​Welcome to Binge Thinking. We invite professors and experts to give lectures in bars around Boston, NYC, and DC!

In a world of AI slop, doomscrolling and brainrot, Binge Thinking brings real experts into real places for nights of learning, conversation, and community.

Think Responsibly.

​TOPIC:
Sustainability: Distinguishing Its Real Messages from the Myths

SPEAKER:
Dr. Julian Agyeman, Tufts University

​Reusable straws, “eco-friendly” labels, carbon-neutral everything. Sustainability is everywhere these days, but how much of it is real change and how much is just good marketing in a green outfit?

​According to Dr. Julian Agyeman, our biggest environmental problems were never really about science or technology. We already have plenty of both. The deeper challenges are cultural and spiritual: how we see each other, how we treat the land, and who gets to belong in the places we build.

​In this talk, Dr. Agyeman asks a bold question: what if we shaped our cities as if people, lands, and nature were sacred? He’ll unpack the myths, cut through the greenwashing, and make the case for sustainability as a true guiding principle instead of a buzzword.

​Topics include:

​Why our biggest crises are cultural, not technical

​How to tell genuine sustainability apart from greenwashing

​What “just sustainabilities” means and why fairness belongs at the center of climate action

​How who belongs in a city shapes what that city can become

​What it might look like to design places as if they were sacred

​Beyond the policy, this is a conversation about values.

​It’s about rethinking what we owe each other, the planet, and future generations, and imagining cities that work for everyone, not just a lucky few.

​Come for the drinks, stay for a new way of seeing the world you live in.

​About the Speaker

​Dr. Julian Agyeman is a Professor of Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning and the Fletcher Professor of Rhetoric and Debate at Tufts University, as well as a Secondary Professor at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (FRSA) and the Royal Geographical Society (RGS). Born and trained in the UK, he holds a B.Sc. in Geography and Botany with a minor in Anthropology from the University of Durham, a Postgraduate Certificate in Education from the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, an MA in Conservation Policy from Middlesex University, and a Ph.D. in Urban Studies from the University of London.

​He is the originator of “just sustainabilities,” a concept that brings social justice and environmental sustainability together. He is the author or editor of 15 books, including  Just Sustainabilities: Development in an Unequal World (MIT Press, 2003), Cultivating Food Justice: Race, Class and Sustainability (MIT Press, 2011) Sharing Cities: A Case for Truly Smart and Sustainable Cities (MIT Press, 2015), one of Nature’s Top 20 Books of 2015, Nurturing Food Justice (MIT Press 2026) and Just Cities: The Struggle for Urban Racial and Climate Justice (Oxford 2027).

​In September 2021, he became Fletcher Professor of Rhetoric and Debate, an endowed chair at Tufts University. In November 2021, he was invited by then Boston Mayor-Elect Michelle Wu to be a Transition Advisor on her Transition Committee. In November 2023, he became Hedersdoktorer (Honorary Doctor) at KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden and March 2025, he was awarded the Tufts Distinguished Scholar Award by the Faculty Research Awards Committee.

​Agenda

7:00 PM | Doors Open (Grab a seat and drinks!)
7:30 PM | Lecture Begins
8:10 PM | Audience Q&A
8:30 PM | Drinks & Conversation
9:00 PM | Event Ends

​Join us and grab a drink as we separate real sustainability from greenwashing. What if we built cities like they were sacred?