A Compendium of Environmentalist Reading Lists on University Courses

Ecology, Spirituality, & Religion

Source: <www.scribd.com/document/501759253/ESR-Recommended-Reading-List-CIIS>

Notes: For more information on this course you can go here: <elizabethallisonphd.com/teaching>

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California Institute of Integral Studies

Recommended Reading List

Environmental Political Thought

Source: <www.polis.cam.ac.uk/files/environmental_political_thought_outline.pdf>

Convenor

Dr Sean Fleming, Christ’s College (srf44@cam.ac.uk)

Time

Wednesdays from 3-5PM, starting on 26 January 2022

Description

How should human societies relate to the Earth and to other species? What kinds of political institutions are conductive to a sustainable society? This module explores a range of contemporary political ideas about the environment—from reformist to radical, from optimistic to apocalyptic, from left to right, and from West to East. The focus is on critiques of liberal environmentalism.

Until fairly recently, the environment was of little concern to most political theorists. Politics was understood as a human activity, and political theory was concerned with the question of how human beings ought to live with each other. But in the age of climate change, questions about how human beings should relate to the environment and to other species have become difficult to ignore. Older strands of political thought, such as liberalism, socialism, and conservatism, have had to adapt. New worldviews, such as deep ecology, have emerged. Some defunct ideas and ideologies, such as Malthusianism and primitivism, have re-emerged. Meanwhile, Indigenous and nonWestern thinkers have challenged the dominant understandings of the environment in Europe and North America. Once seen as a peripheral concern, the environment is now at the forefront of political theory.

This seminar will guide participants through the classic works, the cutting edge, and the darkest corners of environmental political thought. We will analyze, compare, and critique a series of ‘green’ ideologies and question the boundaries between these ideologies. Participants will develop a better understanding of the worldviews and assumptions that inform environmental policymaking, activism, and political debate.

Teaching

The module comprises seven two-hour seminars.

Readings

Participants are expected to read all essential readings in advance and come to the seminars prepared to discuss them. These will be available on the Moodle site or through the library. The further readings are optional but will be helpful for exploring a topic in more depth and for developing an essay idea.

Assessment

Participants will be graded on the basis of a 3,000-word essay, which is due on 17 March. Further instructions and a list of topics will be provided in January.

Week 1 – Liberal and Post-Liberal Environmentalism

Essential reading:

• Marcel Wissenburg, “Liberalism,” in Political Theory and the Ecological Challenge (Cambridge, 2006), pp. 20–34.

• Robyn Eckersley, The Green State: Rethinking Democracy and Sovereignty (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2004), 1–18.

Further reading:

• Robyn Eckersley, “Exploring the Environmental Spectrum: From Anthropocentrism to Ecocentrism,” in Environmentalism and Political Theory: Toward an Ecocentric Approach (State University of New York Press, 1992), pp. 35–47.

• Andrew Vincent, “Green Political Theory,” in Political Concepts, eds. Richard Bellamy and Andrew Mason (Manchester University Press, 2003), pp. 182–95.

• Teena Gabrielson, Cheryl Hall, John M. Meyer, and David Schlosberg, “What is Environmental Political Theory?” in The Oxford Handbook of Environmental Political Theory (Oxford, 2016), pp. 3–14.

• John Dryzek, The Politics of the Earth: Environmental Discourses, Third Ed. (Oxford, 2013).

• Andrew Dobson, Green Political Thought, Third Ed. (New York: Routledge, 2001).

• Derek Bell, “Liberal Environmental Citizenship,” Environmental Politics 14, no. 2 (2005): 179–94.

• David Miller, “Social Justice and Environmental Goods,” in Fairness and Futurity: Essays on Environmental Sustainability and Social Justice, ed. Andrew Dobson (Oxford, 1999), pp. 151–72.

• Marcel Wissenburg, Green Liberalism: The Free and the Green Society (London: UCL Press, 1998).

• Robyn Eckersley, “Review of Green Liberalism,” Journal of Environmental Policy and Planning 1, no. 3 (1999): 261–63.

• John Dryzek, Rational Ecology: Environment and Political Economy (Oxford: Blackwell, 1987).

• Robert Goodin, Green Political Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1992).

Week 2 – Democracy and the Environment

Essential reading:

• Terence Ball, “Democracy,” in Political Theory and the Ecological Challenge, pp. 131–47.

• Val Plumwood, “Has Democracy Failed Ecology? An Ecofeminist Perspective,” Environmental Politics 4, no. 4 (1995): 134–68.

Further reading:

• Quan Li and Rafael Reuveny, “Democracy and Environmental Degradation,” International Studies Quarterly 50, no. 4 (2006): 935–56.

• Manus Midlarsky, “Democracy and the Environment: An Empirical Assessment,” Journal of Peace Research 35, no. 3 (1998): 341–61.

• Graham Smith, Deliberative Democracy and the Environment (London: Routledge, 2003).

Week 3 – Conservatism and Conservation

Essential reading:

• Wendell Berry, “Think Little,” “The Total Economy,” and “The Agrarian Standard,” in The World-Ending Fire: The Essential Wendell Berry (London: Penguin, 2018), pp. 48–58, 66–81, 133–43.

• Bruce Pilbeam, “Natural Allies? Mapping the Relationship between Conservatism and Environmentalism,” Political Studies 51, no. 3 (2003): 490–503.

Further reading:

• Roger Scruton, “Conservatism,” in Political Theory and the Ecological Challenge, pp. 7–19.

• Roger Scruton, How to Think Seriously about the Planet: The Case for an Environmental Conservatism (Oxford, 2012).

• John Bliese, “Traditionalist Conservatism and Environmental Ethics,” Environmental Ethics 19, no. 2 (1997): 135–51.

• Philip Cafaro, “Patriotism as an Environmental Virtue,” Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics 23, no. 1–2 (2010): 185–206.

Week 4 – Deep Ecology and Social Ecology

Essential reading:

• Arne Naess, “The Shallow and the Deep, Long-Range Ecology Movement: A Summary,” Inquiry 16 (1977): 95–100.

• Bill Devall, “The Deep Ecology Movement,” Natural Resources Journal 20, no. 2 (1980): 299–322.

• Murray Bookchin, “Social Ecology Versus Deep Ecology: A Challenge for the Ecology Movement,” Green Perspectives: Newsletter of the Green Program Project, no. 4–5 (Summer 1987): 1–23.

Further reading:

• Arne Naess, Ecology, Community and Lifestyle: Outline of an Ecosophy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989)

• Martha Lee, Earth First! Environmental Apocalypse (Syracuse University Press, 1995).

• Bill Devall and George Sessions, Deep Ecology: Living As If Nature Mattered (Salt Lake City: Gibbs Smith, 1985).

• Edward Abbey, The Money Wrench Gang (London: Penguin, 2004 [1975]).

• Arne Naess, “A Defence of the Deep Ecology Movement,” Environmental Ethics 6, no. 3 (1984): 265–70.

• Ariel Salleh, “Deeper than Deep Ecology: The Eco-Feminist Connection,” Environmental Ethics 6, no. 4 (1984): 339–45.

• Warwick Fox, “The Deep Ecology-Ecofeminism Debate and Its Parallels,” Environmental Ethics 11, no. 1 (1989): 5–25.

• Val Plumwood, Feminism and the Mastery of Nature (London: Routledge, 1993).

Week 5 – Primitivism and Critiques of Modern Technology

Essential reading:

• Theodore Kaczynski (the Unabomber), “Industrial Society and Its Future,” Washington Post, 19 September 1995, especially paragraphs 1–5, 33–76, 143–84, and 204–12.

• Chellis Glendenning, “Notes Toward a Neo-Luddite Manifesto,” Utne Reader (March/April 1990).

Further reading:

• Jacques Ellul, The Technological Society, trans. John Wilkinson (New York: Vintage, 1964 [1954]).

• Ivan Illich, Tools for Conviviality (London: Marion Boyars, 2009 [1973])

• Sean Fleming, “The Unabomber and the Origins of Anti-Tech Radicalism,” Journal of Political Ideologies (forthcoming), https://doi.org/10.1080/13569317.2021.1921940

• Theodore Kaczynski (the Unabomber), “Chapter 2: Why the Technological System Will Destroy Itself,” in Anti-Tech Revolution: Why and How, Second Edition (Scottsdale, AZ: Fitch & Madison, 2020).

• Mauro Lubrano, “Stop the Machines: How Emerging Technologies Are Fomenting the War on Civilization,” Terrorism and Political Violence (forthcoming), https://doi.org/10.1080/09546553.2021.1919097

• John Zerzan, “Future Primitive,” in Future Primitive Revisited (Port Townsend, WA: Feral House, 1994.

• Wendell Berry, “Horse-Drawn Tools and the Doctrine of Labor Saving” and “Feminism, the Body, and the Machine” in The World-Ending Fire: The Essential Wendell Berry (London: Penguin, 2018), pp. 152–59, 244–62.

• Paul Kingsnorth and Dougald Hine, “Uncivilisation: The Dark Mountain Manifesto,” 2009.

• Derrick Jensen, Endgame Volume One: The Problem of Civilization (New York: Seven Stories Press, 2006).

• Kirkpatrick Sale, Rebels Against the Future: The Luddites and Their War on the Industrial Revolution (New York: Basic Books, 1996).

Week 6 –Neo-Malthusianism and Eco-Fascism

Essential reading:

• Garrett Hardin, “Lifeboat Ethics: The Case Against Helping the Poor,” Psychology Today (1974).

• Pentti Linkola, “A Perspective on the State of the World, or the ABC of the Deep Ecologist,” in Can Life Prevail?: A Revolutionary Approach to the Environmental Crisis (Arktos, 2002), pp. 166–71.

• Betsy Hartmann, “The Greening of Hate: An Environmentalist’s Essay,” in Greenwash: Nativists, Environmentalism & the Hypocrisy of Hate (Southern Poverty Law Centre 2010), pp. 13–15.

• Peter Staudenmaier, “Fascist Ecology: The ‘Green Wing’ of the Nazi Party and Its Historical Antecedents,” in Ecofascism Revisited: Lessons from the German Experience, eds. Janet Biehl and Peter Staudenmaier (Porsgrunn: New Compass Press, 2011), 13–42.

Further reading:

• Daniel Rueda, “Neoecofascism: The Example of the United States,” Journal for the Study of Radicalism 14, no. 2 (2020), pp. 95–126.

• Paul Ehrlich, The Population Bomb (New York: Ballantine Books, 1968).

• Philip Cafaro, How Many Is Too Many? (University of Chicago Press, 2014).

• Monica Aufrecht, “Rethinking ‘Greening of Hate’: Climate Emissions, Immigration, and the Last Frontier,” Ethics and the Environment 17, no. 2 (2012): 51–74.

Week 7 – Environmentalism Beyond the West

Essential reading:

• Farah Godrej, “Culture and Difference: Non-Western Approaches to Defining Environmental Issues,” in The Oxford Handbook of Environmental Political Theory (Oxford, 2016), pp. 39–56.

• Enrique Salmón, “Kincentric Ecology: Indigenous Perceptions of the HumanNature Relationship,” Ecological Applications 10, no. 5 (2000): 1327–32.

Further reading:

• Ramachandra Guha, “Radical American Environmentalism and Wilderness Preservation,” Environmental Ethics 11, no. 1 (1989): 71–83.

• Alfred Crosby, Ecological Imperialism: The Biological Expansion of Europe 9001900, (Cambridge, 1986).

• Richard Grove, Green Imperialism: Colonial Expansion, Tropical Island Edens and the Origins of Environmentalism, 1600–1800 (Cambridge, 1995).

• Helaine Selin, ed., Nature Across Cultures: Views of Nature and the Environment in Non-Western Cultures (Manchester: Springer, 2003).

• Kevin Behrens, “An African Relational Environmentalism and Moral Considerability,” Environmental Ethics 36, no. 1 (2014): 63–82.

• Andrew Geddis and Jacinta Ruru, “Places as Persons: Creating a New Framework for Māori-Crown Relations,” in The Frontiers of Public Law, ed. Jason Varuhas (Hart Publishing, 2019).

• J. Peter Brosius, “Endangered Forest, Endangered People: Environmentalist Representations of Indigenous Knowledge,” Human Ecology 25, no. 1 (1997): 4769.

• Elizabeth Macpherson, Indigenous Water Rights in Law and Regulation (Cambridge, 2019).

• Jacinta Ruru, “Listening to Papatūānuku: A Call to Reform Water Law,” Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand 48, no. 2–3 (2018): 215–24.

• Catherine Magallanes, “Maori Cultural Rights in Aotearoa New Zealand: Protecting the Cosmology That Protects the Environment,” Widener Law Review 21, no. 2 (2015): 273–328.

• Coleen Fox et al., “‘The River Is Us; The River is in Our Veins’: Re-Defining River Restoration in Three Indigenous Communities,” Sustainability Science 12, no. 4 (2017): 521–33.

Religious Fundamentalism and Violent Extremism

Source: <www.gu.se/en/study-gothenburg/religious-fundamentalism-and-violent-extremism-rt2214/reading-list/93affd1c-6a8a-11ef-8528-b9857ed1423e>

Course: RT2214

Second cycle

7.5 credits (ECTS)

Go to Religious Fundamentalism and Violent Extremism

About the Reading list

Valid from

2024-11-05

Decision date

2024-09-04

Books

Dwyer, Philip (2022), Violence: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press, ISBN 9780198831730, 160 pages.

Véronique Altglas (2022), Religion and Conflict in Northern Ireland: What Does Religion Do? Cham: Palgrave MacMillan.

Juergensmeyer, Mark (2022), When Gods Stops Fighting: How Religious Violence Ends. Berkeley: University of California Press, ISBN 9780520384736, 196 pages.

Ruthven, Malise (2007), Fundamentalism: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press, ISBN 9780199212705, 176 pages.

Articles (all accessible via the Library of the University of Gothenburg)

Axelson, Tomas & Jonas Stier (2020) Religions – a Janus-Faced Phenomenon in Local Politics: A Swedish Interreligious council and Participants’ Views on Religions as a Possible Asset for Social Cohesion in the Local Community, Interreligious Studies and Intercultural Theology, 4(2): 224–246. https://doi.org/10.1558/isit.41383

Blee, Katheen M. (1991). Women in the 1920s’ Ku Klux Klan Movement. Feminist Studies, 17(1): 57–77. https://www.jstor.org/stable/3178170

Clemmow, Caitlin; Gill, Paul; Bouhana, Noémie; Silver, James and Horgan, John (2020), Disaggregating Line-actor Grievance- fuelled Violence: Comparing Lone-actor Terrorists and Mass Murderers, Terrorism and Political Violence 34(3): 558–584. https://doi-org.ezproxy.ub.gu.se/10.1080/09546553.2020.1718661

Gill, Paul, Horgan, John & Deckert, Paige (2014). Bombing alone: Tracing the Motivations and Antecedent Behaviors of Lone-Actor Terrorists, Journal of Forensic Sciences, 59(2): 425–435. https://doi.org/10.1111/1556-4029.12312

Greenwood, Maja Taouzari (2019). When Foreign Fighters Come Home: The Story of Six Danish Returnees. Perspective on Terrorism, 13(4): 27–38. https://www.jstor.org/stable/26756701

Gøtzsche-Astrup, Oluf; Lindekilde, Lasse and Fjellman, Anna-Maria (2023). Perceived Legitimacy of CVE Policies and the Willingness to Report Concerns of Radicalization to Authorities in the Nordic Countries, Terrorism and Political Violence 35(3): 712–728. https://doi-org.ezproxy.ub.gu.se/10.1080/09546553.2021.1972977

Larsson, Göran (2022), Those Who Choose to Fight the Islamic State: Autobiographical Accounts of Western Volunteers, Terrorism and Political Violence 34(8):1758–1773. https://doi-org.ezproxy.ub.gu.se/10.1080/09546553.2020.1837118

Nesser, Petter (2024). Introducing the Jihadi Plots in Europe Dataset (JPED), Journal of Peace Research, 61(2): 317–329. https://doi.org/10.1177/00223433221123360

Taylor, Bron (1998), Religion, violence and radical environmentalism: From earth first! To the Unabomber to the earth liberation front, Terrorism and Political Violence 10(4):1–42 https://doi.org/10.1080/09546559808427480

Environment, Communication, & Culture

Source: <view.officeapps.live.com/op/view.aspx?src=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.uvm.edu%2F~aivakhiv%2F272_Communication.doc&wdOrigin=BROWSELINK>

Environmental Studies 272

Environmental Studies Program, University of Wisconsin Oshkosh

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Environment, Communication, & Culture

Instructor: Dr. Adrian Ivakhiv

Office: 320 Swart Hall Phone: 424–0848

Office hours: Mondays 3–5 pm (4–5 pm on the first Monday

of every month) and by appointment

E-mail: ivakhiv@uwosh.edu (please always include “ES 272” in your “Subject:” line)

COURSE DESCRIPTION

This course will offer a basic introduction to cultural, media, and communication studies, focusing specifically on the cultural communication of environmental issues and ideas. Through various readings as well as visual materials, we will explore and examine how environmental issues are framed and represented by various media; how these images and representations are used and contested by different cultural communities; and the ways in which environmental ideas circulate between the mass media and popular and alternative cultures in North America today.

OBJECTIVES

1. To familiarize students with the major competing perspectives on media and popular culture, as found in the fields of cultural and communication studies.

2. To develop a critical understanding of various media, their possibilities and limitations, as communicative tools in (and for) a democratic society.

3. To introduce students to the main issues in environmental communication, especially focused around the tension between the environmentalist imperative to ‘get the message out’ and the various constraints inherent in the contexts of production (the realities of media ownership and concentration), consumption (public disinterest, the allure of high-consumption lifestyles), and the creation of the message itself (scientific uncertainty, etc.).

4. To provide the opportunity for students to gain some hands-on experience of producing communicative messages on environmental themes.

CURRICULAR ROLE OF COURSE

This course serves as a General Education/Humanities Elective and as a 200-level core course in the ‘Environment, Community and Culture’ emphasis of the Environmental Studies program.

OUTLINE

Popular culture and the mass media play an inestimable role in shaping people’s perception and understanding of environmental issues. At the same time, the communication of environmental ideas is central to many forms of work and activism in the environmental field. This course will offer a basic introduction to cultural, media, and communication studies, focused specifically around the cultural communication of environmental issues and ideas. Through various readings as well as visual materials, we will explore and examine how environmental issues are framed and represented by various media; how these images and representations are used and contested by a variety of cultural communities and discourses; the ways in which environmental ideas circulate between mass media, the scientific community, and literary, artistic, popular and alternative cultures in North America today; and the possibilities for cultivating a “greener” environmental culture in our lives and in the world at large.

The course will begin with an introduction to cultural and communications theory, which will be contextualized within the media and messages that surround us in our everyday lives. We will explore critical analyses of the mass media and discuss concepts such as ideology, hegemony, semiotics, framing, and the like.

The remainder of the course will focus on specific issues and topics, such as the following:

• visual imagery in environmental communication (e.g., in promotional or ‘consciousness-raising’ materials by environmental groups, in the marketing of ‘green’ products by businesses, etc.)

• the framing of environmental issues and the portrayal of environmental (and other) activists in the print media, television, documentary and feature films

• images of nature, wilderness, and animals, in visual art (e.g., landscape painting and photography), political discourse, advertising, the marketing of products aimed at children, and debates over genetic engineering, cloning, and other technological developments

• environmental (and anti-environmental) rhetoric and the use of shock and overstatement to ‘get the message out’

• utopian and dystopian (apocalyptic) rhetoric in environmental discourse and literature

• the use of video and the internet by environmental and social justice activists

• and other related topics.

Though the course is not primarily a hands-on production course, students will be encouraged to experiment with different media in the production of an individual or group project.

READING

REQUIRED TEXTS

1. Course Reader (available at University Books ’n More)

2. Additional materials to be made available on BlackBoard and/or the World Wide Web.

SUPPLEMENTARY TEXTS

(AVAILABLE AT BOOKSTORE OR ON RESERVE AT POLK LIBRARY)

(Selections from these may be required reading.)

Cronon, William (ed.). Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature. New York: Norton, 1995.

DeLuca, Kevin M. Image Politics: The New Rhetoric of Environmental Activism. Guilford, 1999.

Herndl, Carl and Stuart Brown. Green Culture: Environmental Rhetoric in Contemporary America. University of Wisconsin Press, 1996.

Killingsworth, M. Jimmie, and Jacqueline S. Palmer. Ecospeak: Rhetoric and Environmental Politics in America. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1992.

Wilson, Alex. The Culture of Nature: North American Landscape from Disney to the Exxon Valdez. Toronto: Between the Lines, 1991.

FOR FURTHER RECOMMENDED READING, SEE “COURSE RESOURCES” BELOW.

_____________________________________________________________________

REQUIREMENTS AND EVALUATION

Reading response papers (due by April 7) 15%

Research paper 25%

Group project and presentation 30%

Attendance and participation 15%

Reading report/presentation 5%

One in-class quiz (February 24) 5%

“Floating” grade 5%

Attendance and class participation (15%)

The course will take a seminar format, and readings and class discussions will be of primary importance to the success of the class. Students are expected to have done the required readings before every class and to have prepared responses, to be shared in class, to the focus questions provided. Some of the readings are written in an academic and technical language and may require careful study. You are encouraged to keep a journal of unfamiliar terms and to look these up in a dictionary of cultural or critical theory or to bring these up in class for clarification. Students are expected to participate in class discussions in an informed and respectful manner which contributes to the collective ‘thinking through’ of the issues raised. Those who miss more than three classes without a valid medical or emergency reason will fail the course.

Reading response papers (4 x 4% to a maximum of 15%)

Students will be required to hand in four reading response papers in the first eight weeks of classes (by April 7). These may involve responding to specific questions or may follow a general format as follows:

(a) For each reading (up to three per week), provide a one-paragraph summary of the author’s main argument and how that argument is presented and supported; and

(b) For the week’s readings as a whole, provide a one- to two-paragraph personal response in which you articulate your own position on the issues raised and draw connections between these readings and other authors or readings we have read or events from the news or from your everyday life.

These should be handed in on time at the beginning of the class in which the readings are being discussed. You will automatically receive 1 grade-point for doing it on time. The other 2 grade-points will be based on a qualitative evaluation of your writing.

In-class quiz (5%)

In week four of the course (February 24), students will be examined on their knowledge and understanding on the main concepts in contemporary cultural and communication studies.

In-class reading report/presentation (5%)

Each student will be required to prepare one in-class reading report or presentation, that is, a brief (10 minutes or so) presentation either on the author, background and cultural context of one of the required or supplementary readings for the given week or on one of the supplementary readings marked by an asterisk (*) in the “Course Resources” section at the back of this syllabus. This presentation should normally have been done by April 21 at the latest.

Group project and presentation (30%)

Students will be required to undertake a group project, the intent of which will be to create some form of ‘environmentally communicative’ cultural, literary or media product, to reflect on what and how it communicates its message and to evaluate its success, and to present it in some form to the class. Possible media include text (e.g., a short story, an essay for a popular magazine, an op-ed piece for a newspaper), film or video, photography, web pages, an audio work (such as a radio program), a multi-media installation or display, a theatrical performance, or a combination of any of these.

Evaluation will be subdivided as follows:

Group proposal 5%

Class presentation 20%

Brief report and self-evaluation (including bibliography) 5%

Research Paper: Environmental cultural/communication analysis (25%)

Each student will be expected to complete a research paper (of approx. 1200 words) analyzing a cultural or media product, environmental advocacy group, advocacy campaign, or ‘site’ of environmental communication, based on the critical approaches studied in the course, and to make a brief classroom report based on it (either singly or in groups, according to topics). Papers should be written in a scholarly format, with a complete bibliography, and should consist of the following sections:

(a) a brief introduction stating the topic and thesis (no more than one paragraph);

(b) a description of the product, organization, campaign or ‘site,’ providing some historical background where necessary (no more than 2–3 paragraphs);

(c) an analysis of the key factors that explain the success or failure of the campaign, product, organization, or communication practice, in communicating an environmental message, generating enhanced environmental awareness, or bringing about social or environmental change (this should be the longest section of the paper);

(d) a brief conclusion summarizing your evaluation of your topic as a form of environmental communication (normally one paragraph);

(e) a full bibliography of all sources, in either APA, MLA, or other academically recognized style;

(f) an appendix (optional) including any materials used (e.g., photographys, notes from public meetings, ad scripts, audio materials, etc.)

Papers will be presented in class (no more than five minutes per student). Presentations will be worth 5 grade-points, while papers will be worth 20 grade-points.

“Floating” 5%

The final 5% of the grade will be assigned by each student either to the group project/presentation, the research paper, or an additional reading report/presentation. You should submit your decision to me in writing by the final class. (The default decision will be that the 5% will go to whichever of the first two – your group project or research paper – gets a higher grade.)

Grading scale

(Final grade scale) (Working grade scale)

__________ _________ __________

A 90–100

A+ 97–100 Excellent

A 94–96

A- 91–93

A/AB 90

__________ _________ __________

AB 80–89

AB+ 87–89

AB 84–86

AB- 81–83

AB/B 80

__________ _________ __________

B 70–79

B+ 77–79 Very good

B 74–76

B- 71–73

B/BC 70

__________ _________ __________

BC 60–69

BC+ 67–69

BC 64–66

BC- 61–63

BC/C 60

__________ _________ __________

C 50–59

C+ 57–59 Good

C 54–56

C- 51–53

C/CD 50

__________ _________ __________

CD 40–49

CD+ 47–49

CD 44–46

CD- 41–43

CD/D 40

__________ _________ __________

D 30–39

D+ 37–39 Satisfactory

D 34–36

D- 30–33

__________ _________ __________

F below 30 Unsatisfactory

COURSE SCHEDULE

TOPICS & THEMES READINGS

CR = Course Reader. Others as noted.

