOD strives to make a difference in the lives of deserving students, to help them achieve their dream of receiving a university degree and joining the alumni community.

About the Alumni Association Board of Directors

UMBC’s Alumni Association is a non ­dues-paying organization and is led by a volunteerBoard of Directors—volunteer graduates, like Lisa, who support advancing the mission and vision of the association and, by extension, UMBC, through their visibility as alumni leaders and active participants in the ongoing work of the board and its committees.

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UMBC’s greatest strength is its people. When people meet Retrievers and hear about the passion they bring, the relationships they create, the ways they support each other, and the commitment they have to inclusive excellence, they truly get a sense of our community. That’s what “Meet a Retriever” is all about.

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