Amedeo Policante
Amedeo Policante is a critical theorist and historian at NOVA University Lisbon, Portugal, and the author of three books, including Mutant Ecologies: Manufacturing Life in the Age of Genomic Capital, published in 2022, and The Pirate Myth: Genealogies of an Imperial Concept, published in 2015. CAF awarded Amedeo a grant for “Bear Homecoming,” which focuses on the decision to reintroduce the bear into the Trentino region of the Italian Alps, after they were made extinct in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Trentino’s rewilding project has been controversial since its inception, and Amedeo’s project aims to demonstrate to local policymakers that the continuation of rewilding is essential, through offering an alternative history and perspective on human–bear relations, highlighting the importance of their need to co-exist.