Feb 3	INTRODUCTION & COURSE OVERVIEW DEMOCRACY, SPECTACLE, AND THE PUBLIC SPHERE IN A MEDIA CULTURE Is our society genuinely democratic (ruled by the people)? Or is it a mixture of democracy and oligarchy (rule by powerful elite interests)? How have communications media changed the world? What should be the role of media in the practice of democracy? How can we use the media (mass media, electronic media, alternative media) to transform an unsustainable overconsumptive society to a sustainable ‘greener’ one? VIDEO: The Ad and the Ego
	PART I – MEDIA CULTURE
Feb 10	PRODUCTION: POLITICAL ECONOMY OF THE MASS MEDIA What is the ‘public sphere’? Is this concept still relevant today? According to a political economy perspective, what are the forces which shape the messages we receive in the mass media? Who owns the media, and how has media ownership been changing in our globalizing world? What is ideology, and how is it disseminated through the mass media (according to Chomsky and Herman’s ‘propaganda model’)? VIDEO: Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media	REQUIRED: 1. Mick Underwood, ‘The mass media as fourth estate,’ at http://www.cultsock.ndirect.co.uk/MUHome/cshtml/index.html 2. Chomsky and Herman, ‘A propaganda model,’ from Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media (Pantheon, 2002), pp. 1–35. (CR) 3. Mizrach, ‘Consent, American style’, Third World Traveler, at http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media/Consent_AmerStyle.html SUPPLEMENTARY: McChesney, ‘The global media giants,’ Extra! Nov-Dec 1997. Available at http://www.fair.org/extra/9711/gmg.html ‘Liberal media? Examining corporate media ownership and the resulting conservative bias,’ http://www.liberalslant.com/mediaownership.htm Robert McChesney, ‘Global media, neoliberalism,and imperialism,’ Monthly Review 52: 10 (March 2001). http://www.monthlyreview.org/301rwm.htm ‘The wealthy (conservative) think tanks,’ Covert Action Quarterly, Winter 1998, And see the chart of media ownership at www.mediachannel.org/ownership/chart.shtml For some other web sites on the political economy of media, see: www.mediachannel.org/ownership/ www.opendemocracy.net www.fair.org www.fair.org/counterspin/
Feb 17	CONSUMPTION: POPULAR CULTURE, HEGEMONY, AND THE STRUGGLE OVER MEANING How do viewers ‘construct’ and make use of the messages they get from media? How are meanings encoded and decoded, according to Hall’s model of media culture? What is hegemony, and how is it shaped and contested through media and everyday life? What are some ways in which media audiences are active rather than passive? Are there limits to this ‘activism’ and how could those limits be expanded? VIDEO T.B.A. QUIZ	REQUIRED: 1. Dick Hebdige, ‘Ideology’ and ‘Hegemony’ sections, Subculture: The Meaning of Style (Methuen, 1979), pp. 11–19. (CR) 2. John Storey, ‘Television,’ Cultural Studies and the Study of Popular Culture (Edinbugh Univ. Press, 1996), pp. 9–18. (CR) 3. Michel Real, ‘Co-authorship of media culture’ and ‘Navajo co-authorship of Cheyenne Autumn,’ in Exploring Media Culture (Sage, 1996), pp. 268–277. (CR) SUPPLEMENTARY: Anderson, et al., ‘Pressure politics and the news media,’ in Media, Culture, and the Environment (UCL Press, 1997). Justin Lewis, ‘Reproducing political hegemony in the United States,’ Critical Studies in Mass Communication 16: 3 (Sept 1999): 251–267. Available at Polk, follow the links from http://www.uwosh.edu/library/serialsolutions/jnlsC.html John Fiske, ‘Ideological analysis’, from Chapter 9 (‘Ideology and meanings’) of Introduction to Communication Studies, 2nd edition (Routledge, 1990), pp. 178–186.
	PART II – REPRESENTING NATURE & ENVIRONMENT
Feb 24	MEDIA DISCOURSE AND TEXT: ANALYZING ENVIRONMENTAL MESSAGES What are the main approaches used in narrative, semiotic, and structural analysis of media messages? VIDEO: Earth Day QUIZ.	REQUIRED: 1. DeLuca, Image Politics, pp. 1–14, 52–57, 92–118, and 124–128. (CR) 2. Michael X. Delli Carpini and Bruce A. Williams, ‘‘Fictional’ and ‘non-fictional’ television celebrates Earth Day: or, politics is comedy plus pretense,’ Cultural Studies 8:1 (1994), pp. 74–96. (CR) SUPPLEMENTARY: Michael Spangle and David Knapp, ‘Ways we talk about the Earth: An exploration of persuasive tactics and appeals in environmental discourse,’ Muir and Veenendall, Earthtalk. Pp. 3–26.
Mar 3	REPRESENTING ENVIRONMENTALISM How are environmentalists portrayed in the mass media? What effect does this have on environmentalism and its reception in society at large? VIDEO T.B.A.	REQUIRED: 1. David Easter, ‘Activism in a moderate world: media portrayals and audience interpretations of environmental activism,’ in S. Muir and T. Veenendall, Earthtalk: Communication Empowerment for Environmental Action (London: Praeger, 1996), pp. 45–58. (CR) 2. Harold Schlechtweg, ‘Media frames and environmental discourse: the case of ‘Focus: Logjam’,’ in Cantrill and Oravec, The Symbolic Earth: Discourse and Our Creation of the Environment (Univ. Press of Kentucky, 1996), pp. 257–275. (CR) SUPPLEMENTARY: M. Jimmie Killingsworth and Jacqueline S. Palmer, from ‘Transformations of Scientific Discourse in the News Media,’ in Ecospeak: Rhetoric and Environmental Politics in America (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1992), pp. 133–141, 148–160. Jennifer Price, ‘Roadrunners can’t read: The greening of television in the 1990s,’ Flight Maps: Adventures with Nature in Modern America (Basic, 1999), pp. 217–256.
Mar 10	REPRESENTING NATURE & WILDERNESS I: ENVIRONMENTAL VISUALITY Traditional environmental visuality: landscape painting, nature and wildlife photography Sublime nature and ‘primal’ wilderness: Imagining the Americas before the ‘white man.’ Images of ecocatastrophe Postmodern nature and landscape photography POSSIBLE VIDEOS: Wilderness and the West, Lawn and Order	REQUIRED: 1. William Cronon, ‘The trouble with wilderness,’ Uncommon Ground, pp. 69–90. 2. Andrew Ross, ‘The Ecology of Images,’ in The Chicago Gangster Theory of Life: Nature’s Debt to Society (New York: Verso, 1994). (CR) 3. Michael Pollan, ‘Beyond wilderness and lawn,’ Harvard Design Magazine 4 (Winter/Spring 1998), available at www.gsd.harvard.edu/research/publications/hdm/back_issues/4ondesign_pollan.pdf SUPPLEMENTARY: Erik Davis, ‘The jungle: Leafy green celluloid,’ Village Voice, June 2, 1992, http://www.techgnosis.com/jungle.html Carolyn Merchant, ‘Reinventing Eden: Western culture as a recovery narrative,’ in Cronon (ed.), Uncommon Ground. Mick Gold, ‘A history of nature,’ in D. Massey and J. Allen, Geography Matters! (London: Macmillan, 1984), pp. 12–32. Alex Wilson: ‘The view from the road: Recreation and tourism,’ ‘Nature education and promotion,’ Looking at the nonhuman: Nature movies and TV,’ ‘City and country,’ and ‘From reserve to microenvironment: Nature parks and zoos,’ all in The Culture of Nature: North American Landscape from Disney to the Exxon Valdez (Between the Lines, 1991). Candace Slater, ‘Amazonia as Edenic narrative,’ in Cronon (ed.), Uncommon Ground. ‘Sublime nature’ (images), in Cronon, Uncommon Ground, pp. 163–167. Susan Kollin, ‘Inventing the last frontier,’ Nature’s State: Imagining Alaska as the Last Frontier (Univ. of North Carolina Press, 2001). John Sandlos, ‘Purple loosestrife and the “bounding” of nature in North American wetlands,”Electronic Journal of Sociology 3: 1 (1997), available at www.sociology.org/vol003.001/sandlos.article.1997.html Denis Cosgrove, ‘Contested global visions: One-world, Whole-earth, and the Apollo space photographs,’ Annals of the Association of American Geographers 84 (2), 1994, 270–294.
Mar 17	SPRING RECESS: NO CLASS
Mar 24	REPRESENTING NATURE & WILDERNESS II: RECREATION, ECO-TOURISM, ECO-MARKETING, & ENVIRONMENTAL KIDS’ CULTURE Recreation, theme parks, nature tourism and ecotourism. Eco-marketing, corporate greening and ‘greenwashing.’ Childrens’ environmental culture, from Bambi and Smokey the Bear to Ferngully and Captain Planet	REQUIRED: 1. L. M. Benton, ‘Selling the natural or selling out? Exploring environmental merchandising,’ Environmental Ethics 17 (Spring 1995), pp. 3–22. (CR) 2. Donna Lee King, ‘Selling environmentalism to kids,’ Doing Their Share to Save the Planet (Rutgers Univ. Press, 1995), pp. 29–53. (CR) 3. Joyce Nelson, ‘Deconstructing ecobabble: notes on an attempted corporate takeover,’ Sign Crimes/Road Kill: From Mediascape to Landscape (Between the Lines, 1992), pp. 203–217. (CR) SUPPLEMENTARY: Susan Davis, ‘Touch the magic,’ in Cronon (ed.), Uncommon Ground, pp. 204–217. Jennifer Cypher and Eric Higgs, ‘Colonizing the imagination: Disney’s Wilderness Lodge,’ in B. Herzogenrath, From Virgin Land to Disney World (Rodopi, 2001). Eric Wiley, ‘Wilderness theatre: Environmental tourism and Cajun swamp tours,’ The Drama Review 46: 3 (Fall 2002): 118–131. Follow links from www.uwosh.edu/library/serialsolutions/jnlsT.html — look for ‘TDR’. Bob Bednar. Snapshot Semiotics Project. www.southwestern.edu/~bednarb/snapshotsemiotics/ Kenneth Olwig, ‘Reinventing common nature,’ in Cronon (ed.), Uncommon Ground.
Mar 31	TRANSFORMATIONS OF NATURE: SIMULATION, REENGINEERING, GLOBALIZATION Representations of ‘life,’ biodiversity, biotechnology, and the genetic engineering of nature. Environmental implications of the Human Genome Project VIDEO: Excerpts from Jurassic Park, et al.	REQUIRED: 1. Sarah Franklin, ‘Life itself: Global nature and the genetic imaginary,’ in Franklin, Lury, and Stacey, Global Nature, Global Culture. (CR) 2. John Beardsley, ‘Kiss nature goodbye: Marketing the great outdoors,’ Harvard Design Magazine 10 (Winter-Spring 2000), available at www.gsd.harvard.edu/research/publications/hdm/back_issues/10beardsley.html 3. Jennifer Price, ‘Looking for nature at the mall,’ in W. Cronon, ed., Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature, pp. 186–202. (CR) SUPPLEMENTARY: William Cronon, ‘Introduction: In search of nature,’ in W. Cronon, Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature (New York: Norton, 1995), pp. 23–56. Steven Best, ‘high noon at Jurassic Park: Technofantasies confront complexity,’ http://utminers.utep.edu/best/papers/jpark.htm Katherine Hayles, ‘Simulated nature and natural simulations,’ in Cronon (ed.), Uncommon Ground.
Apr 7	REPRESENTING ANIMALS How are nonhuman animals (and human relations with nonhuman animals) represented in the media? How are animal activists represented? Animals as predators, victims, meat, family members, social others, et al. VIDEO: Cane Toads	REQUIRED: 1. John Berger, ‘Why Look at Animals?’ About Looking (New York: Pantheon, 1980). 2. Steve Baker, ‘Escaping the ratking: strategic images for animal rights,’ Picturing the Beast: Animals, Identity, and Representation (Manchester Univ. Press, 1993). FINAL WEEKLY READING RESPONSE PAPER DUE TODAY AT THE LATEST. SUPPLEMENTARY: Morris Berman, ‘The wild and the tame: humans and animals from Lascaux to Walt Disney,’ Coming to Our Senses: Body and Spirit in the Hidden History of the West (Bantam, 1990), pp. 63–102. Alex Wilson, ‘Looking at the nonhuman,’ The Culture of Nature. Matt Cartmill, ‘The Bambi syndrome,’ A View to a Death in the Morning: Hunting and Nature through History (Harvard Univ. Press, 1993) Jody Emel, ‘Are you man enough, big and bad enough? Ecofeminism and wolf eradication in the USA,’ Society and Space 13 (1995), pp. 707–34.
	PART III – TOWARD AN ENVIRONMENTAL CULTURE
Apr 14	IMAGINING & CONTESTING THE FUTURE: UTOPIA, DYSTOPIA, & THE ENVIRONMENTAL IMAGINATION Alternative futures: Technotopia, dystopia, ecotopia, and business-as-usual How do we imagine the future? How do optimistic (utopian) and pessimistic (dystopian) visions of the future shape our understanding of the present? PRESENTATIONS VIDEO: Koyaanisqatsi?	REQUIRED: 1. M. Jimmie Killingsworth and Jacqueline S. Palmer, ‘Millennial ecology: the apocalyptic narrative from Silent Spring to Global Warming,’ in Herndl and Brown, Green Culture: Environmental Rhetoric in Contemporary America (Univ. of Wisconsin Press, 1996), pp. 21–43. 2. Killingsworth and Palmer, ‘Rhetoric and action in ecotopian discourse,’ in Ecospeak (So. Illinois Univ. Press, 1992). SUPPLEMENTARY: Chris Lewis, ‘Telling stories about the future: environmental history and apocalyptic science,’ Environmental History Review 17:3 (Fall, 1993), pp. 43–57. R. Brown and C. Herndl, ‘Beyond the realm of reason: Understanding the extreme environmental rhetoric of the John Birch Society,’ in Green Culture, pp. 213–235. Lawrence Buell, ‘Environmental apocalypticism,’ The Environmental Imagination: Thoreau, Nature Writing, and the Formation of American Culture (Harvard University Press, 1995), pp. 280–308. Douglas Torgerson, ‘Comedy and tragedy in green politics,’ The Promise of Green Politics. Eugene Doyen, ‘Utopia and apocalypse: The cultural role of Hollywood cinema’. Michael S. Cummings, ‘Credibility of transition in Callenbach’s Ecotopia Emerging: lessons for practical utopians,’ in M. S. Cummings and N. D. Smith, eds., Utopian Studies II (University Press of America, 1989), pp. 69–77. John Delicath, ‘In search of Ecotopia: “Radical environmentalism” and the possibilities of utopian rhetorics,’ in Muir and Veenendall, Earthtalk. RECOMMENDED FICTION: Ursula LeGuin, Always Coming Home. Ernest Callenbach, Ecotopia and Ecotopia Emerging. (And see other titles in ‘Course Resources’ section below)
Apr 21	ENVIRONMENTAL ADVOCACY, ALTERNATIVE MEDIA, ALLIANCE BUILDING, & ‘CULTURE JAMMING’ Producing new environmental messages and rhetorics Native activism, the anti-globalization movement, and the building of inter-causal alliances (loggers & environmentalists, natives & environmentalists, et al.). Audio, video, and internet activism and production techniques. ‘Culture jammers’ and media guerillas. VIDEO: Adbusters; Seattle WTO videos PRESENTATIONS	REQUIRED: 1. Marilyn Cooper, ‘Environmental rhetoric in the age of hegemonic politics: Earth First! And the Nature Conservancy,’ in Herndl and Brown, Green Culture, pp. 236–260. 2. Jennifer Barron, ‘In the name of solidarity: The politics of representation

and articulation in support of the Labrador Innu,’ Capitalism Nature Socialism (Sept 2000).

3. Giovanna di Chiro, ‘Nature as community: The convergence of environment and social justice,’ in Cronon (ed.), Uncommon Ground, pp. 298–320.

SUPPLEMENTARY:

*Kalle Lasn, Culture Jam: How to Reverse America’s Suicidal Consumer Binge – and Why We Must (Quill, 1999).

Jim Bohlen, The Origins and Future of Greenpeace. Black Rose, 2000.

A. G. Jordan, Shell, Greenpeace, and the Brent Sparr. Palgrave Macmillan, 2001.

Steven Dale, McLuhan’s Children: The Greenpeace Message and the Media. Between the Lines, 1996. |

Apr 28	ART, MUSIC, THEATRE: RECLAIMING THE STREETS & REINHABITING THE BIOREGION Protest as performance Theatre, pageant, ritual Music and the environment (from folk to punk to thrash to rave to rap to country) Ecopopulism, nature and nationalism, cultures of place and bioregion Earthworks and land art VIDEO: Power? PRESENTATIONS	REQUIRED: 1. George McKay, ‘Direct action of the new protest: eco-rads on the road,’ Senseless Acts of Beauty. 2. Lucy Lippard, ‘Out the picture window,’ The Lure of the Local (New Press, 1997), pp. 178–187, and plates 5, 10–11, 15–16. 3. Alan Sonfist, ‘Natural phenomena as public monuments,’ in K. Stiles and P. Selz, Theories and Documents of Contemporary Art, pp. 545–547. 4. Richard Misrach, ‘Exceeding the carrying capacity of the West: an artist’s erspective,’ in Holthaus, et al., A Society to Match the Scenery (Univ. Press of Colorado, 1991). SUPPLEMENTARY: John Jordan, ‘The art of necessity: The subversive imagination of anti-road protests and Reclaim the Streets,’ in G. McKay, DiY Culture: Party & Protest in 90s Britain (Verso, 1998), pp. 129–151. Bronislaw Szerszynski, ‘Ritual action in environmental protest events,’ Theory, Culture & Society 19: 3 (2002): 51–69. Megan McShane, ‘The manifest disharmony of ephemeral culture: Art, ecology, and waste management in American culture,’ in B. Herzogenrath, From Virgin Land to Disney World (Rodopi, 2001). Bron Taylor, ‘Earth First!: from primal spirituality to ecological resistance,’ in Roger Gottlieb, ed., This Sacred Earth: Religion, Nature, Environment (New York: Routledge, 1996), pp. 545–556.
May 5	THE ECOPOLITICS OF EVERYDAY LIFE Ecocommunities, cooperatives, the Fair Trade movement, organic food production, the community gardens movement, green consumption, environmental youth subcultures, etc.! PRESENTATIONS	REQUIRED: 1. See www.earthcelebrations.com on the community gardens movement in New York City. 2. T.B.A. SUPPLEMENTARY: Michael V. McGinnis, Freeman House, and William Jordan III, ‘Bioregional restoration: Re-establishing an ecology of shared identity,’ in M. V. McGinnis, Bioregionalism (Routledge, 1999), 205–221. Charles Bergman, ‘The curious peach: Nature and the language of desire,’ in Herndl and Brown, Green Culture, pp. 281–303.
May 12	SYNTHESIS PRESENTATIONS

APPENDIX: COURSE RESOURCES

BOOKS (Those marked by asterisks (*) are recommended for in-class reports.)

MEDIA CULTURE (GENERAL)

Burnett, Ron. Cultures of Vision: Images, Media, and the Imaginary. Indiana University Press, 1995.

Kellner, Douglas. Media Culture. Routledge, 1995.

*Lasn, Kalle. Culture Jam: How to Reverse America’s Suicidal Consumer Binge – and Why We Must. Quill, 1999.

Real, Michael. Exploring Media Culture: A Guide. Sage, 1996.

Robins, Kevin. Into the Image: Culture and Politics in the Field of Vision. Routledge, 1996.

Storey, John. An Introductory Guide to Cultural Theory and Popular Culture. New York: Harvester/Wheatsheaf, 1993.

Wark, Mackenzie. Virtual Geography: Living With Global Media Events. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994.

ENVIRONMENTAL REPRESENTATION & CULTURE

Alaimo, Stacy. Undomesticated Ground: Recasting Nature as Feminist Space. Cornell University Press, 2000.

Anderson, Alison. Media, Culture, and the Environment. Rutgers Univ. Press, 1997.

*Baker, Steve. Picturing the Beast: Animals, Identity, and Representation. Manchester University Press, 1993.

Bennett, Jane, and William Chaloupka (eds.). In the Nature of Things: Language, Politics, and the Environment. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993.

Benton, Lisa and John R. Short. Environmental Discourse and Practice. Blackwell, 1999.

Cantrill, J.G., and C. L. Oravec (eds.). The Symbolic Earth: Discourse and Our Creation of the Environment. Lexington: Univ. Press of Kentucky, 1996.

Coupe, Laurence (ed.). The Green Studies Reader: From Romanticism to Ecocriticism. Routledge, 2000.

Cronon, William (ed.). Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature. New York: Norton, 1995. (POLK RESERVE)

Franklin, Sarah, Celia Lury, and Jackie Stacey. Global Nature, Global Culture. London: SAGE, 2000.

Hansen, Anders, ed. The Mass Media and Environmental Issues. Leicester University Press.

Herndl, Carl, and Steven Brown (eds.). Green Culture: Environmental Rhetoric in Contemporary America. University of Wisconsin Press, 1996.

Hochman, Jhan. Green Cultural Studies: Nature in Film, Novel, and Theory. University of Idaho Press, 1998.

Jagtenberg, Tom, and David McKie. Eco-Impacts and the Greening of Postmodernity: New Maps for Communications Studies, Cultural Studies, and Sociology. London: Sage, 1997.

Killingsworth, M. Jimmie, and Jacqueline S. Palmer. Ecospeak: Rhetoric and Environmental Politics in America. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1992. (POLK RESERVE)

Kollin, Susan. *Nature’s State: Imagining Alaska as the Last Frontier. Univ. of North Carolina Press, 2001.

*Luke, Timothy. Ecocritique: Contesting the Politics of Nature, Economy, and Culture. Univ. of Minnesota Press, 1997.

Lutz, Catherine and Jane Collins. *Reading National Geographic. Univ. of Chicago Press, 1993.

Muir, Star A. and Thomas L. Veenendall (eds.). Earthtalk: Communicative Empowerment for Environmental Action. Westport, CN & London: Praeger, 1996.

Nash, Roderick. Wilderness and the American Mind. Yale Univ. Press, 2001 (4^th edition).

Nelson, Joyce. Sign Crimes/Road Kill: From Mediascape to Landscape. Toronto: Between the Lines, 1992.

Rowell, Andrew. Green Backlash. Routledge, 1996.

Plumwood, Val. Environmental Culture. New York: Routledge, 2002.

Shutkin, William. The Land that Could be: Environmentalism and Democracy in the Twenty-first Century. MIT Press, 2000.

Taylor, Bron R. Ecological Resistance Movements: The Global Emergence of Radical and Popular Environmentalism. SUNY Press, 1995.

*Wilson, Alex. The Culture of Nature: North American Landscape from Disney to the Exxon Valdez. Toronto: Between the Lines, 1991. (POLK RESERVE)

ECOTOPIAN AND ECODYSTOPIAN NOVELS

*Callenbach, Ernest. Ecotopia.

Callenbach, Ernest. Ecotopia Emerging.

*LeGuin, Ursula. Always Coming Home.

*LeGuin, Ursula. The Dispossessed.

*Piercy, Marge. Woman at the Edge of Time.

Starhawk. The Fifth Sacred Thing.

*Robinson, Kim Stanley. Mars trilogy (Red Mars, Blue Mars, Green Mars).

Brunner, John. The Sheep Look Up.

Herbert, Frank. Dune.

JOURNALS

(available or accessible through Polk Library or other area libraries; underlined titles are especially recommended for this course)

Scholarly journals

Annals of the Association of American Geographers

Ecologist

Environmental Ethics

Environmental Conservation

Environmental History

Environmental Science and Technology

EPA Journal

World Watch

Women and Environments (WE International)

Wild Earth

Capitalism Nature Socialism

State of the Environment (Gov. Docs.)

Environmental Education Reseaerch

Journal of Environmental Planning

Environmental Planning and Management

Environmental Policy and Law

Human Ecology

Journal of Environmental Sciences

Urban Studies

Popular science and environment magazines

Sierra

Audubon

Earth Island Journal

Greenpeace

Amicus Journal

It’s Our Nature (Fox Valley Sierra Club)

Smithsonian

National Parks and Conservation

New Scientist

Discover

National Geographic

Natural History

Journals available through Article Express

Ecumene

Environmental Politics

Global Environmental Politics

Human Ecology

National Parks

Organization & Environment

Space and Culture

Wilderness

Recommended journal databases

Ebsco (MasterFile, Academic Search Elite, Online Citations)

Wilson (General Science, Social Science)

J-Stor

Lexis/Nexis

Project Muse

SOME IDEAS FOR RESEARCH PAPER TOPICS

• Analysis of an environmental, nature or wildlife advocacy organization: e.g., Greenpeace, Sierra Club, Audubon Society, Worldwide Fund for Nature, the Nature Conservancy, Earth First!, the Worldwatch Institute, the Natural Resources Defense Council, Ducks Unlimited, a local organization, et al.

• Analysis of an environmental campaign: e.g., the grassroots (environmentalist and Native) campaign against the Crandon mine, the effort to clean up PCBs in the Fox River, green consumerism campaigns, community recycling initiatives, etc.

• Analysis of an environmental debate: e.g., strategies, successes and failures of the competing sides (corporate, organic farming, environmentalist, et al.) of the genetically modified foods debate

• Environmental cultural analysis of a work of literature, music, art, etc.:

• Ecotopian (or eco-dystopian) novels, e.g., Ernest Callenbach’s Ecotopia and Ecotopia Emerging, Ursula LeGuin’s Always Coming Home, Marge Piercy’s Woman on the Edge of Time, Starhawk’s Fifth Sacred Thing, Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars trilogy

• Popular or ‘alternative’ comics (e.g. the Animal Man series)

• Science-fiction films & television series (e.g., the Star Trek, Robocop, Terminator, and Alien series; Brazil, Total Recall, Soylent Green, 1984, The Handmaid’s Tale, et al.)

• Images of nature and/or animals in horror and monster movies

• Images of place and nature in popular novels, music, art, etc.

• Analysis of a form of childrens culture: e.g., ‘eco-friendly’ kids’ culture from Bambi and Smokey the Bear to Captain Planet and Ferngully to ...

