Edited by Samia Henni, Deserts Are Not Empty challenges colonial and imperial portrayals of arid territories as vacant lands available for occupation, extraction and pollution. Through essays, poems and conversations, contributors explore the human and nonhuman lives, histories and political struggles that shape desert environments.

Drawing on architecture, landscape, photography, literature and decolonial thought, the book offers alternative ways of understanding and representing arid lands. Contributors include Menna Agha, Ariella Aïsha Azoulay, Danika Cooper, Brahim El Guabli, Jill Jarvis, Paulo Tavares and Alla Vronskaya.