Cynthia Barnett

CYNTHIA BARNETT is an author and environmentalist based in Gainesville, Florida. This presentation is sponsored by the Tallahassee Scientific Society as part of their Horizons 2023 speaker series. Tickets for this talk are available at the TSS website.

The human fascination with seashells is primal. In the 1950s, the nation burned with a shell-collecting fever only a Florida beach vacation could cure. Traveling from Florida to the Bahamas to the Maldives, West Africa, and beyond, Barnett uncovers the ancient history of shells as global currency, their use as religious and luxury objects, and the rarely appreciated but remarkable creatures that make them. While shells reveal how humans have altered the climate and the sea—down to its very chemistry—they are also sentinels of hope for coastal adaptation for climate change, alternative energy and other solutions that lie beneath the waves. Barnett illuminates the beauty and wonder of seashells as well as the human ingenuity and scientific solutions they represent for our warming world.