• Analysis of tourist brochures, promotion or practice of ecotourism, or some other form of recreational culture

• Analysis of advertisements: e.g., the use of nature in ads for cars or SUVs

• Popular-science and technoculture:

• Analysis of the role of whole-earth photographs, satellites, and the NASA space program in shaping the environmental imagination

• Analysis of environmental simulations such as ‘Biosphere 2’ (in Arizona), computer simulations (e.g., SIM-Earth), etc.

• Celebrities and environmental issues: e.g., rock stars and the rainforest (e.g., an analysis of Sting’s book on the Amazon), celebrities in the anti-fur campaign, etc.

• The popular anti-environmental backlash and its denial of the environmental crisis (e.g., as discussed in Andrew Rowell’s Green Backlash).

• etc.!

Spiritual Ecology

Source: https://www.wabashcenter.wabash.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Spiritual-Ecology-10.pdf

SYLLABUS

COURSE: ANTH/REL 444 SPIRITUAL ECOLOGY (Theory) 3 credits

(Exploring the Interface between the Supernatural and the Natural)

TIME: 12:00–1:15 TTh, Spring Semester 2013

PLACE: Webster Hall 203

University of Hawai‘i at Manoa

INSTRUCTOR:

Dr. Les Sponsel

Professor Emeritus

Department of Anthopology UHM

Office: Saunders Hall 321

Office hours: 1:30–3:00 TTh by appointment

Office phone: 956–3770

Email: sponsel@hawaii.edu

Website: http://www.spiritualecology.info_

(For information about the instructor see Author file).

ORIENTATION

“Throughout history, it [religion] has expressed the deepest questions human beings can ask, and it has taken a central place in the lives of virtually all civilizations and cultures.... Religion persists and is on the rise, even as scientific and non-religious perspectives have become prominent” (American Academy of Religion, “Why Study Religion?,” www.aarweb.org).

“Most anthropologists like to think of themselves as scientists, and that of course includes anthropologists who study religion. But science is not only a way of gathering data and testing hypotheses; it is also a belief system in its own right.... the study of one belief system by proponents of another belief system is going to raise problems” (Morton Klass, 1995, Ordered Universes: Approaches to the Anthropology of Religion, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, p xiii).

“The notion that fact can be cleanly separated from value is absurd. The notion that our understanding of the material world can be cleanly separated from our experience of the spiritual world is impossible. The magisteria [science and religion] are mixed, shuffled, irremediably joined” (Bruno Guiderdoni, astrophysicist at the Observatory of Lyon, France) [quoted in Science and Spirit May-June 2006 17(3):59].

“Contemporary spiritualities combine practices of particular religious traditions with concern for the global situation and the life of the planet.... are pluralistic and diverse; they search for a global ethic, are concerned with ecology, encourage the cultivation of healthy relationships, support feminism, and pursue peace.... Given the increasing scholarly attention in conferences and publications to the role of spirituality in contemporary culture, it is clear that the academy has recognized spirituality as a subject of study both within and independent of the study of religion” Mary N. MacDonald, 2005, “Spirituality,” The Encyclopedia of Religion (Second Edition), Lindsay Jones, Editor-in-Chief, New York, NY: Thomson Gale 13:8719, 8721.

“... the upsurge of Spirit is the only plausible way to stop the ecological destruction of our planet. Even people who have no interest in a communal solution to the distortions in our lives will have to face up [to] this ecological reality. Unless we transform our relationship with nature, we will destroy the preconditions for human life on this planet” (Rabbi Michael Lerner, 2000, Spirit Matters, Charlottesville, VA: Hampton Roads Publishing Company, Inc., p. 138).

[This is] “...one of the most important new areas of academic inquiry for the twenty-first century” (Richard Foltz, 2003, Worldviews, Religion, and the Environment: A Global Anthology, Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/Thomson Learning, p. xv).

“The Environmental crisis requires changes not only in public policy, but in individual behavior. The historical record makes clear that religious teaching, example, and leadership are powerfully able to influence personal conduct and commitment. As scientists, many of us have had profound experience of awe and reverence before the universe. We understand that what is regarded as sacred is more likely to be treated with care and respect. Our planetary home should be so regarded. Efforts to safeguard and cherish the environment need to be infused with a vision of the sacred” (statement from “Preserving the Earth: An Appeal for Joint Commitment in Science and Religion,” Global Forum, Moscow, January 1990).

Spiritual ecology refers to scientific and scholarly studies of the vast, complex, diverse, and dynamic arena at the interfaces of religions and spiritualities on the one hand, and on the other environments, ecologies, and environmentalisms. The term spiritual ecology is used simply because it is more inclusive than religion, referring to individual as well as organizational ideas and actions in this arena, and because it parallels the names of other major approaches within ecological anthropology like historical ecology and political ecology.

This advanced course pursues a systematic and thorough holistic survey and critical analysis of spiritual ecology in anthropological and cross-cultural perspective. Spiritual ecology is a most exciting and positive new interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary frontier for research, teaching, and practice that has been growing exponentially since the 1990s. Here the anthropological method of cultural relativism will be applied by suspending judgements on different religious beliefs and actions, although some criticisms will be considered, particularly from the “New Atheists” in the last class meeting.

The instructor will discuss his own research and publications on various aspects of this subject, including his continuing long-term fieldwork on the relationships among Buddhism, sacred places, ecology, and biodiversity conservation in Thailand drawing on his forthcoming book Natural Wisdom: Explorations in Buddhist Ecology and Environmentalism.

FORMAT

The course material will be surveyed by a few lectures with PowerPoint (Spiritual Ecology Overview, Buddhism and Nature, and St. Francis); seminar discussions of readings through a division of labor among students; and a succession of very carefully selected documentary films. A unique feature of this course is its emphasis on an experiential as well as intellectual exploration of spiritual ecology through film. Long films that consume the entire class period will be discussed on the Laulima course website, while the class discussion of shorter films may continue on the website as well. Beyond class viewing, a wealth of other films, mainly from YouTube and most of them very short, are listed in the course schedule as recommended, but these are optional depending on the interests of individual students.

Students are required to be open minded as well as courteous and professional in class. Any student can say anything as long as it is relevant, concise, and polite. The ideals of academic freedom and democracy apply in this class, even if they are restricted elsewhere. Being concise is important because there is a wealth of course material to cover in the very limited time of each class meeting, and because everyone who wishes should have an opportunity to contribute to discussion, rather than one person or a few dominating the class for an entire semester.

The only prerequisite for this course is Anth 152 Culture and Humanity or 200

Cultural Anthropology, although 415 Ecological Anthropology, 422 Anthropology of Religion, and related courses such as in religion, ecology, and environmental studies would be helpful. However, most of all, one simply needs an open mind together with intellectual curiosity and serious commitment, attributes of any reputable scientist or scholar worthy of the title.

OBJECTIVES

The three primary goals of this course are to:

1. provide a broad, systematic, and in-depth cross-cultural survey of the relationships between religion/spirituality and nature/environmentalism with an emphasis on an anthropological perspective;

2. allow each student to penetrate especially deeply into the ecology of the religion or other topic of her or his choice with an emphasis on its cultural and natural contexts; and

3. provide an inventory of key resources on spiritual ecology, including books, periodicals, articles, reference works, videos, and internet sites for present and future study and research (see Reading and Resources below plus the instructor’s book and complementary website http://www.spiritualecology.info_).

The learning outcomes for achieving these three objectives will be measured by several graded exercises as indicated below.

GRADING

The final course grade will be calculated as follows:

1. class attendance with active and meaningful participation in the discussion of assigned readings, films, and other resources in class and on the Laulima course website (20%);

2. weekly journal entries of at least one solid paragraph summarizing and reacting to key points in the course material, the first installment due March 5 and the second April 30 (30%);

3. book review essay of two to three pages single-spaced emailed as an attachment to the instructor and posted on the Laulima course website for other students who may be interested due April 30 (20%);

4. a reflective essay on the entire course of four pages single-spaced for the takehome final examination due May 7 (30%).

Please see Appendix I in this syllabus for guidelines about the journal, book review essay, and final examination essay.

Student work will be evaluated for:

1. achieving the primary objectives of the course;

2. general knowledge of all required reading assignments and of all material presented by the instructor in lectures and from class discussions, films, and so on;

3. clear, concise, logical, analytical, and critical thinking; and

4. regular, active, and meaningful participation in class discussions of assigned readings in class and on the course website.

Students pursuing an A grade should do more than the minimum requirements; that is, do additional reading and view extra films as recommended in the course Schedule.

Undergraduate and graduate student work will be graded separately, and greater sophistication is expected for the latter including a higher quantity and quality of work. Graduate students are also expected to undertake extra readings of their choice in pursuing their own special topical and regional interests.

Attendance will be taken at every class meeting during the first ten minutes of the period. Students are expected to arrive on time to class, stay and remain attentive throughout the entire period, and to come to every single class meeting throughout the entire semester. To be approved an absence requires a convincing excuse, ideally with documentation such as a memo from an appropriate official like a medical doctor. The final course grade will be reduced by one whole letter grade for every three unapproved absences.

Any students who wish to sleep or to carry on private conversations should do so outside of the classroom to avoid distracting other students and the instructor. In short, like the instructor, students are expected to take this course seriously. Anyone who does not is wasting their time and that of other students and the instructor; thus, they should drop the course immediately instead of waiting until the end of the semester to receive a poor or failing grade.

Extra credit may be earned by writing a one-page reaction (not summary) to a video, journal article, book chapter, lecture, or class discussion from any of the material covered in the syllabus or class. Five high quality extra credit papers can make the difference for a borderline course grade (e.g., B+ to A-), while ten such papers can elevate the course grade to the next higher level (e.g., B to A). Other alternatives for more extra credit include writing a review of an extra book or an extra report based on library or field research; however, the specifics have to be approved in advance by the instructor. Thus, in principle, with enough high quality work any student can earn an A in this course.

SPECAL NEEDS

If any student feels the need for reasonable accommodations because of the impact of a disability, then she or he should contact the KOKUA Program in QLCSS 013 (phones 956–7511 or 956–7612), and/or speak to the instructor in private to discuss specific needs. The instructor is quite willing to collaborate with any student and KOKUA about needs related to a documented disability.

READING

Students are required to discuss in class and on the Laulima course website one of the following three textbooks of their choice; read one additional book of their own choice, write a review, send it as an email attachment to the instructor and post it on the Laulima course website; and read a few carefully selected additional assigned journal articles, book chapters, and handouts.

Gottlieb, Roger S., 2006, A Greener Faith: Religious Environmentalism and Our

Planet’s Future, New York, NY: Oxford University Press BT 695.5 .G69 2006 (http://www.wpi.edu/academics/facultydir/rgs.html, http://users.wpi.edu/~gottlieb, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVpxdd1Oosg.

Sponsel, Leslie E., 2012, Spiritual Ecology: A Quiet Revolution, Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger (http://www.spiritualecology.info, http://olelo.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=30&clip_id=30484).

Taylor, Bron, 2010, Dark Green Religion: Nature, Spirituality and the Planetary Future, Berkeley, CA: University of California Press BL65 .N35 T39 2010

(http://www.brontaylor.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxIvBZEBS1M8).

Please see Appendix II for more resources.

You are encouraged to pursue your individual interests in exploring some of the resources identified in this syllabus including viewing extra videos and surfing websites. Students who take advantage of as many of the resources provided here as feasible will obtain a systematic and thorough overview of the subject.

Please alert the instructor if there is a problem with any of the websites listed in this syllabus or recommended during class.

Please see Appendix III for topics at a glance.

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SCHEDULE

JANUARY

PART I – ORIENTATION

8T Introduction

Required reading: either Gottlieb-Intro, Sponsel-Foreword & Prologue, or

Taylor-Preface. Additional required reading for everyone: Sponsel, L.E., 2012 (November), “Spiritual Ecology,” AAA Anthropology News 53(9):24–25. http://www.anthropology-news.org/index.php/2012/11/08/spiritual-ecology/_.

Recommended films: “Welcome to the Anthropocene” (3.5 minutes) http://www.anthropocene.info. “David Suzuki on Education for a Changing Biosphere” (60) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReFdEQBWBzw. “John Cobb on The Global Spiritual Crisis” (5.5)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xjAcSsL1Pag. “Stephen Wollaston’s A Meditation About GreenSpirit” (6) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CxkuRhVmj-0. “Keeping the Earth: Religious and Scientific Perspectives on the Environment” VHS 13215 (27).

10Th Film: “Butterfly” DVD 8340 (90), S-1

Recommended films: “Forests of Reverence in India” (8.5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P7pXo6FMEpY.

“Reviving Faith: Saving the Forests of Himalayas” (56.5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DBfYYJd1Ho

“Pagan Tree Worship in Finland” (5)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QS6pgH_pfv0&playnext=1&list=PL6537CE</verbatim> <verbatim>EC95F27CD0&feature=results_video. “Bonsai Journey in Japan” (12) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtIk2GN6v6I. “Awakening Our Relationship with Trees” (10) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7702KWymIT4

Recommended reading: Julia Butterfly Hill http://juliabutterfly.com. Circle of Life Foundation http://www.circleoflife.org. Altman, Nathaniel, 1994, Sacred Trees, San Francisco, CA: Sierra Club Books.

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15T Film: “Taking Root: The Vision of Wangari Maathai” (80), S-16

Recommended reading: Wangari Maathai Institute for Peace and Environmental

Studies http://www.uonbi.ac.ke/node/316. Maathai Wangari, 2004, The Green Belt Movement: Sharing the Approach and the Experience, New York, NY: Lantern Books.

17Th Lecture: Spiritual Ecology Overview, G-1, T-1,2

PART II – PIONEERS

22T Film: “Spirit and Nature” (88)

Recommended films: “Mountain Stream” (10) http://www.youtube.com/user/okanokumo?v=RrL_gLM4AR0.

“Spirits of Nature” (5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAMoCQI95EQ. “Maria Alice Campos Friere About the Preservation of Spirit and Nature” (4) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xU2THiAODc.

“Boris Petrovic on the Brazilian Ecovillage Movement” (6.5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aT2Qw-LOkSw.

Recommended reading: Rockefeller, Steven C., and John C. Elder, eds., 1992, Spirit and Nature: Why the Environment Is a Religious Issue, Boston, MA: Beacon Press [available at Google books].

24Th Indigenous Peoples: The Original Spiritual Ecologists S-2,3,4

Recommended films: “Fred Alan Wolf on Shamanic Physics” (27) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yufAa4oFyug&list=PL68E9483FD1B218E4. “Daniel Wildcat on Seven Basic Points in Considering How to Move Forward with Indigenous Solutions” (23.5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmXz5qb86nw.

“Winona LaDuke on Land, Life and Culture: A Native Perspective” (48) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXA2zCfxxAw&playnext=1&list=PL8F17D</verbatim> <verbatim>B322139063E&feature=results_video.

“Paganism – Back to Nature (3) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwddqafZx4.

Recommended reading: Neihardt, John G., 2008, Black Elk Speaks: Being the

Life Story of a Holy Man of the Oglala Sioux, Albany, NY: State University of New York Press (Premier Edition). Indigenous Environmental Network http://www.ienearth.org. Graham Harvey on Animism at http://www.grahamharvey.org_.

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29T Lecture: Buddhism and Nature S-5

Recommended films: “Forest Monks” http://www.pbs.org/wnet/religionandethics/episodes/january-15-2010/forestmonks/5472/. “Mark Coleman Spirit Rock Meditation Center” (4) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPfBsrenNls. “Nature, Harmony, and Buddhist Chant” (25) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKoVoG3ubVI.

“His Holiness the 14^th Dalai Lama of Tibet on Ecology, Ethics, and Interdependence” (108) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3HoMlYU9npo.

Recommended reading: Sulak Sivaraksa, 2009, The Wisdom of Sustainability: Buddhist Economics for the 21^st Century, Kihei, HI: Koa Books http://www.sulak-sivaraksa.org. Ecological Buddhism: A Buddhist Response to Global Warming http://www.ecobuddhism.org. Naropa University http://naropa.edu_.

31Th Film and Lecture: “St. Francis of Assisi” (30) S-6

Recommended films: “Brother Keith Warner on Franciscan Care for Creation” (6) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUrAS1G1-9Y. “Father Charles Cummings on Simplicity of Life” (38) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNU4KwDyWPE.

“Franz Liszt’s St. Francis Preaching to the Birds by pianist Anthony Byrne” (8) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2o1HC7OEMI.

Recommended reading: Mitchell, Donald W., and William Skudlarek, eds., 2010, Green Monasticism: A Buddhist-Catholic Response to an Environmental Calamity, Brooklyn, NY: Lantern Books.

________________________________________________________________ FEBRUARY

5T Film: “Thoreau at Walden Pond” VHS 21767 (21) S-7, T-3 & Appendix

Recommended films: “Thoreau’s Walden” VHS 9922 (27). “Henry David Thoreau on Walden Pond” (6) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0Quw_RPB0U.

“Tiago Sousa’s Walden Pond Monk” (5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Bds8Z5-xyQ. “Barry Wood on Thoreau’s Life at Walden Pond” (83) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=464a_VYqU0Y.

“Radically Simple” (35).

Recommended reading: Merkel, Jim, 2003, Radical Simplicity: Small Footprints on a Finite Earth, Gabriola Island, BC: New Society Publishers http://radicalsimplicity.org. The Thoreau Society http://www.thoreausociety.org_.

7Th Film: “John Muir in the New World” (85) S-8

Recommended films: “Lee Stetson: The Voice of John Muir” (90). “The Wilderness Idea” VHS 17105 (58). “PBS Previews The National Parks:

America’s Best Idea” (27) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mx8WbZIWCSM.

“Meditation: A Walk through the Sierras” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAs0hZb-DNs&feature=related. “John Muir: The Wild Gospel of Nature” (8) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ygw1cmEYlHg. “Biography of John Muir” (Parts 1 & 2, 10 & 12) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CDzhIvugw8. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tpgx-LkvHGE. “John Muir Trail” (10) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1FwGspvNlg. “Sierra Club 2012 Success” (7.5) http://www.youtube.com/user/nationalsierraclub_.

Recommended reading: Sierra Club http://www.sierraclub.org. Muir Woods National Monument http://www.nps.gov/muwo/. Browning, Peter, ed., 1988, John Muir In His Own Words, Lafayette, CA: Great West Books.

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12T Film: “Green Fire: Aldo Leopold and a Land Ethic for Our Time” DVD 10699

(73).

Recommended films: “Aldo Leopold: A Prophet for All Seasons” (56). “Leopold Education Project” (10)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSotChN0fGk.

Recommended reading: Leopold, Aldo, 1966, A Sand County Almanac, New York, NY: Ballatine Books. Aldo Leopold Foundation http://www.aldoleopold.org_.

PART III – ENVIRONMENTALISM

14Th Radical Environmentalism T-4, S-15

Recommended films: “Earth Days” [PBS American Experience on environmental movement] Leeward CC DVD 0454 (108) http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/earthdays/player/. “David Suzuki: An Elder’s Vision For Our Sustainable Future” (73) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2b7SpLpN5A. “Edward Abbey: A Voice in the Wilderness” (60). “Earth First! The Politics of Radical Environmentalism” (60). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhTTAVbDEfw. “Dave Foreman” (various) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4ut85q6tEE&list=PL3667EACE1A427841.

“Earth Liberation Front: Igniting a Revolution” (20) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MO2pA5We34A. “If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front (86) http://www.pbs.org/pov/ifatreefalls/full.php_.

“Burning Rage 60 Minutes” (13) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFhx9o30fps. “She’s Alive… Beautiful… Finite… Hurting… Worth Dying For” (5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGeXdvuPaw&playnext=1&list=PL25E07314849A25DF&feature=results_video.

Recommended reading: Taylor, Bron, ed., 1995, Ecological Resistance Movements: The Global Emergence of Radical and Popular Environmentalism, Albany, NY: SUNY Press.

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19T Film: “Renewal: Stories from America’s Religious-Environmental Movement” (90).

Recommended film: “Bill McKibben at screening of Renewal” (6.5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5IqeshDL5MU. http://www.350.org. “Sally Bingham on A Religious Response to Global Warming” (11) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhPbVbFzj5A&playnext=1&list=PLDE4AC</verbatim> <verbatim>3DDDC2EE953&feature=results_main. “Hawai`i Interfaith Power and Light” (0.5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqD7zsld5Eo. Young Evangelicals for Climate Action http://www.yecaction.org_.

Recommended reading: Renewal Project http://www.renewalproject.net, Interfaith Power and Light http://interfaithpowerandlight.org_.

Hawai`i Interfaith Power and Light http://www.hipl.org. Climate Change Statements from World Religions http://fore.research.yale.edu/climate-change/statements-from-world-religions/_.

McDuff, Mallory, ed., 2012, Sacred Acts: How Churches Are Working To Protect Earth’s Climate, Gabriola Island, British Columbia: New Society Publishers.

21Th Religious Environmentalism G-3,4,7

Recommended films: “Roger S. Gottlieb lecture on Religious Environmentalism” (95) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVpxdd1Oosg. “Steve Green’s Symphony of Praise” (5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ih8mnBCVHpA.

“A Rocha: Why Should Christians Care for Creation” (16)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjiX0ztGUTs. “The Green Bible” (3) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2jGbLtmrEce. “Environmental Science and Theology: Salmon Recovery in the Columbia River Basin” (5.5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sngMKPu_ZVM. “Interfaith Center for Sustainable Development” (various films) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mrkQd8b45lI&playnext=1&list=PL84ACCE1</verbatim> <verbatim>9F326AC6E&feature=results_main.

Recommended reading: Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life http://coejl.org/. Evangelical Environmental Network/Creation Care http://www.creationcare.org. Genesis Farm http://www.genesisfarm.org. Islamic Foundation for Ecology and Environmental Sciences http://www.ifees.org.uk/. National Religious Coalition on Creation Care http://www.nrccc.org. National Religious Partnership for the Environment http://www.nrpe.org. Patheos on Religions and Ecology http://www.patheos.com/search?q=ecology.

Taylor, Sarah McFarland, 2007, Green Sisters: A Spiritual Ecology, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

---------------------------------------------------- 26T Film: “Mountain Mourning” (78)

Recommended films: “Is God Green? Bill Moyers On America” (50) http://www.pbs.org/moyers/moyersonamerica/green/index.html_.

“Mountain Top Removal” (various films) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPixjCneseE&list=PLA48EE6F00EFC3D50.

Recommended reading: Christians for the Mountains http://www.ChristiansfortheMountains.org. Mountaintop Mining: Background on Current Controversies

http://www.eoearth.org/article/Mountaintop_Mining:_Background_on_Current_ Controversies. Scott, Rebecca R., 2010, Removing Mountains: Extracting Nature and Identity in the Appalachian Coalfields, Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.

28Th Film: “A Conversation with America’s Poet Laureate: W.S. Merwin with Leslie Wilcox on PBS Hawai‘i” (50) S-13

Recommended films: “W.S. Merwin/Bill Moyers Journal” (50)

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/06262009/watch.html. “A Walk Through the Palms with W.S. Merwin” (8) http://www.merwinconservancy.org/about-theconservancy/writing-about-the-land/. Merwin Conservancy http://www.merwinconservancy.org/_.

Recommended reading: “The House and Garden: The Emergence of a Dream by W.S. Merwin” http://www.merwinconservancy.org/wpcontent/uploads/2011/01/Merwin.Essay_.pdf. W.S. Merwin at Poetry Foundation http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/w-s-merwin. Felstiner, John, 2009, Can Poetry Save the Earth? A Field Guide to Nature Poems, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

_________________________________________________________________

MARCH

5T Film: “The Practice of the Wild” (Gary Snyder) (52)

Recommended films: Gary Snyder Interview http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlsyGmnHDy8&feature=gv. “Gary Snyder on Ecology and Poetry” (25) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D8SXDe9hnfI&playnext=1&list=PL73860A3</verbatim> <verbatim>A4BF5CD62&feature=results_main. Arne Naess http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8meah_arne-naess_creation. “Activism, Deep Ecology, and the Gaian Era with Lynn Margulis, Stephen Buhner, and John Seed” (45) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7BJ94fGKQw.

“Satish Kumar on Beyond Deep Ecology” (8) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MlmTLvHMg-g.

Recommended poetry reading: Gary Snyder Mountains and Rivers without End http://www.asia.si.edu/explore/china/handscroll/. http://www.asia.si.edu/podcasts/player.asp?song=snyder&parts=1.

Recommended reading: Gary Snyder Biography at Poetry Foundation http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/gary-snyder. Gary Snyder on Buddhist Anarchism http://www.bopsecrets.org/CF/garysnyder.htm. Gary Snyder on Art,

Anarchy, and the Environment http://www.sf360.org/?pageid=12826. Gary Snyder Interview http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/1323/the_ http://www.sf360.org/?pageid=12826-art-of-poetry-no-74-gary-snyder.

Naess, Arne, 2002, Life’s Philosophy: Reason and Feeling in a Deeper World, Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press.

DUE: Journal 1

PART IV – SPIRITUALITY AND RITUAL

7Th Film: “Spiritual Earth: Aloha Waves” (28) T-7

Recommended films: “Disneynature Oceans” (84). “Guided Meditation Exercise – Ocean Breadth” (3)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ze2NtJOGGpo. “Surfing Rabbi Step into Liquid” (7) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8Lhv6hKox8. “Spirit of Nature” (5.5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJv_ZziKUJg.

“A Sense of Wonder” (60). “Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring” VHS 7650 (60). Bill Moyers Journal: Rachel Carson’s Legacy” (53) http://video.pbs.org/video/1442629512/_.

Recommended reading: Carson, Rachel, 1950, The Sea Around Us, New York, NY: Oxford University Press. http://www.rachelcarson.org/_

Hawaiian Culture and Conservation in Hawai`i

http://hawaiiconservation.org/files/content/resources/publications/position_paper s/kwo3.2011_pg14.pdf_

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12T Film: “A Celebration of Creation: The Blessings of the Animals at New York’s The Cathedral of Saint John the Divine” (59)

Recommended reading: Kevin E. Mackin on The Blessing of Animals http://www.americancatholic.org/features/francis/blessing.asp__. Jewish Blessing of Animals http://www.ritualwell.org/ritual/blessing-animals. Humane Society http://www.humanesociety.org/assets/pdfs/faith/blessing-of-the-animals.pdf. Wilson, Edward O., 2006, The Creation: An Appeal to Save Life on Earth, New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Co. Alliance of Religions and Conservation http://www.arcworld.org. Terralingua: Unity in Biocultural Diversity http://www.terralingua.org_.

