The City as Commons: Extreme Urban Heat and Stories for a Living Future
Photo by King of Hearts CC BY-SA 4.0
Global Rise: Stories for the Future and Climate Film Festival, hosted by Anew, invite you to our second summer gathering to imagine new stories that ignite conversations around urban heat equity in New York City.
For this event, we’ll host a panel conversation with experts in urban heat, followed by a collaborative storytelling workshop, with time to network and connect with fellow writers, filmmakers, and climate-engaged creatives throughout.
The focus of this gathering is urgent, as global warming and the heat crisis are rising faster than public awareness. Extreme heat is the deadliest weather-related hazard in the United States, with more Americans dying in heat waves than in hurricanes, tornadoes, and floods combined. Cities face higher temperatures than suburban and rural areas and require specific strategies and infrastructure to address the impacts.
To ground our understanding of the impacts of heat in NYC, we'll be joined by scientists and experts, Anamika Shreevastava and Mehdi Heris. Dr Anamika Shreevastava is an Assistant Professor at NYU Tandon and the Center for Urban Science & Progress, who studies how extreme heat emerges unevenly across city neighborhoods and creates fractal urban heat islets. Her work in urban design includes using sensing technology and informatics to inform city policy and decision-makers in creative ways. Dr Medhi Heris, Assistant Professor in Urban Policy and Planning at Hunter College, is currently leading the city's Urban Heat Mitigation Portal project. His work bridges the science of urban ecosystems with city planning to address heat mitigation and green infrastructure in planning processes and policy.
With this grounding in place, we'll turn from science and data to dramatic narrative, exercising our imaginations to craft stories that illuminate compelling solutions.
Bring a notebook. Bring your curiosity. Bring what you've been thinking about since last time. Come to create a new project or refine a piece in a collaborative workshop. Or just come listen!
Please note: While this evening is part of a series of gatherings, you don’t need to have attended before to attend this one. Each gathering is designed to stand alone as well as exist within the larger narrative of climate justice and the city.
If you are a filmmaker, writer, journalist, or creative storyteller… We are looking to support new narratives that illuminate climate justice in New York City. All storytellers–from emerging to established–are invited to submit a story proposal (approx 500 words) in the medium of your choice. Selected projects will be developed with the support of the Global Rise team and presented at the Climate Film Festival in September. Extended deadline is July 3, 2026, via this link. (Your story does not need to focus on heat specifically–we welcome proposals addressing NYC climate justice issues at large.)
Global Rise Co-Founders & Facilitators:
Global Rise: Stories for the Future creates innovative strategies for new narratives. We work with creatives and community leaders to examine the interdisciplinary role of science, humanities, and imagination in crafting rich climate stories across media. We believe climate storytelling is most powerful when rooted in the landscapes, communities, systems, and cultures where climate change is lived.
Jessie Keyt — Writer, film scholar, and international script consultant. Co-author of Alternative Scriptwriting: Contemporary Storytelling for the Screen. Head of Screenwriting and Associate Arts Professor at NYU Tisch School of the Arts, where she teaches the graduate-level master class Writing the Climate Change Script.
Lydia Dean Pilcher — Filmmaker, cultural strategist, educator, and two-time Emmy-winning, Oscar-nominated producer. Pilcher has an extensive track record creating multi-stakeholder collaborations across entertainment studios, unions, and guilds. She works with UN Climate Change and designed and teaches Climatic Change: Storytelling Arts, Zeitgeist, and Our Future at the Columbia Climate School.
Abby Rabinowitz — Climate journalist, STEM expert, and Director of the Writing Program at NYU Tandon School of Engineering, where she teaches the advanced seminar Climate Fiction and the City. Her writing on climate policy, technology, and narrative has appeared in Wired, The New York Times, The Guardian, Grist, The New Republic, and Columbia Journalism Review.
The Climate Film Festival is a cultural organization with an annual festival, year-round programming, and educational resources in New York City. CFF rewrites the narrative on climate change by harnessing the power of motion pictures, showcasing new and established voices, classic climate films, and human, energizing stories. Its annual 2026 festival will be held from September 18-21.
Anew is a gathering space and discovery center for the social impact community.