14Th Film: “Confessions of a Burning Man: Experience the Journey” (87) S-17

Recommended film: “Burning Man: Beyond Black Rock” DVD 5163 (106).

“We Love You – Rainbow Gathering” (40)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Wu4H-d_kAI. “Burning Man Virgins” (4)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XujhY-7mpAg.

Recommended reading: Gilmore, Lee, 2010, Theater in a Crowded Fire: Ritual and Spirituality at Burning Man, Berkeley, CA: University of California Press [includes DVD]. Burning Man http://www.burningman.com_.

PART V – ACADEMICS

19T Film: “Thomas Berry: The Great Story” (49)

Recommended films: “The Unfolding Story” (29). “Thomas Berry on Nature and Humans” (9.5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWdo2vpr-Rs.

“Thomas Berry and the Earth Community” (7) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0XBltUQ8qU. “Mary Evelyn Tucker on

Thomas Berry The Great Work Parts 1 & 2” (11 & 8) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1I2-usobL_E, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lskKMeCyyeM. “Ervin Laszlo on the Future of Our World” (47) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yF9KGm2SKJg.

Recommended reading: Berry, Thomas, 2009, The Sacred Universe, New York, NY: Columbia University Press. http://www.thomasberry.org_.

21Th Film: “Journey of the Universe” DVD 11243 (56)

Recommended reading: Swimme, Brian Thomas, and Mary Evelyn Tucker, 2011,

Journey of the Universe, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press http://www.JourneyoftheUniverse.org. Brian Swimme http://www.storyoftheuniverse.org. Mary Evelyn Tucker http://fore.research.yale.edu_.

26T SPRING RECESS

28Th continued

_____________________________________________________________________

APRIL

2T Academic Growth and Development S-11, 12 (9–10 optional)

Recommended films: “Mary Evelyn Tucker on The Emerging Alliance of Religion and Ecology” (32) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15v6f2moleE. “Mary Evelyn Tucker on The Alliance of Religion and Ecology” (51) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eE9PTiHstC8. “Religion and a New Environmental Ethic by Mary Evelyn Tucker and John Grim” (13) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BG0bQ3SwDI8. “John Grim on Religion and Ecology” (40) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGJ_r-pEH64.

Recommended reading: Tucker, Mary Evelyn, with Judith A. Berling, 2003,

Worldly Wonder: Religions Enter Their Ecological Phase, LaSalle, IL: Open Court Publishing Company. Forum on Religion and Ecology http://fore.research.yale.edu. Bron Taylor http://www.brontaylor.com.

International Society for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture http://www.religionandnature.com. Roger S. Gottlieb http://www.wpi.edu/academics/facultydir/rgs.html, http://users.wpi.edu/~gottlieb.

PART VI — ISSUES

4Th Terrapolitan Earth Religion T-6,7,8

Recommended films: Bron Taylor Davos Interview (6)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxIvBZEBS1M8, “Mark Sleboda on Dark Green Religion and Deep Ecology” (13) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8wikSl1JqIk.

Recommended reading: Spretnak, Charlene, 2011, Relational Reality: New

Discoveries of Interrelatedness That Are Transforming the Modern World, Topsham, ME: Green Horizon Foundation. California Institute of Integral Studies http://www.ciis.edu.

9T Film: “Avatar: A Message from Pandora” (20) S-18 http://vimeo.com/28181753.

Recommended films: “Defending the Rivers of the Amazon” (11) http://www.cultureunplugged.com/documentary/watchonline/play/7472/Defending-the-Rivers-of-the-Amazon--with-SigourneyWeaver. Light at the Edge of the World (186). “Why Are Some Christians Mad Over Avatar?” (4.5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rV9Vk1VhFS4

Recommended reading: The Avatar Effect http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1242409/The-Avatar-effect-Moviegoers-feel-depressed-suicidal-able-visit-utopian-alien-planet.html. Amazon Watch http://AmazonWatch.org. Cultural Survival http://www.CulturalSurvival.org. International Rivers http://www.internationalrivers.org. Survival International http://www.SurvivalInternational.org.

Bodley, John H., 2008, Victims of Progress, Lanham, MD: AltaMira Press. Cultural Survival http://www.culturalsurvival.org.

11Th Film: “Mauna Kea: Temple Under Siege” DVD 2902, VHS 21514 (57).

Recommended film: “In Light of Reverence: Protecting America’s Sacred Land” DVD 10922, VHS 18873 (73). Sacred Land Film Project http://www.sacredland.org.

Recommended reading: Harvard University Pluralism Research Report on Mauna Kea http://www.pluralism.org/reports/view/21. Malama Mouna Kea http://www.malamamaunakea.org/. Mauna a Wakea http://www.mauna-awakea.info/. Kahea: The Hawaiian Environmental Alliance http://kahea.org. Mount Graham Coalition http://www.mountgraham.org. Martin Gray’s http://sacredsites.com. Christopher L.C.E. Witcombe’s Sacred Places http://witcombe.sbc.edu/sacredplaces/sacredplacesintro.html. Sacred Sites International http://www.sacred-sites.org. U.S. News and World Report Sacred Places http://www.usnews.com/news/sacred-places/features/sacred-places.

Crowe, Ellie and William, 2001, Exploring Lost Hawai‘i: Places of Power,

History, Mystery, & Magic, ‘Aiea, HI: Island Heritage. Swan, James A. 1990, Sacred Places: How The Living Earth Seeks Our Friendship, Santa Fe, NM: Bear & Company Publishing.

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16T Film: “Earth Pilgrims” (90)

Recommended films: “From the Heart of the World: Elder Brother’s Warning”

(90) [Wong AV streaming video], “2012 Mayan Word” (64) http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/2012-mayan-word/. “Fire on the Mountain: A Gathering of Shamans” (60).

“Satish Kumar on Soil, Soul, and Society” (25) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EQ1HtzXxQU.

“A Day with Satish Kumar” (120) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCW-qkbyezs.

Recommended reading: Kumar, Satish, 2009, Earth Pilgrim, Foxhole, Darlington, Totnes, Devon, UK: Green Books Ltd. Resurgence Magazine http://www.resurgence.org. Schumacher College http://www.SchumacherCollege.org.uk http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQebAaJhtl4.

18Th Film: “Ecopsychology: Restoring Earth, Healing the Self” VHS 14703 (26)

Recommended film: “Theodore Roszak on Towards an Ecopsychology” (11) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=83VHiA2HhkM. “Matt Butler on Ecotherapy: Healing Ourselves with Nature” (10) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jB6FTNHDtR8. “Ralph Metzner on Entheogen Awakening” (12) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQebAaJhtl4.

Recommended radio interview: “Ralph Metzner on Shamanism and Mythology (104) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kH4wIcimAvA.

Recommended reading: Foundation for Global Community http://www.globalcommunity.org. International Community for Ecopsychology http://ecopsychology.org. Ecopsychology UK http://www.ecopsychology.org.uk. Chalquist, Craig, 2007, Terrapsychology: Reengaging the Soul of Place, New Orleans, LA: Spring Journal Books. Ralph Metzner’s Green Earth Foundation http://greenearthfound.org.

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23T Film: “The Great Turning” Joanna Macy (36) S-14 http://www.JoannaMacy.net.

Recommended films: “Joanna Macy: The Great Turning” (90). “Earth, Spirit and Action with John Seed” (59) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7L-1DwM4bw. “An Introduction to the Findhorn Foundation” (8) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=syRtxAzYbC0 http://www.findhorn.org.

Recommended reading: Macy, Joanna, and Chris Johnstone, 2012, Active Hope: How to Face the Mess We’re in without Going Crazy, Novato, CA: New World Library. Earth Charter Initiative http://www.earthcharterinaction.org/content/.

25Th Film: “Mother Ganga: A Journey along the Sacred Ganges River” (55)

Recommended films: “Ganges” Maui CC DVD 1272 (150). “The Sacred

Balance: Science and Spirituality” (4) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qTFzu-ArQk. Green Patriarch

http://www.patriarchate.org. “Holocene” (6) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWcyIpul8OE. “Al Gore: New Thinking on the Climate Crisis” (30) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUO8bdrXghs.

“Climate Change, Despair and Empowerment with Ross Gelbspan and John Seed” (50.5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FnF_AFnGW3Q.

“John Seed’s North American Climate Roadshow” (43) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJPGo5Sjvvw. PBS Coping with Climate Change http://www.pbs.org/newshour/topic/climate-change/.

Recommended reading: Al Gore http://www.algore.com/. See global climate change in the Encyclopedia of Earth http://www.eoearth.org. See global climate change in the Forum on Religion and Ecology http://fore.research.yale.edu. Ecological Buddhism: A Buddhist Response to Global Warming http://www.ecobuddhism.org.

Alley, Kelly D., 2002, On the Banks of the Ganga: When Wastewater Meets a Sacred River, Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.

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30T Difficulties G-2,8, S-19,20,21, T9

Recommended films: “Mary Evelyn Tucker on The Emerging Alliance of Religion and Ecology” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15v6f2moleE.

http://www.emergingearthcommunity.org. “John Grim on the Response to the Religious Perspective on Environmental Issues” (6) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9N2relUIj_g. “Sir David Attenborough’s view on Science and Religion” (2).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gfa88SeNohY. “Hitchens, Dawkins, Grayling 2007: Better Without Religion” (113)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfix_e1QnbM. “Daniel Dennett on Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon” (59) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WhQ8bSvcHQ. “David Sloan Wilson on Religion and Other Meaning Systems” (51) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNghtaLqg4. “Bill Maher’s Religulous” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5ACyiSPAmE. “Hans Zimmer Science and Religion” (12.5) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsTpY-wiezk. “Albert Low on The Origin of Human Nature: A Zen Buddhist Looks at Evolution” (9) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8iqP5awGhzY. “Finding Rudolf Steiner (89). “Accessing the Mystic with Rupert Sheldrake and Matthew Fox” (134). “Rebirth of Nature: A Dialogue with Rupert Sheldrake and Ralph Metzner” (122). “What the Bleep Do We Know!?” (108).

Recommended reading: Harland, Maddy, and William Keepin, eds., 2012, The Song of the Earth: A Synthesis of the Scientific and Spiritual Worldviews, East http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5ACyiSPAmEMeon, Hampshire, UK:

Permanent Publications. Gaia Education Network http://www.gaiaeducation.net.

Institute of Noetic Sciences http://noetic.org. Metanexus http://www.metanexus.net. Society for the Anthropology of Consciousness http://www.sacaaa.org. Society for the Scientific Study of Religion http://www.sssrweb.org. “Spirituality vs. Ecology” http://www.energygrid.com/spirit/2009/01ap-spiritualecology.html.

DUE: Journal 2, and Book Review (latter may be submitted earlier)

___________________________________________________________________

MAY

7T DUE: REFLECTIVE ESSAY FOR FINAL EXAMINATION

_________________________________________________________________

APPENDIX I. GUIDELINES FOR EXERCISES

JOURNAL

Regularly write one entry per week of at least one substantial paragraph (4–5 sentences) identifying and summarizing plus reacting to 3–5 key points covered during that period in the class discussions, readings, and films. Through the journal entries you must prove that you are following and understanding the course material and faithfully doing the readings.

Keep weekly entries in a single file and in chronological order from first to last with the dates clearly marked.

The first journal is due March 5, while the second journal is due April 30. Please send the journal as an email attachment to the instructor (sponsel@hawaii.edu) who will respond with some brief comments and the grade. Thereafter the instructor will delete the file as it is your personal intellectual diary in the course. But you should save the journal as part of your class notes for writing your reflective essay for the final examination. Also, be sure to keep good class notes throughout the semester rather than rely on memory for specifics.

BOOK REVIEW

The purpose of the book review is to allow you to explore in more depth some specific aspect of spiritual ecology that is of special interest to you. If you email the instructor with the religion, culture, region, issue, or other topic of special interest, then he can probably recommend an appropriate book. However, any book cited in the course syllabus or bibliography of the instructor’s book and the complementary website is likely to be appropriate. (For the latter see the file called New under Supplemental Information on the website http://spiritualecology.info_). The book you select must be approved in advance before you read it and write the review.

Your review should provide a comprehensive summary of the book; identify the author’s main thesis along with the argument developed and the evidence marshaled to sustain it; critique the book; and relate the book to the subject of spiritual ecology in general and this course in particular.

The review should be about two to three pages typed single-spaced. It should be sent as an email attachment to the instructor (sponsel@hawaii.edu) with the subject identified as 444 Review and also posted on the Laulima course website identified with the title of the book for any other student who might be interested in reading it.

The review is due by April 30, but may be submitted beforehand which is most advisable.

FINAL EXAMINATION

One or more letter grades will be subtracted from the final examination grade for failure to adhere to the following guidelines.

Your final essay should reflect on the entire course based on your experience in class, class notes, journals, readings, films, and other material. The primary matter to consider is the meaning, significance, achievements, potentials, and limitations of spiritual ecology.

Your essay should be clear and concise but substantial and penetrating. Go beyond generalizations to specifics including particular examples. Your essay should be limited to four pages typed single-spaced. Include introductory and concluding paragraphs. Explicitly identify by number 3–5 main points. Instead of quotes use paraphrasing, don’t waste space. Use the spelling and grammar check on your computer to try to catch any errors in the final draft of your essay, although the grade will be based slolely on the quality and relevance of the content.

Ultimately your essay must be the product of your own individual scholarship and creativity. Any plagiarism will be rewarded with an automatic F for the final course grade and reported to the office of the Dean. However, you are most welcome to consult with any individual as well as any print and internet resources, although covering the required readings for the course is by far the most important. Just be careful to properly acknowledge any source for specific information, ideas, and the like. Also, be sure to include your own insights, comments, reactions, questions, and criticisms.

Be careful to cite your course textbook and other sources including lectures, videos, case studies, websites, class discussions, and handouts. In each reading citation include the author and page (e.g., Gottlieb p. 60, or Gottlieb pp. 65–70). Other kinds of sources can be documented as follows: (lecture Jan. 17), (class discussion Feb. 19), (video title), or (personal communication with Albert Einstein). It is not necessary to append a bibliography with the full citation of sources if they are already in the course syllabus or textbook.

The purpose of the essay is to: (1) convincingly demonstrate your familiarity with the course material; (2) present a critical analysis of it; and (3) discuss your own reactions to it. Your grade will be based on this purpose plus satisfying the above guidelines and the grading criteria and course objectives listed earlier in the syllabus.

The final examination is due May 7. Send it as an email attachment to the instructor with the subject identified as 444 Final at *sponsel@hawaii.edu.

APPENDIX II. RESOURCES

Any of these six books would provide very useful background for the entire course:

Gottlieb, Roger S., 2012, Spirituality: What It Is and Why It Matters, New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Kaza, Stephanie, 2008, Mindfully Green: A Personal and Spiritual Guide to Whole Earth Thinking, Boston, MA: Shambhala Publications, Inc. (http://www.uvm.edu/~skaza_).

Kinsley, David, 1995, Ecology and Religion: Ecological Spirituality in Cross-Cultural Perspective, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, Inc. [This is the first textbook on spiritual ecology and it remains most useful]. GF 80 .K54 1995

Maathai, Wangari, 2010, Replenishing the Earth: Spiritual Values for Healing Ourselves and the World, New York, NY: Doubleday.

McGrath, Alister, 2003, The Reenchantment of Nature: The Denial of Religion and the Ecological Crisis, New York, NY: Doubleday/Galilee BT 695.5 .M444 2002 (http://users.ox.ac.uk/~mcgrath_).

Tucker, Mary Evelyn, with Judith A. Berling, 2003, Worldly Wonder: Religions Enter

Their Ecological Phase, La Salle, IL: Open Court BL 65 .N35 T38 2003 (http://fore.research.yale.edu, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15v6f2moleE, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BG0bQ3SwDI8).

These are especially useful reference works:

Bauman, Whitney A., Richard R, Bohannon II, and Kevin J. O‘Brien, eds., 2011, Grounding Religion: A Field Guide to the Study of Religion and Ecology, New York, NY: Routledge.

Gottlieb, Roger S., ed., 2006, The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Ecology, New York, NY: Oxford University Press. Ref. BL 65 .E36 O94 2006

Taylor, Bron, Editor-in-Chief, 2005, Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature, New York, NY: Continuum, Volumes 1–2 (http://www.religionandnature.com_). Ref. BL 65 .N35 E53 2005

When presenting a class discussion of a particular religion in relation to ecology it is useful to consult other sources such as a relevant book below from the Harvard University Press series on Religion and Ecology:

Chapple, Christopher Key, ed., 2002, Jainism and Ecology: Nonviolence in the Web of Life. BL 1375 .H85 J35 2002

Chapple, Christopher Key, and Mary Evelyn Tucker, eds., 2000, Hinduism and Ecology: The Intersection of Earth, Sky, and Water.

BL 1215 .N34 H56 2000

Foltz, Richard, Frederick Denny, and Azizan Baharuddin, eds., 2003, Islam and

Ecology. BP 190.5 .N38 I85 2003

Girardot, N.J., James Miller, and Liu Xiaogan, eds., 2001, Daoism and Ecology: Ways Within a Cosmic Landscape. BL 1923 .D36 2001

Grim, John A., ed., 2001, Indigenous Traditions and Ecology: The Interbeing of

Cosmology and Community. GN 470.2 .I53 2001

Hessel, Dieter T., and Rosemary Radford Ruether, eds., 2000, Christianity and Ecology: Seeking the Well-Being of Earth and Humans. BT 695.5 C49 2000

Tirosh-Samuelson, Hava, ed., 2002, Judaism and Ecology: Created World and Revealed Word. BM 538 .H85 J85 2002

Tucker, Mary Evelyn, and Duncan Ryuken Williams, eds., 1997, Buddhism and Ecology: The Interconnection of Dharma and Deeds.

BQ 4570 .E23 B83 1997

Tucker, Mary Evelyn, and John Berthrong, eds., 1998, Confucianism and Ecology: The Interrelation of Heaven, Earth, and Human. B127 .C65 C64 1998

The website of the Forum on Religion and Ecology (FORE) at Yale University includes a brief summary for each “world religion” in relation to ecology as well as a wealth of other information: http://fore.research.yale.edu. Also see the website of Bron Taylor at the University of Florida: http://www.brontaylor.com.

The periodicals Worldviews: Environment, Culture, Religion (BL 65 .N35 W675, _www.brill.nl, http://micro189.lib3.hawaii.edu/ezproxy/details.php?dbId=37832) and Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture (http://www.equinoxpub.com_) have many relevant articles. Yet another useful source is the special issue “Nature As Thou” in the periodical CrossCurrents for Summer 1994 at: http://www.crosscurrents.org/nature.htm.

The instructor’s book Spiritual Ecology: A Quiet Revolution includes an unusually extensive bibliography that lists films and websites as well as print publications. The complementary website for the book contains a wealth of information; see especially the section “Supplemental Information” including the topically arranged “Resource Guide” in the 2010 course syllabus: http://www.spiritualecology.info.

________________________________________________________________

APPENDIX III. TOPICS AT A GLANCE

ORIENTATION

Introduction

Julia saving redwood

Maathai planting trees

Spiritual ecology overview

PIONEERS

Spirit and nature

Indigenous peoples

Buddhism and nature

St. Francis

Thoreau at Walden

Muir’s cathedral

Leopold’s land ethic

ENVIRONMENTALISMS

Radical environmentalism

Religious environmentalism

Mountaintop removal in Appalachia

Ecopoet Merwin

Ecopoet Snyder

SPIRITUALITY AND RITUAL

Sea

Animal blessing

Burning Man

ACADEMICS

Berry

Journey of the Universe

Growth and development

ISSUES

Terrapolitian earth religion

Avatar

Mauna Kea

Earth pilgrims in Andes

Ecopsychology

Great Turning

Ganges

Difficulties

CULTURE and ENVIRONMENT

Source: <www.zbi.ee/~kalevi/cultenvi.htm>

Faculty of Environmental Studies — Winter 1997 Course Syllabus
ENVS 6149.03

CULTURE and ENVIRONMENT

Course director: Adrian Ivakhiv. Email: ai@yorku.ca.
Office: Room 226-B Lumbers Building. Course consultation hours: T.B.A.

OBJECTIVES

This course offers an advanced, critical introduction into current issues and debates in environmental cultural studies — i.e., the growing field of interdisciplinary research and practice located at the intersection of environmental studies/environmental thought and critical cultural theory/cultural studies. We will study culture and cultural practices as both the medium through which and the terrain within which different ideas about people and nature, and different social and ecological relations, are articulated and contested. We will survey the various ‘intersections’ of environmental thought and cultural studies around a series of themes including ‘social space’ and ‘sense of place’, race, gender, class, nature, media, globalization, cultural displacement and deterritorialization, the social production of ‘Canada’, and the technologization of the lifeworld.

RATIONALE AND THEMES

The field of environmental studies has developed as a response to the growing recognition of a deeply rooted, global ecological crisis — a crisis marked by such well-known problems as the destruction and transformation of ecosystems, rapid species loss, intensifying levels of pollution and bioaccumulation of toxins, climate change, human population growth and overconsumption, and so on. Many environmental activists and theorists believe that these conditions cannot be effectively addressed through strictly technical measures, because they are intertwined within a crisis of politics, of values, and of worldview. In other words, the ecological crisis is not merely a scientific fact to be addressed through ‘technological fixes,’ but it is more importantly a cultural fact: it is conceived, imagined, discussed, and acted upon through the diverse cultural activities of humanity. It is ‘made sense of’ culturally, and our responses to the crisis are enabled as well as constrained by our imagination and interpretation of the crisis.

The development of critical social and cultural theory, especially within the field of cultural studies, in the last few decades has provided an array of theoretical and analytical tools useful in understanding the ways cultural practices are implicated within the perpetuation and contestation of relations of power. Focusing primarily on the terrain of ‘popular’ and ‘alternative’ cultures and subcultures, dominant or hegemonic cultural formations, and the mass media, cultural studies has been especially concerned with understanding the workings of culture in relation to social and political struggles, and with enhancing the possibilities for social and cultural change. Meanwhile, the fields of cultural geography, cultural anthropology and sociology, have featured a deepened concern with cultural practices, issues of representation, identity and difference, and more recently with questions of ‘social space’ and the environment.

The emancipatory focus in cultural studies and critical theory regarding questions of class, race, gender/sexuality, and identity/difference, offers a series of ‘lenses’ or ‘optics’ through which environmental issues and struggles can be viewed, engaged, and understood. At the same time, environmentalists’ focus on relations between humans and the nonhuman world presents cultural studies (and the social sciences in general) with a serious and radical ecological challenge. Environmental cultural studies (or ‘cultural environmental studies’) represents the point at which these traditions meet and overlap; as such, it can be seen as a response to a crisis that is simultaneously social/cultural and ecological.

Our engagement with this emerging field of research and critical practice will involve: (a) a simultaneous critical focus on relations between humans and their nonhuman environments, on intra-human social and political relations (i.e. relations formed around economic class, race, gender, and other cultural identities/differences), and on the inevitable interaction between these (two) categories*; and (b) an emphasis on the cultural dimensions of these relations. We will identify and study the relationship between different dimensions of what Arjun Appadurai calls ‘global cultural flows’ — ‘imagined worlds’ (including ‘ethnoscapes,’ ‘technoscapes,’ ‘mediascapes,’ et al.) constituted by the historical and geographical imaginations of persons and groups spread around the globe. A central focus of this course will be the question of ecocultural identity/difference — that is, different modes of human interaction and ‘immersion’ with(in) nonhuman environments (via productive labour, leisure, scientific research, religion and myth, etc.) and the politics within which these are imposed, resisted, legitimized and/or marginalized.

STRUCTURE OF THE COURSE

Following a brief introduction to different notions of ‘culture’ and ‘environment’, we will begin by looking at the problematic relationship between environmental thought/radical environmentalism and cultural studies/critical social theory, especially centered around the ‘social construction of nature’ debate (weeks 1 and 2). Having mapped out the problematic of the course, we will begin to address a series of potential ‘intersections’ between cultural and environmental concerns, including place/space, agency and ecocultural identity/difference. We will begin, in week 3, with humanistic and phenomenological approaches to the perception of landscapes, places and spaces, and will gradually deepen and critique these, over the course of the next several weeks, by engaging them within a series of themes and problematics including ‘gender,’ ‘race,’ ‘class,’ media, ‘nature,’ and ‘community.’

EXPECTATIONS AND REQUIREMENTS

As a 6000-level seminar course, this course will require an extensive level of engagement with the course material. The course will assume a basic familiarity with the core themes and concerns of environmental thought, and, to a lesser extent, of critical social theory (but not necessarily cultural studies in any great depth). *The reading load for this course is substantial, and student participation in class discussions will be considered an essential component of its (potential) success. Student involvement in the course will be expected to include the following activities and assignments:

Reading and class participation

1. Reading and preparation of critical responses to the required readings.

2. Regular participation in class discussions.

3. Preparing a short in-class presentation. This will normally involve a ‘close reading’ of an article or articles, and discussion of their background, contexts and reception, and relevance to other class topics. (Depending on the size of the class, students may be expected to present on more than one occasion.)

Written work

1. Two brief (2–3 page) reaction papers to specific readings. (A format for these will be provided in class.) These will be used as ‘discussion papers’ around which in-class discussion of a given topic or set of readings will be organized.

2. A critical, annotated bibliography of readings in a topic area of your choice. This would normally be related to your plan of study, and should include reference to readings on the course list as well as others you have found useful and relevant to the topic.

3. A *research paper, which will normally be an in-depth critical analysis — an ‘environmental cultural study’ — of a specific cultural product or phenomenon. This will involve analyzing the selected ‘item’ in terms of its production context, its ‘content’ and/or ‘discourse’, and its reception or ‘consumption’ and cultural ‘resonance.’ (Length should be 10–12 pages, typed, double-spaced. Formats other than the conventional scholarly paper may be acceptable, but will need to be discussed in advance with the course director. Detailed suggestions and expectations will be provided in class.)

Additional course-related activities

In connection with the course, a series of Monday lunch-time (12 to 2 p.m.) film/video screenings will take place through the term. Attendance will not be obligatory, but it is hoped that students will be able to attend at least some of these screenings, followed by discussions, as they will be programmed so as to supplement the class topics. Occasional other activities may be recommended to students as these occur throughout the term.

READINGS

Required readings for the course will be made available in one of two forms:

(KIT) = a KIT of course readings, to be available in the York University Bookstore; and

(RESERVE) = readings set aside on reserve in the F.E.S. Resource Room.

In addition, students are encouraged to familiarize themselves with books from the following list of recommended and representative texts. All of the following titles have been ordered for the course book section of the York University Bookstore (with the exception of *Ebr, available on the World Wide Web). Required Readings from any of these texts will be made available either on reserve in the F.E.S. Resource Room (first two categories below) or in the course reading kit.

Recommended ‘Core’ Background Reading:

1. William Cronon (ed.), Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature (N.Y.: Norton & Co., 1995).

2. Alex Wilson, The Culture of Nature: North American Landscape from Disney to the Exxon Valdez (Toronto: Between the Lines, 1991).

3. Peter Jackson, Maps of Meaning: An Introduction to Cultural Geography (N.Y.: Routledge, 1989).

Recommended Texts (containing Required Readings not included in Course Kit):

1. L. Grossberg, C. Nelson, and P. Treichler, eds. Cultural Studies (New York: Routledge, 1992).

2. Gillian Rose, Feminism and Geography: The Limits of Geographical Knowledge (Polity Press, 1993).

3. Doreen Massey, Space, Place, and Gender (London: Polity Press, 1994).

4. Jody Berland and Jennifer Daryl Slack (eds.), special issue of Cultural Studies 8:2 (1994).

5. G. Robertson, M. Mash, et al. (eds.), FutureNatural: Nature, Science, Culture (N.Y.: Routledge, 1996).

6. David Harvey, Justice, Nature, & the Geography of Difference (Oxford: Blackwell, 1996).

Other recommended texts:

John Storey, An Introductory Guide to Cultural Theory and Popular Culture (New York: Harvester/Wheatsheaf, 1993).

Henri Lefebvre, The Production of Space (Oxford: Blackwell, 1974/1991).

Ross, Andrew, The Chicago Gangster Theory of Life: Nature’s Debt to Society (New York: Verso, 1994).

Michael Keith and Steve Pile (eds.), Place and the Politics of Identity (New York: Routledge, 1993).

Tom Jagtenberg and David McKie, Eco-Impacts and the Greening of Postmodernity: New Maps for Communications Studies, Cultural Studies, and Sociology (London: SAGE, 1997).

Cheryl Glotfelty and Harold Fromm, eds., The Ecocriticism Reader: Landmarks in Literary Ecology (U. of Georgia Press, 1996).

Kay Anderson and Fay Gale (eds.), Inventing Places: Studies in Cultural Geography (Melbourne: Longman Cheshire, 1992).

James Duncan and David Ley, eds., Place/Culture/Representation (Routledge, 1993).

John Rennie Short, Imagined Country: Environment, Culture, and Society (N. Y.: Routledge, 1991).

Timothy Luke, Ecocritique: Contesting the Politics of Nature, Economy, and Culture (Univ. of Minnesota Press, 1997).

Kay Milton, Environmentalism and Cultural Theory (London: Routledge, 1996).

Ebr (electronic book review) special issue (vol. 4, Winter 1996/97) on ‘Critical Ecologies’

SCHEDULE OF TOPICS AND READINGS :

January 12 (Week 1)

INTRODUCTION: ‘CULTURE’(S) AND ‘ENVIRONMENT’(S)

January 19 (Week 2)

ENVIRONMENTAL THOUGHT & CULTURAL STUDIES: DIVERGENCES, CONVERGENCES

REQUIRED READING:

*1. C. Nelson, P. Treichler, and L. Grossberg, “Cultural Studies: An Introduction,” in Grossberg, et al., *Cultural Studies, pp. 1–16. (RESERVE)

*2. Stuart Hall, “Cultural Studies and its Theoretical Legacies,” in Grossberg, et al., *Cultural Studies, pp. 277–86. (RESERVE)

*3. William Cronon, “Introduction: In Search of Nature,” *Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature, pp. 23–56. (RESERVE)

4. Mary Douglas, “Environments at risk.” (RESERVE)

RECOMMENDED READING:

Simon During, “Introduction” to *A Cultural Studies Reader, pp. 1–23. (RESERVE)

Stuart Hall, “Cultural Studies: Two Paradigms.” (RESERVE)

Kate Soper, “Nature/‘Nature’,” in *FutureNatural, pp. 22–34. (RESERVE)

*Laurie Anne Whitt and Jennifer Daryl Slack, “Communities, Environments, and Cultural Studies,” in Berland and Slack, eds., Cultural Studies 8:1, pp. 5–29. (RESERVE)

A. Ivakhiv, “The ‘Nature’ Wars: Seeking Common Grounds for Uncommon Agents.” (RESERVE)

*Jennifer Daryl Slack and Laurie Anne Whitt, “Ethics and Cultural Studies,” in Grossberg, et al., Cultural Studies, pp. 571–90.

FURTHER READING:

On nature and its ‘social construction’:

*William Cronon (ed.), Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature

*Alex Wilson, The Culture of Nature: North American Landscape from Disney to the Exxon Valdez.

*G. Robertson, M. Mash, et al. (eds.), FutureNatural: Nature, Science, Culture.

Elizabeth Bird, “The Social Construction of Nature: Theoretical Approaches to the History of Environmental Problems,” *Environmental Review, Winter 1987, pp. 255–64.

Neil Evernden, The Social Creation of Nature (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992).

Michael Soule and Gary Lease (eds.), Reinventing Nature? Responses to Postmodern Deconstruction (Washington, DC: Island Press, 1995).

Kate Soper, What is Nature? (Oxford: Blackwell, 1995).

Cultural studies (general):

*P. Jackson, “Culture and Ideology,” ch. 3 in Maps of Meaning.

*Lawrence Grossberg, Cary Nelson, and Paula Treichler, eds. Cultural Studies (New York: Routledge, 1992).

*John Storey, An Introductory Guide to Cultural Theory and Popular Culture (New York: Harvester/Wheatsheaf, 1993).

Ian Angus and Sut Jhally, Cultural Politics in Contemporary America .

Domenic Strinati, An Introduction to Theories of Popular Culture (New York: Routledge, 1995).

Simon During (ed.), The Cultural Studies Reader (New York: Routledge, 1993).

Jessica Munns and Gita Rajan (eds.), A Cultural Studies Reader: History, Theory, Practice (London & N.Y.: Longman, 1995).

Ann Gray and Jim McGuigan (eds.), Studying Culture: An Introductory Reader (London: Edward Arnold, 1993).

John Storey (ed.), Cultural Theory and Popular Culture: A Reader. (Edinbugh University Press, 1996).

Douglas Kellner, Media Culture: Cultural Studies, Identity and Politics Between the Modern and the Postmodern (New York: Routledge, 1995).

Environmental thought / critical environmentalism (general):

Michael Zimmerman, Contesting the Earth’s Future: Radical Ecology and Postmodernity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994).

Carolyn Merchant, Ecology (Key Concepts in Critical Theory), (Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities Press, 1994).

Neil Evernden, The Natural Alien: Humankind and Environment (University of Toronto Press, 1985).

January 26 (Week 3)

ENCOUNTERING ENVIRONMENTS: HUMANISTIC PERSPECTIVES ON SPACE, PLACE, & LANDSCAPE

REQUIRED READING:

1. Yi-Fu Tuan, ch. 3, “Common psychological structures and responses,” and ch. 6, “Culture, experience, and environmental attitudes”, in *Topophilia: A Study of Environmental Perception, Attitudes, and Values, pp. 13–29, 59–74. (KIT)

2. Yi-Fu Tuan, “Space and place: Humanistic perspectives,” pp. 445–55. (KIT)

3. Edward Relph, “Placelessness,” ch. 6 in *Place and Placelessness, pp. 79–121. (KIT)

4. Robert Mugerauer, “Language and the Emergence of Environment,” in Seamon and Mugerauer (eds.), Dwelling, Place and Environment: Towards a Phenomenology of Person and World, pp. 51–68. (KIT)

RECOMMENDED READING:

Christopher Tilley, A Phenomenology of Landscape: Places, Paths, Monuments (Oxford: Berg, 1994) pp. 14–34. (RESERVE)

Tim Ingold, “Culture and the Perception of the Environment,” in E. Croll and D. Parkin, *Bush Base: Forest Farm. Culture, Environment and Development, pp. 39–54. (RESERVE)

FURTHER READING:

David Seamon and Robert Mugerauer, eds. Dwelling, Place and Environment: Towards a Phenomenology of Person and World (Martinus Nijhoff, 1985).

Tuan, Topophilia: A Study of Environmental Perception, Attitudes, and Values (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1974).

Edward Relph, Place and Placelessness (London: Pion, 1976).

Edward Casey, Getting Back into Place: Toward a Renewed Understanding of the Place-World (Indiana University Press, 1993).

Neil Evernden, “The Ambiguous Landscape,” The Geographical Review 71:2 (April 1981), pp. 147–57.

Kent C. Ryden, Mapping the Invisible Landscape: Folklore, Writing, and the Sense of Place (Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1993).

February 2 (Week 4)

THE SOCIAL PRODUCTION OF SPACE AND PLACE

REQUIRED READING:

*1. K. Anderson and F. Gale, “Introduction,” ch. 1 in K. Anderson and F. Gale (eds.), *Inventing Places: Studies in Cultural Geography, pp. 1–11. (KIT)

*2. Henri Lefebvre, The Production of Space, sections XII, XIV-IXX in ch. 1, pp. 26–7, 30–59. (KIT)

*3. David Harvey, “From space to place and back again,” in *Justice, Nature, and the Geography of Difference, pp. 291–326. (KIT)

RECOMMENDED READING:

*M. Keith and S. Pile, “Introduction part 1: The politics of place” and “Introduction part 2: The place of politics,” in Keith and Pile (eds.), *Place and the Politics of Identity, pp. 1–38. (RESERVE)

FURTHER READING:

<verbatim>Lefebvre, The Production of Space.

*Duncan and Ley (eds.), Place/Culture/Representation

Ed Soja, Thirdspace: Journeys to Los Angeles and Other Real-and-Imagined Places (Oxford: Blackwell, 1996).

Neil Smith, Uneven Development: Nature, Capital, and the Production of Space (Oxford: Blackwell, 1990).

February 9 (Week 5)

GENDERSCAPES: NOT JUST ‘MAN”S WORLD

REQUIRED READING:

*1. Gillian Rose, Feminism and Geography: The Limits of Geographical Knowledge, selections from ch. 3 (pp. 41–61), ch. 4 (pp. 78–85), ch. 6 (pp. 101–112) and ch. 7. (RESERVE)

2. Rosalyn Deutsche, pp. 13–29 in “Boys town,” Society and Space 9 (1991). (RESERVE)

*3. Hilary Winchester, “The construction and deconstruction of women’s roles in the urban landscape,” in K. Anderson and F. Gale (eds.), *Inventing Places: Studies in Cultural Geography, pp. 139–50. (KIT)

RECOMMENDED READING:

Donna Haraway, “Situated knowledges.” (RESERVE)

*Janice Monk, “Gender in the landscape,” in Anderson and Gale, Inventing Places. (RESERVE)

Meaghan Morris, “Things to do with shopping malls.” (RESERVE)

*Doreen Massey, “Flexible sexism,” in Space, Place, and Gender.

Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, “Introduction: Axiomatic” and “Epistemology of the closet,” in Epistemology of the Closet (Berkeley: Univ. of California Press), pp. 1–90. (RESERVE)

FURTHER READING:

*Doreen Massey, Space, Place, and Gender.

Kate Soper, “Feminism and Ecology: Realism and Rhetoric in the Discourses of Nature,” in Science, Technology, & Human Values 20:3 (Summer 1995): 311–331.

Annette Kolodny, The Lay of the Land (Chapel Hill: Univ. of North Carolina Press, 1975).

*Peter Jackson, “Gender and Sexuality” in Maps of Meaning.

Caren Kaplan, Questions of Travel: Postmodern Discourses of Displacement (Duke University Press, 1996), pp. 143–87.

Verena A. Conley, “Back to Writing: The Fate of Post-1968 Feminine Writing,” in Ecopolitics: The Environment in Poststructuralist Thought (London: Routledge, 1997).

Joni Seager, Earth Follies: Coming to Feminist Terms with the Global Environmental Crisis (New York: Routledge, 1993).

February 16:

READING WEEK: No Class

February 23 (Week 6)

ETHNOSCAPES: IMAGINED COMMUNITIES, ‘ORIENTALISM’/POSTCOLONIALISM, & THE GLOBAL CULTURAL ECONOMY

REQUIRED READING:

1. Edward Said, from *Orientalism, pp. 1–11, 329. (KIT)

2. Arjun Appadurai, “Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy”. (KIT)

3. Akhil Gupta and James Ferguson, “Beyond ‘Culture’: Space, Identity, and the Politics of Difference,” Cultural Anthropology 9:1, pp. 6–20. (KIT)

4. Eve K. Sedgwick, “Nationalisms and Sexualities in the Age of Wilde,” in Parker, Russo, et al. (eds.), Nationalisms and Sexualities (N.Y.: Routledge, 1992), pp. 235–44. (KIT)

RECOMMENDED READING:

Peter Jackson and Jan Penrose, “Introduction,” Constructions of Race, Place and Nation (Univ. of Minnesota Press, 1994), pp. 1–20. (RESERVE)

Etienne Balibar, “Racism and Nationalism” and Immanuel Wallerstein, “The Construction of Peoplehood: Racism, Nationalism, Ethnicity,” in Balibar and Wallerstein, Race, Nation, Class: Ambiguous Identities (London: Verso, 1991). (RESERVE)

Simon Dalby, “The environment as geopolitical threat: Reading Robert Kaplan’s ‘Coming Anarchy’,” Ecumene 1996: 3 (4): 472–91. (RESERVE)

FURTHER READING:

Edward Said, Orientalism (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1978).

Francis Barker, et al. (eds.), Europe and Its Others (Colchester: Univ, of Essex Press, 1985).

Benedict Anderson, *Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, 2^nd ed. (London: Verso, 1992).

Homi Bhabha (ed.), Nation and Narration (New York: Routledge, 1990).

Smadar Lavie and Ted Swedenburg, Introduction to Displacement, Diaspora, and Geographies of Identity (London: Duke U. Press, 1996), pp. 1–23.

Simon Schama, Landscape and Memory (N.Y.: Alfred A. Knopf, 1995).

Paul Carter, The Road to Botany Bay: An Exploration of Landscape and History (New York: Knopf, 1988).

Timothy Mitchell, “The World as Exhibition,” Comp. Studies in Society and History 31: 217–36 (1989).

*David Sibley, “Outsiders in Society and Space,” ch. 7 in Anderson and Gale (eds.), Inventing Places: Studies in Cultural Geography.

March 2 (Week 7)

MEDIASCAPES, PLACE(LESSNESS), AND GLOBALIZATION

REQUIRED READING:

1. Joshua Meyrowitz, “Where Have We Been, Where Are We Going?”, ch. 15 in No Sense of Place: The Impact of Electronic Media on Social Behaviour (New York: Oxford Univ.Press, 1985). (KIT)

*2. Doreen Massey, “A place called home” and “A global sense of place” in *Space, Place, and Gender, pp. 157–72, 146–56. (RESERVE)

*3. Jody Berland, “Angels Dancing: Cultural Technologies and the Production of Space,” in Grossberg, et al., *Cultural Studies, pp. 38–50. (RESERVE)

RECOMMENDED READING:

Mike Featherstone, “Global and Local cultures” and “Localism, Globalism, and Cultural Identity,” in Undoing culture: Globalization, Postmodernism and Identity (London: SAGE, 1995), pp. 86–125. (RESERVE)

FURTHER READING:

Anthony D. King (ed.), Culture, Globalization and the World-System: Contemporary Conditions for the Representation of Identity (Univ. of Minnesota Press, 1997).

David Harvey, Part III, “Space, Time, and Place,” in Justice, Nature & the Geography of Difference (Oxford: Blackwell, 1996).

Arjun Appadurai, “The production of locality.”

Ulf Hannerz, “Cosmopolitans and Locals in World Culture,” Theory, Culture & Society 7 (1990), pp. 237–251.

R. Robertson, “Glocalization: Time-Space and Homogeneity-Heterogeneity,” in M. Featherstone, S. Lash, and R. Robertson, Global Modernities (London: SAGE, 1995), pp. 24–44.

Stanley Brunn and Thomas Leinbach (eds.), Collapsing Space and Time: Geographic Aspects of Communication and Infromation (London: Harper Collins Academic, 1991).

Arran Gare, “What is Postmodernity?” ch. 1 in Postmodernism and the Environmental Crisis (N.Y.: Routledge, 1995).

Veit Erlmann, “The Aesthetics of the Global Imagination: Reflections on World Music in the 1990s,” Public Culture 8:3 (Spring 1996).

Willard Uncapher, “Between Local and Global: Placing the Mediascape in the Transnational Cultural Flow”

Mackenzie Wark, Virtual Geography: Living With Global Media Events (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994).

March 9 (Week 8)

CONSTRUCTING CANADA & THE ‘NORTH’

REQUIRED READING:

1. Margaret Atwood, “Death By Landscape,” *Wilderness Tips, pp. 109–29. (KIT)

2. Rob Shields, from “The True North Strong and Free,” in Places on the Margin: Alternative Geographies of Modernity (New York: Routledge, 1991), pp. 82–99. (KIT)

3. Scott Watson, “Race, Wilderness, Territory, and the Origins of the Modern Canadian Landscape Painting,” in J. Zinovich (ed.), *Semiotext(e): Canadas, pp. 93–104. (KIT)

4. Thomas Haig, “Not just some sexless queen: A note on ‘Kids in the Hall’ and the queerness of Canada,” J. Zinovich (ed.), *Semiotext(e): Canadas, pp. 227–9. (KIT)

5. Rinaldo Walcott, “Voyage through the Multiverse: Contested Canadian Identities,” Border/Lines 36, pp. 49–52. (RESERVE)

RECOMMENDED READING:

Kieran Keohone, “Symptoms of Canada: National Identity and the Theft of National Enjoyment,” CineAction 28 (1992), pp. 20–33. (RESERVE)

Lorna Roth, “(De)Romancing the North,” Border/Lines 36 (1995), pp. 36–43. (RESERVE)

Gaile McGregor, “Re constructing environment: a cross-cultural perspective,” Canadian Review of Sociology and Anthropology 31 (3). (RESERVE)

FURTHER READING:

Ian Angus, A Border Within: National Identity, Cultural Plurality, and Wilderness (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1997).

Jordan Zinovich (ed.), Semiotext(e): Canadas (New York: Semiotext(e)/Marginal, 1994)

John C. Lehr, “As Canadian as Possible... Under the Circumstances: Regional Myths, Images of Place and National Identity in Canadian Country Music,” Border/Lines 2 (Spring 1985), 16–19.

Margaret Atwood, Strange Things: The Malevolent North in Canadian Literature (Oxford Clarendon Press, 1995).

Gaile McGregor, The Wacousta Syndrome: Explorations in the Canadian Langscape (Univ. of Toronto Press, 1985).

March 16 (Week 9)

THE CITY: CLASS, HOMELESSNESS, & CONTESTED SPACE

REQUIRED READING:

1. Neil Smith, “Homeless/Global: Seeing Places,” in Bird, Curtis, et al. (eds.), Mapping the Futures: Local Cultures, Global Change (Routledge, 1993), pp. 87–115. (KIT)

2. Sharon Zukin, “Postmodern Urban Landscapes,” in Lash and Friedman (eds.), Modernity and Identity (Blackwell, 1992), pp. 221–43. (KIT)

3. Mike Davis, “Beyond Blade Runner: Urban Control — The Ecology of Fear”, Open Magazine Pamphlet Series. (RESERVE)

4. Roger Keil, “Greasy Jungle Metropolis Noir,” in *Local Places in the Age of the Global City, pp. 1–8. (KIT)

RECOMMENDED READING:

Rosalyn Deutsch, “Uneven development: the spaces of public art in New York City,” in Ferguson, Geher, et al. (eds.), Out There: Marginalization and Contemporary Cultures (Cambridge, MA & London: MIT Press, 1992).

*David Harvey, “Class Relations, Social Justice, and the Politics of Difference,” ch. 3 in Keith and Pile, Place and the Politics of Identity . OR

David Harvey, ch. 12 (“Class Relations, Social Justice, and the Political Geography of Difference”) and ch. 13 (“The Environment of Justice”) in Justice, Nature & the Geography of Difference.

Edward Soja, “Inside Exopolis: Everyday Life in the Postmodern World,” in Thirdspace: Journeys to Los Angeles and Other Real-and-Imagined Places (Oxford: Blackwell, 1996), pp. 237–79. (RESERVE)

FURTHER READING:

Mike Davis, City of Quartz: Excavating the Future in Los Angeles (N.Y.: Verso, 1990).

Manuel Castells, The Informational City (Blackwell, 1989).

Roger Keil, “The Urban Future Revisited: Politics and Restructuring in L.A. After Fordism,” Strategies: A Journal of Theory, Culture and Politics 3 (1990), pp. 105–29.

Susan Ruddick, “Heterotopias of the Homeless: Strategies and Tactics of Placemaking in Los Angeles,” Strategies: A Journal of Theory, Culture and Politics 3 (1990), pp. 184–201.

*Peter Jackson, “Popular Culture and the Politics of Class,” ch. 4 in Maps of Meaning.

Peter Jackson, “Policing difference: ‘race’ and crime in metropolitan Toronto,” in Jackson and Penrose, Constructions of Race, Place and Nation (London: UCL Press, 1993).

Paul Gilroy, “Urban Social Movements, ‘Race’ and Community,” in ‘There Ain’t No Black in the Union Jack’ (London: Hutchinson, 1987).

Dean MacCannell, “Postmodern Community Planning: Notes on the Homeless and Other Nomads,” in Empty Meeting Grounds: The Tourist Papers (London: Routledge, 1992).

March 23 (Week 10)

BORDERZONES, ‘HETEROTOPOLOGIES’: SPACES & STRATEGIES OF RESISTANCE

REQUIRED READING:

1. bell hooks, “Marginality as site of resistance,” pp. 341–3. (KIT)

2. Smadar Lavie and Ted Swedenburg, Introduction to Displacement, Diaspora, and Geographies of Identity (London: Duke U. Press, 1996), pp. 1–23. (RESERVE)

3. Edward Soja, “Utopias and Heterotopias” and “The Principles of Heterotopology,” Thirdspace: Journeys to Los Angeles and Other Real-and-Imagined Places, pp. 155–62. (KIT)

*4. Barri Cohen, “Technological Colonialism and the Politics of Water,” Cultural Studies 8 (2). (RESERVE)

5. George McKay, “Direct Action of the New Protest: Eco-Rads on the Road,” in Senseless Acts of Beauty: Cultures of Resistance Since the Sixties (London: Verso, 1996), pp. 127–58. (KIT)

RECOMMENDED READING

Jane Jacobs, “‘Shake ‘im this country’: the mapping of the Aboriginal sacred in Australia — the case of Coronation Hill”, in Jackson and Penrose, *Constructions of Race, Place and Nation, pp. 100–16. (RESERVE)

W. Chaloupka and R. McGregor Cawley, “The Great Wild Hope: Nature, Environmentalism, and the Open Secret,” in J. Bennett and W. Chaloupka, eds., In the Nature of Things: Language, Politics, and the Environment (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993), pp. 3–23. (RESERVE)

*Giovanna di Chiro, “Nature as community: the convergence of environment and social justice,” in W. Cronon (ed.), Uncommon Ground. (RESERVE)

FURTHER READING:

*Trinh Min-ha, “Nature’s r,” in FutureNatural.

Jane M. Jacobs, Edge of Empire: Postcolonialism and the City (N.Y.: Routledge, 1996).

Ferguson, Geher, et al. (eds.), Out There: Marginalization and Contemporary Cultures (Cambridge, MA & London: MIT Press, 1992).

George Chauncey, Gay New York (New York: Basic Books, 1994).

Helene Clark, “Sites of resistance: place, ‘race’ and gender as sources of empowerment”, in Jackson and Penrose, Constructions of Race, Place and Nation.

bell hooks, “Postmodern blackness” and “Choosing the margin as a space of radical openness,” in Yearning: Race, Gender, and Cultural Politics (Boston: South End Press, 1990).

*Peter Jackson, “Languages of Racism,” ch. 6 in Maps of Meaning.

Steven E. Silvern, “Nature, Territory and Identity in the Wisconsin Treaty Rights Controversy,” Ecumene 2 (3), 1995, pp. 267–90.

March 30 (Week 11)

SPECTACLE, TOURISM, & THE CONSUMPTION OF NATURE

REQUIRED READING:

1. Cindy Katz and Andrew Kirby, “In the nature of things: the environment and everyday life, Trans. Inst. Br. Geog. 16 (1991), pp. 259–71. (KIT)

2. Jody Berland, “Fire and flame, lightning and landscape: tourism and nature in Banff, Alberta”, in D. Augaitis and S. Gilbert, Between Views and Points of View (Banff: Walter Phillips Gallery, 1992), pp. 12–17. (RESERVE)

3. Rob Shields, “Imaginary Sites,” in Augaitis and Gilbert. *Between Views and Points of View, pp. 22–26. (RESERVE)

4. A. Ivakhiv, “Red Rocks, ‘Vortexes,’ and the Politics of Landscape,” Social Compass vol. 44, no. 3 (1997), pp. 367–84. (KIT)

5. Jennifer Price, “Looking for nature at the mall,” in W. Cronon, ed., *Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature, pp. 186–202. (RESERVE)

RECOMMENDED READING:

*Neil Smith, “The production of nature,” in FutureNatural. (RESERVE)

*Alex Wilson, chapters 1 (“The view from the road: recreation and tourism”), 4 (“Looking at the non-human: nature movies and TV”), and 6 (“City and country”), in The Culture of Nature.

*W. Cronon (ed.), Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature: chapters by Cronon (“The trouble with wilderness”), Spirn (“Constructing nature: the legacy of F. L. Olmstead”), Slater (“Amazonia as Edenic Narrative”), White (“Are you an environmentalist or do you work for a living?”), and Proctor (“Whose nature? The contested moral terrain of ancient forests”), and Susan G. Davis, “Touch the magic.”

*Ross, Andrew, “The Ecology of Images,” in The Chicago Gangster Theory of Life: Nature’s Debt to Society (New York: Verso, 1994). (RESERVE)

FURTHER READING:

John Urry, Consuming Places (London: Routledge, 1995) and The Tourist Gaze: Leisure and Travel in Contemporary Societies (London: SAGE, 1990).

Guy Debord, The Society of the Spectacle (Detroit: Black and Red, 1983).

Sharon Zukin, “Disney World: The Power of Facade and the Facade of Power,” ch. 8 in Landscapes of Power: From Detroit to Disney World.

Steven Best and Douglas Kellner, “Modernity, Commodification, and the Spectacle From Marx through Debord into the Postmodern,” in The Postmodern Adventure.

*J. R. Short, Imagined Country: Environment, Culture, and Society.

Larsen, Svend Erik. 1994. “Nature on the move: meanings of nature in contemporary culture.” Ecumene 1 (3): 283–300.

Joe Bandy, “Managing the Other of Nature: Sustainability, Spectacle, amd Global Regimes of Capital in Ecotourism,” Public Culture 8:3 (Spring 1996).

April 6 (Week 12)

‘TECHNOSCAPES’, CYBERNETIC NATURES, AND DIGITAL ECOLOGIES

REQUIRED READING:

*1. Donna Haraway, “The Promises of Monsters: A Regenerative Politics for Inappropriate/d Others,” ch. 18 in Grossberg, et al., Cultural Studies. (RESERVE)

2. Jody Berland, “Mapping Space: Imaging Technologies and the Planetary Body,” in Aronowitz, ed., Technoscience and Cyberculture (New York: Routledge, 1996). (KIT)

*3. Mackenzie Wark, “Third Nature,” Cultural Studies 8:1 (1994). (RESERVE)

4. Nigel Clark, “Panic Ecology: Nature in the Age of Superconductivity,” TCS 14(1): 77–96, 1997. (KIT)

RECOMMENDED READING:

Jennifer S. Light, “The Changing Nature of Nature,” Ecumene 4: 2 (1997), pp. 181–95. (RESERVE)

D. Haraway, “The Cyborg Manifesto,” Simians, Cyborgs, and Women (New York: Routledge, 1991). (RESERVE)

*Tiziana Terranova, “Posthuman unbounded: artificial evolution and high-tech subcultures,” in G. Robertson, M. Mash, et al., FutureNatural: Nature, Science, Culture (New York: Routledge, 1996), pp. 165–180. (RESERVE)

*J. Berland, “On Reading ‘the Weather’,” Cultural Studies. (RESERVE)

Arthur Kroker, “Virtual Capitalism” in Aronowitz, ed., Technoscience and Cyberculture (New York: Routledge, 1996). (RESERVE)

FURTHER READING:

“Nature, politics, and possibilities: a debate and discussion with David Harvey and Donna Haraway,” Social Space 1995

Felix Guattari, “The Three Ecologies,” New Formations 8 (1989): 131–47.

Stephen Cosgrove, “Contested Global Visions: One-World, Whole-Earth, and the Apollo Space Photographs,” Annals of the Assn. of Amer. Geographers 84 (2), 1994, pp. 270–94

*Alex Wilson, “Technological Utopias: World’s Fairs and Theme Parks” and “On the Frontiers of Capital: Nuclear Plants and Other Environmental Architectures” in The Culture of Nature.

Arthur Kroker and Michael Weinstein, “The political economy of virtual reality: Pan-capitalism.”

*Timothy Luke, “Environmental Emulations: Terraforming Technologies and the Tourist Trade at Biosphere 2” (ch. 5) and “Worldwatching at the Limits of Growth” (ch. 4) in Ecocritique.

Timothy Luke, “On Environmentality: Geo-Power and Eco-Knowledge in the Discourses of Contemporary Environmentalism,” *Cultural Critique, Fall 1995, pp. 57–81.

Timothy Luke, “Liberal society and cyborg subjectivity: The politics of environments, odies, and nature,” Alternatives 21 (1996): 1–30.

*Jagtenburg and McKie, “Decentering Cartography,” ch. 9 in Eco-Impacts and the Greening of Postmodernity.

*Mark Poster, “Postmodern virtualities,” in FutureNatural.

Vivian Sobchack, “New Age mutant Ninja hackers: reading Mondo 2000,” in Mark Dery, ed., Flame Wars: The Discourse of Cyberculture (London, Duke University Press, 1994), pp. 11–28.

Jane Bennett, “Primate visions and alter-tales,” in J. Bennett and W. Chaloupka (eds.), In the Nature of Things: Language, Politics, and the Environment (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993), pp. 250–65.

William Gibson, Neuromancer

Larry McCaffery (ed.), Storming the Reality Studio (London: Duke University Press, 1991).

Andrew Ross, Strange Weather: Culture, Science and Technology in the Age of Limits (London: Verso, 1991).

*Andrew Ross, The Chicago Gangster Theory of Life: Nature’s Debt to Society.

April 13 (Week 13; optional class)

REIMAGINING NATURES/CULTURES ... ?

READINGS T.B.A.

Note:

A course in ‘Culture and Environment’ could take a number of different forms, and this one has taken its shape around a particular focus — that of current issues and debates in cultural theory, intersected with (and against) an interest in place, space, environment and ‘nature.’ Needless to say, the ‘field’ covered by this is still quite large, and any single weekly topic could potentially be expanded into a whole course on its own. Certain topics deserving of their ‘own’ separate week (such as race, sexuality, queer theory, nationalism, religion, ethnicity, animals, wilderness, weather, natural disasters and technological risks, television and other forms of cultural production, et al.) have been collapsed or merged into others. And among the forms that this course has not taken, but which it may well have, is one focused on environmental literature and the growing field of environmental literary criticism or ‘ecocriticsm’; and the very active area of environmental discourse analysis (the analysis of media and public discourses and rhetorics of nature, the environment, and environmental issues, politics and action). Depending on student interest, an attempt could be made to accommodate these or other relevant areas within the course — by way of student presentations, for instance, or through an ‘extra,’ thirteenth week. A few suggestions along with bibliographies for such an additional week follow.

(a) ANIMALS

John Berger, “Why Look at Animals?” in About Looking (New York: Pantheon, 1980).

*Alex Wilson, “Looking at the nonhuman,” in The Culture of Nature.

Jody Emel, “Are you man enough, big and bad enough? Ecofeminism and wolf eradication in the USA,” Society and Space 13 (1995), pp. 707–34.

Chris Philo, “Animals, geography, and the city: notes on inclusions and exclusions,” Society and Space 13 (1995), pp. 655–81.

J. R. Wolch, K. West, and T. E. Gaines, “Transspecies urban theory,” Society and Space 13 (1995), pp. 735–60.

Haraway, Donna, Primate Visions: Gender, Race, and Nature in the World of Modern Science. (New York: Routledge, 1989).

Barry Lopez, Of Wolves and Men (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1978).

M. Cartmill, A View to a Death in the Morning: Hunting and Nature Through History (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993).

Jennifer Wolch,“Zoopolis,” Capitalism Nature Socialism v. 7, n. 2 (1996), pp. 21–47.

Morris Berman, “The wild and the tame: humans and animals from Lascaux to Walt Disney,” in Coming to Our Senses: Body and Spirit in the Hidden History of the West (New York: Bantam, 1990), pp. 63–102.

(b) ECOCRITICISM (ENVIRONMENT AND LITERATURE):

Lawrence Buell, The Environmental Imagination: Thoreau, Nature Writing, and the Formation of American Culture (Cambridge, London: Belknap/Harvard University Press, 1995).

Michael McDowell, “The Bakhtinian Road to Ecological Insight,” in C. Glotfelty and H. Fromm (eds.), The Ecocriticism Reader: Landmarks in Literary Ecology (Athens: Univ. of Georgia Press, 1996).

John Berger and Jean Mohr, excerpt from Another Way of Telling.

Barry Lopez, “Landscape and narrative,” in Crossing Open Ground (N.Y.: Random House/Vintage, 1989), pp. 61–71.

Barry Lopez, Arctic Dreams: Imagination and Desire in a Northern Landscape (New York: Bantam, 1987).

William Least Heat Moon, PrairyErth: (a deep map) (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1991).

Leslie Marmon Silko, Ceremony (New York: Viking, 1977).

*Cheryl Glotfelty and Harold Fromm (eds.), The Ecocriticism Reader: Landmarks in Literary Ecology (Athens: Univ. of Georgia Press, 1996).

Karl Kroeber, Ecological Literary Criticism: Romantic Imagining and the Biology of Mind (N.Y.: Columbia Univ. Press, 1994).

Patrick Murphy, Literature, Nature, and Other: Ecofeminist Critiques (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1995).

(c) ENVIRONMENTAL(IST) DISCOURSES & RHETORICS:

*Timothy Luke, Ecocritique: Contesting the Politics of Nature, Economy, and Culture (Univ. of Minnesota Press, 1997).

Carl G. Herndl and Stuart C. Brown, eds. Green Culture: Environmental Rhetoric in Contemporary America (Madison: University of Wisconsin, 1996).

James G. Cantrill and Christine L. Oravec (eds.), The Symbolic Earth: Discourse and Our Creation of the Environment (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1996).

Jane Bennett and William Chaloupka (eds.), In the Nature of Things: Language, Politics, and the Environment (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993).

M. Jimmie Killingsworth and Jacqueline S. Palmer, Ecospeak: Rhetoric and Environmental Politics in America (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1992).

Star A. Muir and Thomas L. Veenendall (eds.), Earthtalk: Communicative Empowerment for Environmental Action (Westport, CN & London: Praeger, 1996).

*Michael X. Delli Carpini and Bruce A. Williams, “‘Fictional’ and ‘non-fictional’ television celebrates Earth Day: or, politics is comedy plus pretense,” in Cultural Studies 8:1 (1994), pp. 74–96.

Andrew Ross, Strange Weather: Science, Culture & Technology in an Age of Limits (Verso, 1991) and The Chicago Gangster Theory of Life (Verso, 1994).

Michael Redclift and Ted Benton (eds.), Social Theory and the Global Environment (London: Routledge, 1994).

Jacquelin Burgess and J. R. Gold (eds.), Geography, the Media and Popular Culture (London: Croom-Helm, 1985).

Anders Hansen, ed., The Mass Media and Environmental Issues. Leicester: Leicester University Press.

(d) DOOM AND DISASTER: TECHNOLOGICAL HUBRIS & THE FEAR OF NATURE

Mike Davis, “Let Malibu burn: A political history of the fire coast.”

Mike Davis, The Ecology of Fear (to be published in spring 1997).

Don Delillo, “The Airborne Toxic Event,” from White Noise (New York: Penguin, 1986), pp. 109–63.

Lawrence Buell, “Environmental Apocalypticism,” in The Environmental Imagination: Thoreau, Nature Writing, and the Formation of American Culture (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1995), pp. 280–308.

M. Jimmie Killingsworth and Jacqueline S. Palmer, “Millennial ecology: the apocalyptic narrative from Silent Spring to Global Warming,” in C. G. Herndl and S. C. Brown, Green Culture: Environmental Rhetoric in Contemporary America (Madison: Univ. of Wisconsin Press, 1996), pp. 21–43.

Some useful journals

In cultural studies and related areas (sociology of culture, communications, cultural geography, social space, etc):

Antipode, Border/Lines , Canadian Journal of Communication , Canadian Journal of Political and Social Theory, Configurations, Critical Quarterly , Critical Studies in Mass Communications, CTheory (electronic journal), Cultural Critique, Cultural Studies , Environment and Planning D: Society and Space , Ecumene , Feminist Review, Gender, Place and Culture, Journal of Popular Culture , Media, Culture and Society, New Formations, Postmodern Culture (electronic journal) , Public Culture , Representations, Science as Culture , Screen, Social Text , Space and Culture , Strategies, Textual Practice , Theory, Culture & Society , Topia , 21.C

In environmental thought and culture:

Capitalism Nature Socialism , Environmental Ethics , Environmental History , Environmental Review , ISLE , The Trumpeter , Terra Nova (Nature and Culture)

— Bron Taylor’s Courses —

Source: http://brontaylor.com/102-2/courses/

Bron Lecturing

Bron Taylor has taught many courses related to religion, ethics, and the environment. Gateways or syllabus pdf’s are provided below for some of these courses.

Anyone interested in the subject matter will find much of interest via these links, which provide introductory material, direct access to readings, extensive bibliographies, and often diverse media, such as music, art, and motion pictures.

Faculty developing their own courses in these areas may find good ideas for them and are welcome to link to the resources provided in them.

Since critical thinking and good writing go hand in hand, students are urged to find in these courses, and regularly consult, Taylor’s writing well guide.

Source:

• FALL 2021, Religion and Nature (in theoretical and historical perspective) (graduate seminar)

• FALL 2021, Nature, Spirituality and popular Culture (undergraduate)

• SPRING 2021, Religion and Nature in North America (undergraduate & graduate sections)

• SPRING 2018: Environmental Ethics (Rel 2104)

• FALL 2017: Radical Environmentalism (undergraduate & graduate sections)

• FALL 2016: Religion & Nature (Graduate Seminar)

• FALL 2016: Religion & Nature in North America

• SPRING 2016: From Disney to Avatar: Religion, Spirituality & Popular Culture

SPRING 2016: From Disney to Avatar: Religion, Spirituality & Popular Culture

Source:

<http://brontaylor.com/courses/pdf/Disney2Avatar(sp16).pdf>

From Disney to Avatar: Nature & Spirituality in Popular Culture

Spring 2016 ~ The University of Florida

COURSE NUMBER, TIME & PLACE

REL 3938: Wednesdays, 5:10–8:10; CSE121; an option for viewing assigned films after the scheduled end of the class will be available.

INSTRUCTOR

Professor Bron Taylor (Ph.D.)

Email: bron@ufl.edu

Office: Anderson 121

Office hours: Wednesdays 3:15–4:30 p.m. (Due to my lecture schedule, appointments must made by the end of the previous day to ensure I am free to meet with you and do not waste your time..

COURSE DESCRIPTION

Focusing on the period since Walt Disney began making animal-focused documentaries and animated films in the 1930s, up through the blockbuster motion picture Avatar (2009), this course examines religious, spiritual, and political dimensions of artistic productions, scientific representations in museums, and other cultural inventions (such as theme parks), in which nature takes center stage. We will explore the cultural tributaries, influences, and controversies such productions engender, for they constitute important ways that environmental ethics, and quests for environmentally sustainable livelihoods and lifeways, are expressed and promoted. The course will enhance students’ abilities to interpret these cultural productions and their evocative power and explore their own reactions to these social phenomena.

Purpose and Objectives

1. complicate and thus make more critical and sophisticated what students understand by terms like religion, spirituality, nature, and popular culture.

2. provide students with an understanding of different ways to study beliefs, perceptions, and practices related to what people variously construe as religion or spirituality.

3. illuminate the ways in which religion, spirituality and nature-related values are constructed, expressed, and contested in popular culture.

4. facilitate the development of students’ own critical and ethical engagements related to their understandings of the world and their place in it.

Course Outline

The course will unfold in three main endeavors: (1) understanding worldviews (2) developing analytic frameworks, and (3) analyzing social phenomena at the intersection of religion, spirituality, nature, and popular culture. Specifically:

Worldviews / Cosmovisions ~ Perceptions about the biosphere & universe, the human place in it, and the meaning of it.

1. ‘Religion’, ‘Spirituality’, and the ‘family resemblance’ school of social analysis

1. Hybridity and Bricolage

2. The Natural Dimension of Religion A. Nature and the origins of religion

2. Sacrifice, insecurity, and the experience of prey C. Awe, wonder, mystery, and meaning

3. Ecological adaptation and religious belief A. Maladaptive religious/cultural systems

4. Main types of religious belief and perception

1. Animistic, Pagan & Indigenous B. Axial Age Religions C. Asian / Vedic, Buddhist, Confucian, Polytheistic D. Western / Abrahamic E. New, Emerging, and Contemporary Religion/Spirituality

5. Globalization, pluralism and new forms of religious hybridity

1. New Religious Movements B. The Cultic/countercultural Milieu C. The Environmental Milieu

6. Nature Religion (understandings and examples of) A. Catherine Albanese’s Nature Religion in America

2. ‘Nature as Sacred’ nature religions: C. Paganism D. New Age E. Secular and Scientific Nature Spiritualities (often versus other ones)

7. Green Religion (and the Greening of Religion Hypothesis) VIII. Dark Green Religion

Lenses for Analysis: Strategies and explanatory frameworks

1. Theories of Myth and Popular Culture

1. Cultural productions, including film, as mythmaking B. Cultural productions, including film, as religion C. Cultural productions, including film, as ethics D. Popular culture as religious battleground

2. Lived Religions

3. Sacred Space

4. Eschatology, Apocalypticism & Millenarianism

5. Structuralism

6. Critical schools

1. Feminist and race/ethnic analysis B. Post-modern and post-colonial analysis

7. Environmental Ethics (diagnoses and prescriptions about out environmental predicaments)

1. The elements of ethics (the ethics analysis chart) B. Types of environmental ethics

Examples of Nature & Spirituality Popular Culture

Examples will begin week two and continue throughout the course (see the class schedule).

READINGS

The required books can be found inexpensively from online and other used booksellers, as well as at the University of Florida bookstore. Additional articles will be available via online links.

Required Texts

Bron Taylor, Dark Green Religion: Nature Spirituality and the Planetary Future (Berkeley & Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2010). In addition to this book, at your leisure during this course, view and listen to some of the ‘dark green’ _nature-venerating video_ and _nature-venerating music, and other supplementary materials, at the book’s website.

Daniel Quinn, The Story of B (Bantam, 1997)

Michael Redfield, The Celestine Prophesy (NY/Warner 1993)

Ernest Callenbach, Ecotopia (Heyday/Banyan Tree 2004) (or any other edition)

Bron Taylor, ed., Avatar and Nature Spirituality (WLU Press, 2013) (selections to be made available by instructor).

Bron Taylor, ed., The Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature (2005/2008), selections to be made available by instructor.

Recommended supplemental books

Adrian Ivakhiv, Ecologies of the Moving Image: Cinema, Affect, Nature (WLU Press 2013)

John C. Lyden, Film as Religion: Myths, Morals, and Rituals (New York University Press, 2003)

Jeffrey Cripple, Mutants and Mystics: Science Fiction, Superhero Comics, and the Paranormal (University of Chicago Press, 2011).

REQUIREMENTS

Movies and Documentaries

Students will view motion pictures both in class and outside of class. Many of those that are scheduled to be viewed outside of class (or partly inside and partly outside of class) I will also begin during class or make available immediately after the scheduled class period, in our assigned or another room. Students may opt to see these films using streaming or other methods. Students must see required films no later than they assigned.

Discussion and Participation

Nearly every week students will respond to questions sent by the professor via email. Answers will be brief and will address the week’s readings and/or films. Cumulatively, this is worth 10% of the course grade. Each week’s responses must be sent before class on Wednesday. No exceptions. The points for this part of the class will be awarded at the end of the class.

Exams

There will be a midterm and a final exam, worth 30 and 40% respectively, which will be taken in-class, with diverse questions to respond to, including essays sections. The exams will be comprehensive, with questions drawing on any classroom experience or assignment that occurred previously.

Research Paper and optional Slideshow Presentation

Students will prepare a 2,000–2,500-word research paper that adheres to the University of Florida’s Level-Two Writing Requirement. The essay will comprise 20% of the course grade. In addition to this essay, students may submit a related slideshow illuminating the social phenomena analyzed in the written paper. Excellent slideshows will receive bonus points and outstanding ones (with student permission) may be added to the course syllabus as examples and resources for future classes. Slideshows will be prepared with powerpoint, keynote, or other slideshow presentation programs.

In your paper you will focus on one or more aspects of popular culture, examining the ways in which it (or they) seek to evoke or reinforce spiritual perceptions and beliefs related to the environments that we inhabit. (These environments can be either what we normally consider to be natural and pristine or dramatically modified by our species.)

Use the theoretical lenses presented in the class to make an argument about the social phenomenon under investigation, or draw on other analytic perspectives you have learned elsewhere, or develop your own analytic approach as you make your argument. Build your argument on evidence you bring forward and consider carefully views and evidence contrary to your own perspective (if any such is extant); done well, considering competing points of view will make our argument stronger.

The best papers will often include a library search for scholarly articles or books that illuminate your subject matter but this is not absolutely necessary. Some things you may which to focus upon nobody has analyzed with the kind of focus we are taking in this class. You may, therefore, be plunging into a completely novel area, using lenses learned in or beyond this class as heuristic (interpretive) devices.

Consider what the artists themselves are trying to argue, convince you of, evoke in you, and call you to action regarding. Alternatively, you may elect to focus on the audiences who experience these productions. Consider also whether the social phenomena in question are advancing not only a spiritual approach to nature but also a political ideology, namely, ideas, aims and assertions that constitute a socio-economic-political program. Doing so will also bring into focus the perspectives with which your subject matter is in contention. Good questions to ask include: What do the producers of what you are examining think is at stake? With whom are they in contention? Can their means of artistic expression be considered ‘technologies of the sacred’ and if so, how? If there is a view of where humanity went wrong spiritually and with regard to nature, what is it? And if they are explicitly or implicitly envisioning or advocating a certain kind of future (e.g., a utopian or ‘ecotopian hope), what would it be?

To decide on a research project it would be a good idea to carefully review the entire class schedule to see what is coming up, as well as the “Additional Resources” section at the end of this syllabus.

Hints: In some cases the theoretical approach and arguments found in Dark Green Religion will be helpful as you work up your own paper. Do you these arguments and the evidence mustered for them compelling? Does your own focus evidence such arguments? Or, does your research cast into question those findings? Alternatively or additionally, Avatar and Nature Spirituality might be helpful to you analytically because it exemplifies the sorts of analyses I am looking for in your own papers. You may, therefore, find it helpful to read ahead to find the range of issues it explores that may also be ripe for analysis in your own research.

You are by no means restricted to the many possibilities to be found in the syllabus but being familiar with it may trigger ideas about things you know about that would be fitting. I especially like learning about things I had no idea even existed!

Finally, do not assume that you must focus on social phenomena in popular culture that promotes environmental concern and action. Much of popular culture is indifferent to and a distraction from any environmentalist agenda, and some is in direct opposition to such an agenda, including due to religious, political, and moral beliefs that view environmentalist worldviews as religiously, politically, and ethically misguided or even dangerous.

The more innovative and creative your research paper is, the better argued and evidenced, the better your grade for it will be; the same applies to your slide show presentation if you elect to do one to complement your research paper. If your paper is exceptional, I may encourage you to develop it further in order to submit to a scholarly journal, including the Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, which I edit.

University Writing Requirement

The University Writing Requirement is designed to promote student fluency in writing. To receive writing credit students must receive a grade of C or higher and satisfactorily complete the writing component of the course.

Instructors will assess student’s written assignments with respect to grammar, punctuation, usage of standard written English, clarity, coherence, and organization, according to the specifications of UF’s writing assessment rubric (information about this is available online). Students will receive a coaching on improving their writing, corrections when needed, and a grade for their work. Students are encouraged to review Professor Taylor’s writing well guide.

Extra credit

Students are encouraged to submit additional resources that illuminate course themes, books, motion pictures, comic books, photographs, music, youtube and other online films, with short descriptions of their relevance. Those making contributions to this course or future syllabi for it will receive extra credit points, according to their significance.

EVALUATION

Points Possible for Required Assignments

Assignment	Proportion of Course Grade
Discussion/Participation	10%
Research Paper	20%
Midterm	30%
Final	40%

Calculating Grades

At the end of the semester, the total number of points earned by each student will be divided by the total number earned by the highest-scoring student. The resulting percentage will be used to calculate each student’s grade for the course. Put in a formula, it looks like this:

the score of each individual student (your score) (divided by) the highest score earned by a student* The percentage arrived at by means of this formula will be evaluated according to the following scale:

A	>95
A-	90
B+ B B-	87 83 80
C+ C C-	77 73 70
D+ D D-	67 63 60
F	<59.99

This kind of scoring is fairer than many other forms of grading because: (1) It is based on what students actually achieve rather than some preconceived standard held by the professor; (2) Each student can receive a high grade; (3) Hard-working students will not be penalized for staying in a demanding course full of equally industrious students. With a traditional curve, demanding courses that “weed out” less industrious students, leaving hard-working ones, can unintentionally harm good students putting them in competition with each other. This will not occur in this course. To further insure fairness, any extra credit points will be added to the individual student’s score, only after the highest score earned by a student has been established. This ensures that the extra credit earned will not increase the difficulty of the grading scale. I reserve the right to lower or raise course grades based on classroom contributions or upon absences. I also reserve the right to change course requirements.

Late or Missing Assignments

Students who do not make discussion posts on time will not receive credit for them. Students who cannot take an exam on time for medical reasons, or deaths in their families, must inform the course instructors before the exam of the reason for their impending absence and provide evidence verifying the reason. No accommodation will be made after the fact apart from a contemporaneous accident immediately prior to the exam.

Academic Dishonesty. Students engaged in any form of academic dishonesty, as defined under the “Academic Misconduct” section of the Student Discipline Code, will be subject to other disciplinary measures. Students are expected to know what constitutes plagiarism and to understand and avoid inadvertent forms of it that can occur by cutting and pasting quotations from various texts on the world wide web and elsewhere.

Common Courtesy and Laptops: Cell phones of all sorts must be turned off during class. With the permission of the instructor laptop computers may be used during lectures but not when motion pictures are being presented, so be prepared to take written notes during such times. Students may not check email or surf the web during the class and if this is noticed, will be asked for their names and may be penalized for doing so. Students are not to engage in disruptive behavior such as whispering during the class.

Accommodation for Disabilities: Students requesting classroom accommodation must first register with the Dean of Students Office. The Dean of Students Office will provide documentation to the student who must then provide this documentation to the Instructor when requesting accommodation.

Reviewing exams. Academic dishonesty is so pronounced that faculty need to take precautions to ensure the integrity of exam processes. For this reason, in some classes, exams or parts of them will not be returned, but students may review them during office hours. At the end of the semester, work that was available for student pickup will be available in the Religion Department office in Anderson 107 for 30 days after the official date that grades are posted by the registrar. After this time, they will be recycled.

SCHEDULE

Note: All readings are to be completed before the class date/week under which they are listed. This schedule is subject to change so rather than printing it, I recommend bookmarking and using only this online syllabus and consulting it regularly.

(Week 1) January 6 ~ Cosmogony and Ethical Order

Assignments/Readings

Selections from Genesis 1–12 (which includes commentary from Professor Taylor).

Andrew Fiala’s and Matt Wiebe’s articles about ‘_Creation Myths in the Ancient World’ and the ‘Creation Story in the Hebrew Bible*.’

Daniel Quinn, Animism: Humanities Original Worldview

Popular Culture itself is defined in different ways so we begin by looking at a discussion of the term in Wikipedia, an online source that some would and others would not consider to be an expression of popular culture

Bron Taylor’s Introductory Lecture (week one)

Recommended: William French, Rousseau

Assignments/Personal Viewing

Documentaries: The Bible’s Buried Secrets (1:44); recommended: Zeitgeist the Movie (view Part I, 13:21–40:10; you may also watch more of the film if you wish.)

Presentations

Lecture: Worldviews & Cosmovisions; Cosmogonies and Ethical Order (part I).

Movie: Noah (2014); in class or on your own (Netflix, Amazon, iTunes, Redbox).

(Week 2) January 13 ~ Competing Cosmogonies (Paganism focus)

Assignments/Readings

Lynn White Jr., The Historical Roots of our Ecological Crises

William French, Francis of Asissi

Graham Harvey, Paganism and Contemporary Paganism

Bron Taylor’s Overview of Daniel Quinn’s Ishmael. This book was the inspiration for the motion picture “Instinct”, and it precedes chronologically The Story of B. Daniel Quinn, The Story of B, Bantam, 1997 (begin reading)

Further / recommended reading:

Recommended: Lynn White biography and article about the Lynn White Thesis

Robert Heinland, Stranger in a Strange Land (1981)

Starhawk, The Fifth Sacred Thing (1993) (compare with Ecotopia; a motion picture is in the works).

Presentations

Lecture: Worldviews & Cosmovisions (part II). Movie: Brother Sun, Sister Moon (1972).

Movie (online): Bambi (1942) (available widely online)

Documentary (online): Divine Women: When God Was a Girl (2012). This 58 min documentary is part one of a BBC Series on goddesses in religion. While not the focus of the documentary, the scholarship upon which this documentary draws has influenced and inspired contemporary Paganism, especially Wicca.

Recommended movies: Dumbo (1941) (available widely online); The Color Purple (1985), 2 hours, 34 minutes.

(Week 3) January 20 ~ Battle of the Cosmogonies (Animism & Evolution focus)

Assignments/Readings

Daniel Quinn, The Story of B, Bantam, 1997 (complete)

Graham Harvey, Animism Today

Bron Taylor, Disney Worlds at War

Dana Lyons, Tree Music, and the related song, The Tree mp3

Presentations

Lecture: Worldviews & Cosmovisions (part III), Ishmael, The Story of B, and the Revival of Animism, and some classical lenses for analyzing and explaining religion, including the Sacred/Profane binary.

Movies: Pocahontas (1995); and Left Behind: The Movie (2001); Fantasia (1940)

Powerpoint lecture: The Evolution of Disney’s Nature-Related Spirituality and Ideology

Recommended movies: Instinct (1999), excerpts; This is the End (2013)

Recommended documentaries: Disney True Life Adventures (1950s), The Vanishing Prairie

(1954) excerpts; Oceans (DisneyNature) ‘extra features interviews’; Gates of Heaven (1978, Dir. Errol Morris)

(Week 4) January 27 ~ Dark Green Nature Religions

Assignments/Readings

Dark Green Religion, Preface, Readers Guide and Introductory Chapter (ix-12), Chapter 2, Dark Green Religion (pp. 13–41)

Jo Pearson and Sarah Pike, Wicca

Presentations

Lecture: More Lenses for Analysis of Religion, Nature, and Popular Culture

Movies: The Wicker Man (1993); The Lion King (1994) (or next week) Movie: The Mists of Avalon (2001)

(Week 5) February 3 ~ Religion and Nature in North America; and New Age Spirituality

Assignments/Readings

Dark Green Religion in North America (Ch 3., 42–70)

John Muir, Cedar Keys (written from the Florida Gulf town by this name)

Michael York, New Age

Michael Redfield, The Celestine Prophesy (NY/Warner 1993) (begin reading)

Note: The Celestine Prophesy was also produced as a movie; it was a critical and commercial failure (and in my view, for good reason), but you may find and watch it if you wish: The Celestine Prophesy (2006)

Recommended readings:

Rachel Carson’s nature religion, selected readings

Presentations

Lecture: Yet More Lenses for Analysis, including from Nature Religion in America by C.

Albanese.

Documentary: I Am (2010), Directed by Tom Shadyac

Recommended documentaries: RamDass | Fierce Grace (2001); Afterlife (2011) (promotes reincarnation based on supposedly scientific approach to near-death experiences).

Prepare a proposal for your research paper idea this or next week and submit it for approval.

(Week 6) February 10 ~ New Age Nature Spirituality

Assignments/Readings

Bron Taylor, Celestine Prophesy

Jose Arguelles, Harmonic Convergence

Michael Redfield, The Celestine Prophesy (NY/Warner 1993) (conclude reading) Bron Taylor, The Hundredth Monkey

Presentations

Lecture: Lenses for Analysis (part III)

Documentaries (Tuesday): In the Light of Reverence (2001) (Wintu Mt. Shasta segment; perhaps Hopi/Four Corners segment)

Movie (Thursday): Mindwalk (1990) [credits begin @1:47:45.]

Documentary (recommended): What the Bleep Do We Know? (2004).

Review online documentaries related to the Mayan calendar and the New Age interest in it):

· 2012: Science or Superstition (2009) [New Age genre; see especially the first 41 and last 15 minutes, which is a good reflection of new age visions for an enlightened partnership society].

· Cracking the Maya Code (Nova/PBS, 2008), 78 minutes [A far more scientific examination of the Mayan calendar and supposed prophesies.]

· The Mayan Word (2012) online documentary, 64 minutes) [Provides contemporary Mayan perspectives about the end of the world, especially, that we are destroying our planet and need to work together to create a new beginning. Critically engages New Age views.]

Recommended movie: The Butterfly Effect (2004)

(Week 7) February 16 ~ Mid Term Week

Assignments/Readings

— Complete any readings and viewings from week 1–7

Mid-term exam (in class): Wednesday 17 February

(Week 8) February 23 ~ Radical Environmental Nature Spirituality

Assignments/Readings

Dark Green Religion, Ch 4. Radical Environmentalism (71–102).

John Seed, Re-Earthing

Listen to radical environmental music at the DGR website.

Presentations

Lecture: the Art, Music, and Radical Environmental Nature Spirituality Movie: Butterfly (2000), 79 minutes (or excerpts), and/or If a Tree Falls.

Online movie: Pickaxe (1999); view online

Recommended Films about resisting deforestation and species extinctions: FernGully; The Last Rainforest (1992), 76 minutes; Hoot (2006); The Big Trees (1952): The East (2013).

Further reading (optional)

Bron Taylor, Resacralizing Earth: Environmental Paganism and the Restoration of Turtle Island, in American Sacred Space (1995), 97–151.

Bron Taylor, _Earthen Spirituality or Cultural Genocide?: Radical Environmentalism’s

Appropriation of Native American Spirituality, Religion 27(2):183–215, April 1997.

Recommended documentaries:

If a Tree Falls (2011): documentary about the Earth Liberation Front activist Daniel McGowen, who worked with Bill Rogers (Avalon), who is discussed in DGR chapter 4.

26 February (midnight): Deadline to send Professor Taylor (by email) your research paper idea.

SPRING BREAK 27 FEBRUARY — 6 MARCH

Read Ernest Callenbach’s Ecotopia

View the movie Contact (1997); 2 hours, 21 minutes (many free online sources)

(Week 9) March 9 ~ Surfing Spirituality and other Outdoor Nature Spiritualities

Assignments/Readings

Ernest Callenbach, Ecotopia (conclude, if necessary)

Dark Green Religion, Ch 5. Surfing Spirituality (103–126); optional supplemental materials.

Samuel Snyder, Fly Fishing as Nature Religion

Greg Johnson, Rock Climbing

Kocku von Stuckrad, Mountaineering

Presentations

Surfing Spirituality slide show and motion picture excerpts.

Documentaries: In the Light of Reverence (2001); 1–26 & 1:12–1:15. (Lakota/Blackfeet/Rock Climber-‘Devil’s Tower segments); Step into Liquid (2003) excerpts;

Music and Video: See the DGR surfing spirituality venue*. There have been many websites that have dealt with surfing spirituality (some of which have disappeared since the first time this course was offered)Recommended: video of Kelly Slater and Eddie Vetter . Search also for their conservation efforts at Trestles surf break in California; search also online for surf music.

Movie night options: Point Break (1991); Golf in the Kingdom (2010)

Recommended movies: Minds in the Water (2011), Intentio (2012), Five Summer Stories (1972), Whale Rider (2002), Soul Surfer [about a Christian surfer girl who loses her arm to a shark but keeps her faith] (2013). For a free website see surf movies.

Additional Resources

Surfing History from the Surfing Heritage Foundation Recommendations (from Sam Snyder on fishy spirituality):

You tube videos about Bristol Bay, which UF Religion and Nature graduate Dr. Samuel Snyder is trying to defend (4–5 minutes each).

· Casting for Conservation in Bristol Bay (and) The Live Cast Blogs:

· Erin Block’s Mysteries Internal

· Chris Hunt’s Eat More Brook Trout (who recommended the film ‘A deliberate life’ which is available there.

Books:

· Books: David James Duncan, River Why (Snyder does not recommend the movie based on it); and Norman Maclean, A River Runs Through It (1976).

(Week 10) March 16 ~ Pantheism and Gaian Naturalism

Assignments/Readings & Viewings

Ch 6. Globalization with Predators and Moving Pictures (127–154)

Bernard Zaleha, Pantheism in American Popular Culture (esp. p. 82f)

Jack Loeffler, Edward Abbey, “Either everything is divine, or nothing is” (p.2)

_Pantheism Net_ of the World Pantheist Movement (see especially the _WPM Statement of Principles)

Presentations

Documentary: Journey of the Universe (2001)

Movie: Stigmata (1999), 98 minutes (search online, available at several sites)

David Attenborough Segment

· Sir David Attenborough — the story behind Life on Earth — BBC: Here, Naturalistic Animism is exemplified in Attenborough’s famous encounter with Mountain Gorillas, during which he said, “There is more meaning and mutual understanding in exchanging a glance with a Gorilla than any animal I know. We’re that similar. Their sight, their hearing, their sense of smell, are so similar to ours that we see the world as they do.”

· Yet, ecstatic experiences like this do not prevent him from seeing the violent side of nature and facing head on those who wish he would attribute it to a divine being: _Sir David Attenborough on nature, worms, predation, and those who believe in a beneficent God_ (2.23)

· David Attenborough on Darwin and the Tree of Life blames Genesis as the root cause of the despoliation of the earth. (See Christian article in response)

· David Attenborough’s favorite moments (recommended, worth perusing)

· Symphony of Science music videos (scroll down and, at least, view ‘We’re all connected’ and ‘The Unbroken Thread’), then look at the other music there, such as ‘Holy Now (new video at this link), and Tracy Chapman’s music video, Heaven’s Here on Earth.

Recommended movies:

American Beauty (1999); Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012) Julie Sweeny’s (standup comedy video), Letting Go of God (2006)

Recommended documentaries:

Cosmos: A Personal Voyage, episode 1 of 13 (1980, TV); series re-mastered and updated in 2009 and is available by DVD; Excerpt from The Sacred Balance: Astronaut’s View of Earth.

(Week 11) March 23 ~ Museums, Theme Parks, Photographic & Comic Books

Assignments/Readings & Viewings

Ch 7. Globalization in Arts, Sciences, and Letters (155–179) Get started on the Avatar readings (listed under week 12).

Presentations

Nature Spirituality at the Nation’s Theme Parks, Tourist Attractions, and Museums Movies: Captain Planet (1990) (excerpts) (Season One to be available on Online)

Recommended:

A Walk Through Time (online version of museum-like exhibition on cosmological and biological evolution originally produced by the Hewlett Packard company).

(Week 12) March 30 ~ Cultural Battle over Religion (and Nature) in Contact and Avatar

Assignments/Readings (and viewings)

Research paper BEFORE CLASS Wednesday 6 April, as a word document, sent by email to Professor Taylor (points deducted for absence in class 6 April)

Documentaries and commentary:

Amazon Watch, Defending the Rivers of the Amazon with Sigourney Weaver (2010), 10:39).

Avatar: A Message from Pandora (James Cameron on protecting the Amazon) (optional, 20.00) Indigenous rights websites: Indigenous Environmental Network; Amazon Watch (optional) Selected readings from Avatar and Nature Spirituality (available through Professor Taylor):

Required readings will be made available at the library or otherwise:

· B. Taylor, Prologue: Avatar as Rorschach; and Introduction: The Religion and Politics of Avatar

· Britt Istoft, Avatar Fandom, Environmentalism, and Nature Religion

· Chris Klassen, Becoming the ‘Noble Savage’: Nature Religion and the ‘Other’ in Avatar

· David Landis Barnhill, Spirituality and Resistance: Ursula Le Guin’s The Word for World is Forest and the Film Avatar

· Lisa H. Sideris, I See You: Interspecies Empathy and Avatar

· B Taylor, Truth and Fiction in Avatar’s Cosmogony and Nature Religion

Recommended/optional:

· Matthew Holtmeier, Post-Pandoran Depression or Na’vi Sympathy: Avatar, Affect, and Audience Reception

· Rachelle K. Gould, Nicole M. Ardoin, and Jennifer Kamakanipakolonahe’okekai Hashimoto Transposing the Conversation into Popular Idiom: The reaction to Avatar in Hawai‘i

· Joy H. Greenberg, Avatar and Artemis: Indigenous Narratives as Neo-Romantic Environmental Ethics

·Daniel Heath Justice, Afterword.

·Avatar and Nature Religion from the DGR website

·Alexander Zaitchik, To get the gold, they will have to kill every one of us, Salon, 10 February 2013.

·Martin Ball, Why Psychedelics Make Avatar More Sophisticated (no date)

Presentations

Movies: Avatar (2009)

Recommended Movie: Dances with Wolves (1990), 2 hours, 18 minutes.

(Week 13) April 6 ~ Religion, Nature and the Environmental Future

Assignments/Readings and Research

The optional slide show, which goes with the research paper, must be turned in by 13 April.

Ch 8. Terrapolitan Earth Religion (180–199)

Ch 9. Conclusion: Dark Green Religion and the Planetary Future (200–222)

Presentations

Lecture on Civil and Terrapolitan Earth Religion Documentary:

· The National Parks (2009), excerpts. Some things to remember when viewing the National Parks excerpts:

These things are dealt with in parts of the 12 hour series that are not included in the excerpts:

1. Their establishment, in most cases, depended upon the violent subjugation and displacement of the indigenous populations already living there.

2. Their establishment would not have happened, or at least to the extent and within the specific time frames, were it not for both commercial interests (railroads and tourism, for example) and nationalism, including its ideology of ‘manifest destiny.’

3. The Parks also include historical and cultural sites, and examples in many places in America including Florida.

4. Episode 2 has more historical information about John Muir’s battle against the Hetch Hetchy dam in Yosemite National Park. Before the 1906 earthquake in California, which led to most of San Francisco being burnt to the ground, it looked as though he would win that battle, but afterward, the public switched to supporting it, being misled into believing that the water from it was needed to safeguard the city. Brokenhearted, Muir died soon afterward. But historians say for the most part his loss solidified the notion that National Parks should be off limits to commercial incursions.

5. Wallace Stegner is one of the countries greatest western writers. He is often quoted in the documentary but the excerpts shown do not introduce him.

6. Many of the cultural sites promote and reinforce patriotism and civil religion, which are in turn often linked to the exceptional natural landscapes and used to foster both we feeling and place feeling, and sometimes even superiority, over other people and places. Is a ‘civil earth religion,’ or a ‘terrapolitan earth religion’ expressed and promoted in the parks, or a narrower nationalistic civil religion, or neither?

7. Notice how different the reactions of people are to nature, that these reactions are to at least some extent ‘socially constructed’, namely, a reflection of the preexisting cognitive and cultural frames people bring to the experience. This was seen in the history chapter in the Dark Green Religion book; What examples of it to you see in this film?

8. Notice how different the reactions of people are to nature, that these reactions are to at least some extent ‘socially constructed’, namely, a reflection of the preexisting cognitive and cultural frames people bring to the experience. This was seen in the history chapter in the Dark Green Religion book; What examples of it to you see in this film? E.g., some people were and are horrified and by wild, sometimes geothermal nature, others find the sublime in the continent’s wild places, others find evidence for the grandeur and goodness of God.

9. In a section not excerpted, the National Park Ranger Sheldon Jacobs discussed how he had no connections with wild places growing up in Detroit, but was immediately moved and captured by them on his first visit to Yellowstone National Park. At the time of the filming he was an interpretive ranger in Yosemite National Park. A good question when considering his mystical experiences with the Bison in Yellowstone is whether for him, that was a socially constructed experience, or a more personal one grounded in an experience, and a felt relationship, with the beings and place where Bison still are allowed to live.

10. Are there examples of animistic or Gaian spiritualities depicted in, and even expressed by the filmmakers, in this documentary? If so, where/when?

11. What role did photographers and landscape painters play in expressing and promoting nature spirituality and the establishment and protection of National Parks?

(Week 14) April 13 ~ Religion, Science and the Future of Religion and Nature Research paper returned, graded, with comments, no later than Wednesday, 13 April.

Assignments:

To be assigned

Assignments/Viewings

Documentary: DMT: The Spirit Molecule (2012). Other online sources available.

Presentations

Movie (in class): The Fountain, Darren Aronofsky (2006), 96 minutes.

Recommended film: Tree of Life (2011)

Recommended youtube documentary: There’s No Tomorrow (2012) (produced with support from the Post Carbon Institute).

(Week 15) April 20 (last day of class) ~ Nature’s Call

Assignments:

Complete if necessary and review previous assignments in preparation for the Final Exam.

Presentation

Documentary: Call of Life (excerpts, 50 minutes, of 118)

FINAL EXAM: TWO HOURS, DURING FINAL CLASS

Research paper revision (optional) must be turned in by midnight, April 24.

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

Additional resources, such as links to podcasts, music, slideshows, video, music, and websites, will be made available here during the course. Students are encouraged to send their own ideas for resources to the course instructors.

WRITING WELL

Bron Taylor’s Writing Well Guide

SCHOLARLY BOOKS AND ARTICLES

Verlyn Flieger, “Taking the Part of Trees: Eco-Conflict in Middle-Earth,” in J. R. R. Tolkien and His Literary Resonances: Views of Middle-Earth, (Westport, CT & London: Greenwood Press, 2000. 147–58).

Lee Gilmore, Theatre in a crowded fire: ritual and spirituality at Burning Man (University of California Press, 2010)

David Ingram, Green Screen: Environmentalism and Hollywood Cinema (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2000).

Robert K. Johnston, Reel Spirituality: Theology and Film in Dialogue (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2000)

John May, ed, New Image of Religious Film (Kansas City: Sheed & Ward, 1997).

Eric Mazur, ed., Encyclopedia of Religion and Film (ABC-CLIO, 2011)

Margaret Miles, Seeing and believing: religion and values in the movies (Beacon: 1996).

Joel Martin & Conrad Ostwalt, eds, Screening the Sacred: Religion, Myth, and Ideology in Popular American Film (Boulder: Westview Press, 1995).

Jolyon Mitchell and S. Brent Plate, eds., The Religion and Film Reader (Routledge, 2007).

S. Brent Plate, Religion and Film: Cinema and the Re-Creation of the World (Wallflower Press, 2009).

Graham St. John, Global Tribe: Technology, Spirituality and Psytrance (Studies in Popular Music) (Equinox Press, 2012). (engages trance and psychedelic, nature-related shamanism)

Graeme Turner, Film as Social Practice (London and New York: Routledge, 1999). Gregory J. Watkins, Teaching Religion and Film (Oxford University Press, 2008)

NOVELS

Margaret Atwood, The Year of the Flood: A Novel (Bloomsbury, 2009. London: Virago Press, 2010).

Robert A. Heinlein, Stranger in a Strange Land (New York: Putnam, 1961).

Barbara Kingsolver, Flight Behavior (New York: Harper, 2012).

Michael Murphy, Golf in the Kingdom (New York: Viking, 1972).

Starhawk, The Fifth Sacred Thing (New York: Doubleday, 1993).

Alice Walker, The Color Purple: A Novel (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1982).

DOCUMENTARIES

Nature-venerating (and/or conservationist) American Buffalo: Spirit of a Nation (1999( I Am (III) (2010), Tom Shadyac.

Greenfire: Aldo Leopold (2011)

In the Light of Reverence (2001)

Journey of The Universe (2001)

RamDass|Fierce Grace (2001)

The National Parks: America’s Best Idea (2009f)

The Sacred Balance (2002); based on David Suzuki’s book by this title, narrated by him. Excerpts are sometimes available for free on youtube; if these links do not work, search for them or use a paid video service: part 1; part 2; part 3; part 4; Astronaut’s View of Earth; Science and Spirituality*. The Vanishing Prairie (1954)

Thinking Like A Watershed (1998)

What the Bleep do we Know? (2011)

THEATRICAL MOTION PICTURES

Nature-venerating/mystical, pantheist, etc.

American Beauty (1999)

Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012)

Evan Almighty (2007)

Fern Gully (1992)

Golfing in the Kingdom (2010)

On the Road (2012)

Tree of Life (2011)

The Fountain (2006)

Pagan, Wiccan, Druidic

The Secret of Kells (2009); animated

The Mists of Avalon (2001) (links above)

The Wicker Man (1973)

Dancing at Lughsana (1998)

Animistic

Dumbo (1941)

Bambi (1942)

Fern Gully (1992)

The Lion King (1994)

Pochahontas (1995)

Spirited Away (2001)

Nature Religion & Dark Green Religion

Avatar (2009)

Epic (2013)

Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002). Peter Jackson (Director).

Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Rings. (2001) Peter Jackson (Director).

Spirit Bear (2005)

Grizzly Man (2005)

New Science/New Age

I Am (2011)

Mindwalk (1990)

The Butterfly Effect (2004)

What the Bleep Do We Know? (2011)

The Fountain (2006)

Apocalyptic and Dystopian (cf. Ecotopian/Utopian, and also Apocalpytic and Dystopian, and Natural Disasters / Phenomena)

Alive (1993)

Planet of the Apes (2001)

12 Monkeys (1995)

Fight Club (1999)

Hunger Games (2012)

Left Behind: The Movie (2001), and sequels

The Perfect Storm (2000)

This is the End (2013)

Twister (1996)

Volcano (1997)

Wall-E (2008); animated.

Outdoor recreation & adventure (Surfing, climbing, fishing)

Way of the Ocean (2011), 62 minutes, ‘explores the connection between man and sea through a visual feast of poetic motion’

Salmon Fishing in Yemen (2011)

Step into Liquid (2003)

Minds in the Water (2011)

Science Fiction

Dune (1984), also a book and 2000f TV series. 2001, A Space Odyssey (1968)

Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)

Paranormal phenomena (including near death, reincarnation, extra-terrestrials, ghosts, etc).

Afterlife (2011)

DMT: The Spirit Molecule (2010)

Signs (2002)

12 Monkeys (1995)

Asian Nature Spiritualities

Princess Mononoke (1997)

The Matrix (1999) Star Wars (1977)

VIDEO GAMES, COMPUTER APPLICATIONS

Captain Planet

Game of Thrones Companion

DMD (or Shadows of the Damned)

COMIC BOOKS

Some are relevant

PERFORMANCES & FESTIVALS

Burning Man

Raves

Welcome Ceremony, World Summit on Sustainable Development (2002)

THEME PARKS

Many are relevant: Disney, Bush Gardens, Sea World, etc.

WEBSITES

Professor Leslie Sponsel’s spiritual ecology website has many resources pertinent to this class and its projects, including a recent course, available here.

Fall 2016: Religion and Nature in North America

Source:

<http://brontaylor.com/test_site/102-2/courses/fall-2016-religion-and-nature-in-north-america/>

“Without a fascination with the grandeur of the North American continent, the energy needed for its preservation will never be developed” ~ Thomas Berry

• Readings

• Requirements

• Evaluation

• Schedule

• Resources

SECTIONS

REL 3103 & 5199: Thursday, Period 9–11 (4:05–7:05p.m.), Flint Hall, Room 119

INSTRUCTOR

Professor Bron Taylor (Ph.D.)
Email: bron@religion.ufl.edu
Office: Anderson 121
Office hours: Thursday 1:00–3:00 and by appointment

DESCRIPTION

Brief Course Description (in UF Catalogue)

Investigation of the ways that “religion” and “nature” have evolved and influenced one another during the cultural, political, and environmental history of North America since European Contact.

Précis

Clearcut OregonThis course critically examines the roles played by “religion” and “nature” during the evolution of the cultural, political, and environmental history of North America. Specifically, it considers questions such as:

• What are the various and contested ways terms such as “religion” and “nature” are understood, and do such understandings enhance or constrain our ability to apprehend their reciprocal influence in American cultural, political, and environmental history?

• Have the habitats of North America shaped human consciousness, including “religious” or “spiritual” perceptions, ritualizing, and ethical practices, and if so, how? This question will be in mind throughout the course, from an examination of the cultures of the continent’s “first peoples,” to religionists, environmentalists and scientists in the 20^th century.

• How and to what extent have religions of various sorts influenced human behavior in ways that contributed to the transformation of North American ecosystems?

• What roles have religiously-shaped concepts of nature played in American political history? For example, how have notions such as “natural theology” “natural law” and understandings of “sacred nature” influenced social life and natural systems during the history of the United States?

• How have religion-related nature discourses, attitudes, and practices been shaped by, and shaped European cultures, and later, by such developments in international spheres?

Yosemite Valley
Albert Bierstadt, “Yosemite Valley”, 1866

The course will draw on diverse sources, including ethnographies and other studies pertinent to America’s aboriginal peoples, environmental histories that attend to the role of religion in landscape transformations, primary texts written by the figures most responsible for watersheds in the “religion and ecology” ferment in America, scholarly examinations of these figures and their influence, as well as studies of social movements engaged in the “greening of religion” or conversely, resisting religion-inspired environmentalism. A variety of theoretical issues and background articles, including biographies of many of the central figures to be examined, will be provided from The Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature (2005). Students will complete the course with a broad knowledge of nature-related American religious history, acquainted both with pivotal figures, movements, and critical questions.

Course Outline and Learning Modules

Notch of the White Mountains
Thomas Cole, 1839
“A View of the Mountain Pass Called
the Notch of the White Mountains”

1. Religion & Nature with Early European Contacts (1000–1600)

1. The arrival, first of the Norse, then the Spanish and other European peoples, set in motion dramatic and sometimes devastating changes to the land, its first inhabitants, and the new immigrants. Religion had much to do with the character of these encounters and these changes.

2. The Colonial Period (1600–1775)

1. Fear, Ambivalence, and the Stirrings of Reverence toward Nature in the Colonial Period to the Founding of the Republic (ca. 1600–1776). b. Religion & the Ideology of Manifest Destiny as the violent collision of European and Native American Religious Cultures escalate.

3. Early Republic to the End of the Frontier (ca. 1780 to 1890)

1. The subjugation of wild peoples and places (continued). b. The European tributary of aesthetic, religious, and romantic attachments toward nature,

1. Transcendentalism and romantic theologies of correspondence. ii. Wildness and wilderness emerge as nature religion.

4. The End of the Frontier to Earth Day (1880–1970)Ricardo Lewis

1. Forest Reserves & National Parks; Scouting and Indian Guides. b. Nature writing, Back to the Land Movements, and early “post-supernaturalistic spiritualities of connection.” c. the Land Ethic (1948), Sea Mysticism & Silent Spring (1962). d. “The Historic Roots of our Ecologic Crisis” (1967) and the turn toward the indigenous cultures of Turtle Island (1969) and those originating in Asia.

5. Religion and Nature from Earth Day & the Age of Environmentalism (1970 to present)

1. Asian, Pagan, and Native American Spiritualities as Nature Religions. b. the “Greening” of some factions of the World’s Major Religions. c. The growth of Scientific Nature Religion, including Systems Ecology and the Odumites; Conservation Biology and Restoration Ecology; “Intelligent Design” and its variants; and the Consecration of Scientific Narratives in Cosmos, The Epic of Evolution, & the Universe Story d. Environmentalism and Religion e. Reactionary Responses f. International Dimensions and Future Trends

READINGS

Big SurNote: most of the required books can be found inexpensively from online and other used booksellers. Wherever available, required book readings will also be available on reserve at the library. Additional articles will be available online via links found in the course schedule.

Required Texts (graduate and undergraduate sections)

• Albanese, Catherine L. Nature Religion in America: From the Algonkian Indians to the New Age. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1990.

• Deloria, Vine (Jr.). God Is Red: A Native View of Religion. Updated ed. Golden, Colorado: 1972; reprint, Golden, Colorado: Fulcrum, 1994.

• Nash, Roderick Frazier. Wilderness and the American Mind. 4^th ed. 1967; reprint, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1967.

• Pike, Sarah. New Age and Neopagan Religions in America. New York: Columbia University Press, 2004.

Additional Required Readings for Graduate Section

• Stoll, Mark. Inherit the Holy Mountain: Religion and the Rise of American Environmentalism. Oxford University Press, 2015. Note, this book replaces John Gatta’s Making Nature Sacred: Literature, Religion, and Environment in America from the Puritans to the Present. Oxford University Press, 2004.

• Gould, Rebecca Kneale. At Home in Nature: Modern Homesteading and Spiritual Practice in America. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2005.

• Sears, John. Sacred Places: American Tourist Attractions in the Nineteenth Century. New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED FOR PURCHASE; SELECTIONS REQUIRED OR RECOMMENDED:

][Albert Bierstadt, “Old Faithful”, 1886

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. Nature. Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1986 (reprint); also in Emerson, Ralph Waldo. The Essential Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Edited by Brooks Atkinson. New York: The Modern Library, 2000. Or Essays and Lectures (includes Nature) Library of America, 1983.

• Muir, John. Nature Writings. Edited by William Cronon. New York: Library of America, 1997. This is the best single volume of Muir’s writings and it belongs in religion and nature scholars libraries.

• Thoreau, Henry David. There are many editions; two from the Library of America are nicely produced, 1985 & 2004

Supplementary Primary Texts

• Burroughs, John. Accepting the Universe. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1920. Commemorative Edition, George W. Lugg, ed., reprint of 1920 publication; Moore Haven, Florida: Rainbow Books, 1987, or 2001 edition from Fredonia Books; and Time and Change (the Complete Writings of John Burroughs). Amsterdam: Fredonia Books, 2001

• Carson, Rachel. Silent Spring. New York City: Houghton Mifflin, 1962; The Sea Around Us. New York: Oxford University Press, 1950; Under the Sea Wind. New York: Dutton, 1991; The Edge of the Sea. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1955. Carson, Rachel. Lost Woods: The Discovered Writing of Rachael Carson. Edited by Linda Lear. Boston: Beacon Press, 1998.

• Emerson, Ralph Waldo. Nature. Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1986 (reprint); also in Emerson, Ralph Waldo. The Essential Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Edited by Brooks Atkinson. New York: The Modern Library, 2000.

• Eiseley, Loren. The Immense Journey: An Imaginative Naturalist Explores the Mysteries of Man and Nature. New York: Vintage, 1959; The Firmament of Time. New York: Atheneum, 1960; The Invisible Pyramid. New York: Scribners, 1970; The Unexpected Universe. New York: Harcourt, 1972; The Star Thrower (anthology). New York: Harcourt/Harvest, 1979; All the Strange Hours. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2000.

• Jefferson, Thomas, Notes on the State of Virginia, Penguin Classics, 1998.

• Leopold, Aldo. The Sand County Almanac with Essays from Round River. Oxford: 1949; reprint, New York: Sierra Club and Balentine Books, 1971.

• Muir, John. Nature Writings: The Story of by Boyhood and Youth; My First Summer in the Sierra; The Mountains of California; Stickeen; Essays. Edited by William Cronon. New York: Library of America, 1997.

STUDENTS MAY PROPOSE A VARIETY OF OTHER FIGURES, TO NAME A FEW POSSIBILITIES:

Willa Cather, Susan Fenimore Cooper, Cotton Mather, Jonathan Edwards, Gifford Pinchot, Ernest Thompson Seton, Sarah Orne Jewett, Theodore Roosevelt, Ansel Adams, David Brower, Mable Osgood Wright. Moreover, although the first priority in this class is to help students understand the premium on this class is to focus on the period leading up to 1970, Earth Day, and the Age of Ecology, I will consider proposals to focus on more recent figures including: Edward Abbey, Thomas Berry, Wendell Berry, Annie Dillard, Denise Levertov, Joy Harjo, Robinson Jeffers, Barry Lopez, Peter Matthiessen, Gary Snyder, Starhawk, Terry Tempest Williams, Alice Walker, E.O. Wilson. Feel free to make your own proposals.

REQUIREMENTS

Undergraduate Section

Cole Thomas:Indian Sacrifice
Thomas Cole, “Indian Sacrifice”, 1826

• This is a reading-intensive class so a high priority will be placed on the quality of preparation, participation, and thus also attendance (30%). To ensure careful preparation, there will be regular, unannounced, quizzes held in class based on the readings, or, students will be asked to submit by email, normally no later than midnight Tuesday (otherwise by announcement), a 300–500 word summary of the major arguments being articulated in the major reading, and identify major fault lines and competing perspectives. The weeks in which these short essays will be required will be announced in class, by email, or placed in the reading schedule; so pay attention!

• Multiple choice in class & take home essay mid term exam (30%); see class schedule for details.

• Multiple choice and short answer final exam (40%); see class schedule for details.

Important Notes

This course is a hybrid, including both upper-level undergraduate and a graduate student sections. This has both disadvantages and advantages, but the course has been designed to amplify the advantages. It may be necessary to make adjustments to course readings and requirements along the way. The online version of this syllabus is the operative and binding version, so it is imperative that you use the online version, rather than versions printed out earlier in the class.

The quality of this course depends on the preparation and insights of every participant. Only in exigent circumstances may students be absent, and the instructor should be informed of any absence before the class that is missed, unless health and safety prevents such notice. Students are expected to be punctual, for this expresses courtesy and respect for your colleagues and prevents repetition of material presented in class.

Graduate Section

This course is a luxury in that the premium in it is the reading of primary and secondary sources that you will likely not have the opportunity to do in a similar way unless your research takes you in these directions. Consequently, it is what I call a ‘readings’ course. This means I do not require a research paper. Rather, I prioritize careful reading and class preparation, in-class presentations, and exams, which provide an opportunity to demonstrate careful reading and analytical insights. Here are the specific assignments:

• Grand CanyonConsistent attendance, quality of preparation, & participation (15%). Normally, by no later than Wednesday evening (otherwise by announcement), students are to email a 500–800 word summary of the major arguments being articulated in the major readings, with some reflection on the relationship among these arguments and other currents in the class, first in other readings from that week, and then, with regard to other theoretical streams they are encountering. In other words, after articulating the arguments being advanced and what is at stake with regard to them, you are to identify the fault lines and competing perspectives that are emerging and make connections among the various understandings. If the key readings are not argumentative, then you should describe the perspective(s) presented and note connections among this week’s and prior readings. Remember that the course has to do with religion and nature in America, so you should be especially alert to and engaged in analysis of the religious dimensions of the arguments, figures, movements, and so on, that appear in your readings. In fall of 2013 you will also be regularly called upon to explain and interpret readings that the undergraduates have not had in their assignments.

• Whole Earth CatalogBiographical, Movement Research, or Controversy Analysis (& related classroom presentation). (15%) Each student will either (1) read the major writings of and about seminal figures or (2) read about movements critical to the America’s religion and nature ferment, and then, provide written, and if time allows, oral reports to the classroom, as negotiated with and scheduled through agreement with the instructor. In your presentations you should endeavor to situate the subject within the broader cultural ferment of the time. Presentations focused on individuals will include the reading of biographies (see course bibliography for some examples). A third option will be to read into a critical controversy, such as related to Frederick Jackson Turner’s “Frontier Thesis” and its “New Western History” detractors, analyzing the controversy’s relevance to this course’s critical questions. Whatever else they do, all presentations will bring the same sorts of critical questioning to these analyses as identified under #1, above.

• Mid term exam with in-class and take-home essay components (30%)

• Final exam: with in-class and essay dimensions specified in the course schedule (40%).

* Alternative: Students wishing to write a standard research paper may do so, replacing this for assignment #2, above. In such a case both exams, and the research paper, will each be worth 30% of the course grade.

Important Notes

YosemiteThis course is an important one for Religion and Nature graduate students seeking competence in Occidental traditions in general and North America in particular. It is also an elective in the Religions in the Americas concentration. Given that other courses are offered that focus on Asian and Abrahamic religions, and do so making a priority of examining developments since 1970, the priority in this course is historical. The central objective is to illuminate broad cultural trends and nature-related practices and transformations, rather than attempting to survey the world’s major religious traditions, and their natural dimensions, in America.

Course readings and requirements may be modified. The online version of this syllabus is the operative and binding version, so it is imperative that you use the online version, rather than versions printed out earlier in the class.

The quality of this seminar depends on the insights of every participant. Only in exigent circumstances may students be absent. In such cases, such an absence should be pre-approved by the instructor and the reasons documented. Students are also expected to be punctual, for this expresses courtesy and respect for your colleagues.

EVALUATION

Points Possible for Required Assignments

This chart shows the points it is possible to earn for each assignment:

UNDERGRADUATE SECTION

Assignment	Points per Assignment	Total Possible Points
Quizzes & Summaries	10 or 20 points each	150 (30%)
Midterm Exam	150 points	150 (30%)
Final Exam	200 points	200 (40%)
	Total Possible Points:	500 (100%)

GRADUATE SECTION

Assignment	Points per Assignment	Total Possible Points
Weekly Summaries	10–20 points each	75 (15%)
Research Presentation	75 points	75 (15%)
Midterm Exam	150 points	150 (30%)
Final Exam	200 points	200 (40%)
Total Possible Points:	500 (100%)

Calculating Grades

For both the midterm and final exams, the total number of points earned by each student will be divided by the total number earned by the highest-scoring student. The resulting percentage will be used to calculate each student’s grade for the course. Put in a formula, it looks like this:

the score of each individual student (your score)

(divided by) the highest score earned by a student

The percentage arrived at by means of this formula will be evaluated according to the following scale:

93%	A
90%	A-
87%	B+
83%	B
80%	B-
77%	C+
67%	C
60%	D
59%	F

This kind of scoring is fairer than many other forms of grading because: (1) It is based on what students actually achieve rather than some preconceived standard held by the professor; (2) Each student can receive a high grade; (3) Hard-working students will not be penalized for staying in a demanding course full of industrious students. With a traditional curve, demanding courses that “weed out” less industrious students, leaving hard-working ones, can unintentionally harm good students putting them in competition with each other. This will not occur in this course. To further insure fairness, any extra credit points will be added to the individual student’s score, only after the highest score earned by a student has been established. This ensures that the extra credit earned will not increase the difficulty of the grading scale.

Course instructor reserves the right to lower or raise course grades based on classroom contributions or upon absences. Instructor also reserves the right to change course requirements.

Late or Missing Assignments

Students who do not turn in study guides or reading analyses on the days they are collected will not receive points. The total number of points possible for the review essay will be reduced by 20% for each day it is late.

Returned Assignments

Assignments will usually be returned to students no later than one week after they were due. At the end of the semester, unreturned course work will be available for pickup in the Religion Department office in Anderson 107 for 30 days after the official date that grades are posted by the registrar. After this time, they will be recycled.

Academic Dishonesty

Students engaged in any form of academic dishonesty, as defined under the “Academic Misconduct” section of the Student Honor Code, will be subject to other disciplinary measures. Students are expected to know what constitutes plagiarism and to understand and avoid inadvertent forms of it that can occur by cutting and pasting quotations from various texts on the world wide web and elsewhere.

SCHEDULE

WEEKS

Note: All readings are to be completed before the class date/week under which they are listed. This schedule is subject to change so rather than printing it, I recommend bookmarking this online syllabus and consulting it regularly. To flourish in this class you must read widely and carefully.

(Week 1) 25 August

Starting with a question: Does surfing (ocean not internet) have anything to do with religion, nature, and ethics in North America? If so, why?

Native American and European cultures and nature from contact to the end of the colonial period.

Readings (all)

• From the Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature (henceforth the ERN): S. Kretch American Indians as ‘First Ecologists’; F. Berkes, Traditional Ecological Knowledge

• Albanese, Nature Religion in America, “Introduction” & “Native Ground: Nature & Culture in Early America,” pp. 1–46 (Intro & ch. 1)

• Bron Taylor, “Surfing into Spirituality” (pdf or html ) from the Journal for the American Academy of Religion 75/4, 2007.

Readings (grads)

• Bron Taylor, “Aquatic Nature Religion” (pdf or html)

• Stoll, Inherit the Holy Mountain, Introduction and Ch. 1

• Recommended: Gatta, Making Nature Sacred, Introduction and “Landfall,” pp. 3–33; “Meditating on creatures in early American life and letters,” pp. 34–54; re. “Intimations of an environmental ethic in the writings of Jonathan Edwards,” 55–70 (chs. 1–3)

• From the ERN: Anishnabeg Culture; Harmony in Native North America; Lakota; Sacred Geography in Native North America; Shoshone (Western North America); Shamanism-Traditional; Traditional Ecological Knowledge among Aboriginal Peoples in Canada; Yoeme (Yaqui) Ritual

Website (more examples)

The website providing complementary resources for the book Dark Green Religion has additional examples of Surfing Spirituality, including the Ross Cummings video (also immediately below), music, and slide shows.

(Week 2) 1 September

Note: All students will submit by the end of Tuesday, 6 September, an essay on the readings (through those below) according to the instructions provided above. Since these will cover two weeks, undergraduates may take up to 1,000 and graduates up 1,500 words. Focus especially on Albanese & Nash (and Grad Students also on Stoll).

Readings (below) will explore the entwinment of nature and religion attending the birth of the republic.

The documentary The Faithkeeper (Bill Moyers interview of Oren Lyons) will be made available; view during the first two weeks of the semester.

Readings (all)

• From the ERN: Haudenosaunee Confederacy; Deism; Book of Nature; Christianity (7h)-Natural Theology

• Albanese, Nature Religion ..., “Republican Nature” pp. 47–79 (ch. 2)

• Nash, Wilderness and the American Mind, xii-43 (chapters 1 & 2)

Readings (grads)

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “The Romantic Wilderness” and “An American Wilderness,” pp. 44- 83 (ch. 3 & ch. 4)

• Stoll, Inherit the Holy Mountain, Ch. 2 & 3

• Recommended: Gatta, Making Nature Sacred, “Revelation to US: Green shoots of romantic religion in Antebellum America,” pp. 71–99 (ch. 4)

• From the ERN: Unitarianism; Manifest Destiny

Recommended

• Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia,Aborigines pp. 98–113; The Administration of Justice pp. 137–155, and Religion pp. 163–167.

(Week 3) 8 September

New streams of aesthetic and spiritual appreciation of nature emerge and evolve in the early republic’s first century and to the end of the frontier.

Documentary: Segments from The National Parks: America’s Greatest Idea (2009)

* Reading summaries due by the end of Tuesday, 13 September.

Readings (undergrads)

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “The Romantic Wilderness” and “An American Wilderness,” pp. 44- 83 (ch. 3 & ch. 4)

Readings (all)

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “Henry David Thoreau;” pps. 84–95, (ch. 5)

• From the ERN: Transcendentailsm; Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Recommended

• From the ERN: Thoreau, Henry David

• Albanese, Nature Religion ..., re. “Wilderness and the Passing Show” (on Transcendental
  Religion), pp. 80–116 (ch. 3)

• Gatta, Making Nature Sacred, “Variations on Nature: from the Old Manse to the White Whale,” pp. 102–125 (ch. 5), which is about early 19^th century poets and writers; and “Rare and delectable places: Thoreau‘s imagination of sacred space at Walden,” pp. 127–142 (ch. 6)

Readings (grads)

• John Sears, Sacred Places, re. nature appreciation and pilgrimage, first 1⁄2 19^th century, pp. 1–71

• Stoll, Inherit the Holy Mountain, Ch. 4

• Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nature and other selections.

• Henry David Thoreau, Selections from Bron Taylor‘s Thoreau Appendix in Dark Green Religion, which Dr. Taylor will provide via email)

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “Preserve the Wilderness” and “Wilderness Preserved,” pp. 96–121 (chs. 6 & 7 (read quickly)

• From the ERN (European tributaries): Romanticism-in European History; Romanticism in European Literature; Rousseau, Jean-Jacques; (American manifestations): Romanticism-American; (See also a contemporary reading by a LDS scholar of the natural aspects of the teaching of Joseph Smith and others in the entry): Church of Jesus Christ, Latter Day Saints.

Websites

• Cedar Grove, the National Park Service sponsored site devoted to Thomas Cole, and the Hudson River School of Art, which he founded.

• The Catskill Archive, a site devoted to the history of the Catskill Mountains, has many images from Thomas Cole’s paintings.
  * Note the differences between the various periods of his work, and the environmental and religious values in the paintings, as well as the view of environmental history implicit in them, especially in the “empire” series.

(Week 4) 15 September

John Muir and the ambivalent ethical legacy of American National Parks

Documentary: Segments from The National Parks: America’s Greatest Idea (2009).

Assignment

• Reading summaries due by the end of Tuesday, 20 September.

Readings (all)

• From the ERN: National Parks and Monuments; Pinchot, Gifford; Muir, John; Sierra Club

• John Muir. From Nature Writings. Edited by William Cronon. New York: Library of America, 1997. Read, Cedar Keys, pp. 818–827; Wild Wool, pp. 598–606

• Nash, Wilderness and the American Mind, “John Muir,” pp. 122–140, “The Wilderness Cult,” pp. 141–160, and “Hetch Hetchy,” pp. 161–181 (chs. 8–10)

Readings (grads)

• Stoll, Inherit the Holy Mountain, Ch. 5 — 7

• Mark David Spence. Introduction & Looking Backward and Westward, pp. 1–23, The Heart of the Sierras, Yosemite Indians and the National Parks Ideal, and Conclusion, pp. 101–139. (Dispossessing the Wilderness: Indian Removal and the Making of the National Parks. Oxford University Press, 1999.)

• John Sears, Sacred Places, re. The Sacred & National Parks nature appreciation and pilgrimage, second 1⁄2 19^th century pp. 122–216 (chs 6–8)

Recommended

• John Muir. Nature Writings. Edited by William Cronon. New York: Library of America, 1997. In addition to the required readings, strongly recommended are Stickeen, pp.553–571; and then skim widely, looking especially for his emerging biocentrism and ambivalent attitudes toward Native Americans, in “My First Summer in the Sierra*," pp. 147–309. [Note: this is the volume you should all get for your libraries]

• Lynn Ross-Bryant. Pilgrimage to the National Parks: Religion and Nature in the United States, London: Routledge 2012

• Kerry Mitchell, “Managing Spirituality: Public Religion in National Parks,” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture 1/4 (2007): 431–49. For a more in-depth work see his Spirituality and the State: Managing Nature and Experience in America’s National Parks, NYU Press 2016.

• ERN: Miwok People

• Dispossessing the Wilderness (the remaining chapters) pp. 24-100,* and Robert Keller and Michael Turek, Everglades National Park and the Seminole Problem, pp. 216–231, from American Indians and National Parks. Tucson: Arizona University Press, 1998.

(Week 5) 22 September

Theorizing “Dark Green Religion”

Documentary: Segments from The National Parks: America’s Greatest Idea (2009)

Assignment

• Reading summaries due by the end of Tuesday, 27 September.

Readings (all)

• Taylor, Bron, Dark Green Religion, Preface & Ch. 1, Exploring Critical Terms (Ch. 1 begins at the bottom of the preface); Ch. 2, Dark Green Religion, and Wilderness, Spirituality and Biodiversity in North America: tracing an environmental history from Occidental roots to Earth Day, in Wilderness in Mythology and Religion, ed. Laura Feldt, (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2012), 293–324; Recommended: Ch. 3, Dark Green Religion in North America in Dark Green Religion.

Readings (grads)

• Stoll, Inherit the Holy Mountain, Ch. 8 & Conclusion.

-

Website (more examples)

• The Dark Green Religion website has a variety of supplementary materials that students may enjoy perusing, including video, music, and images.

(Week 6) 29 September

Insights and corrections to the most prevalent narratives about religion and nature in North America from the emerging discipline of environmental history.

Documentary: American Values / American Wilderness (High Plains Films/2005)

No weekly analysis is due on 4 October but students should be ready to address the readings during the in-class and take home portions of their mid-term exam.

6 October: The in-class portion of the mid-term exam will be administered 6 October in class and the take home essay section will be distributed. The take-home essay will be due 13 October before class and submitted as a word or rich text document by email. Students not in class that day will receive a 1 grade deduction on the essay portion of the mid term.

Readings (all)

• ERN:Scouting

• Kimberly Smith, “What Is Africa to Me? Wilderness in Black Thought, 1860–1930,” Environmental Ethics 27/3, 279–97.

• Paul Sutter, The World with Us: The State of American Environmental History, Journal of American History, 2013.

• Bron Taylor, Its not all about us, Journal of American History, 2013.

Recommended

• Rebecca Gould, At Home in Nature, especially “Ambivalent Legacies II: Gender, Class, Nature, and Religion” 201–235.

• ERN (recommended): Indian Guides; Nature Fakers Controversy; Ernest Thompson Seton Institute & Seton biography (Brief)

• Eileen Smith-Cavros, ‘Modern Black Churchgoers in Miami-Dade County, Florida: Place, Nature, and Memory, Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture 1/3: 351–70, 2007.

• New books indirectly pertinent: Ian Finseth, (2009). Shades of green: visions of nature in the literature of American slavery, 1770–1860. University of Georgia Press, 2009; Diane Glave and Mark Stoll, eds. To love the wind and the rain: African Americans and environmental history. Pittsburgh, University of Pittsburgh Press, 2006.

(Week 7) 6 October

John Burroughs & Loren Eiseley: science & nature religion in the early & mid-20^th century

Religion and resistance to Darwinian thought and scientific nature religion

Documentary: Thinking Like a Watershed (1998) (or next week)

Readings (all)

• ERN: Back to the Land Movement; Creationism and Creation Science

• John Burroughs. Preface and The Long Road pp. 1–38, and The Gospel of Nature pp. 243–73, in Time & Change (vol. xv) in The Complete Writings of John Burroughs) Amsterdam: Fredonia Books, 2001. Commemorative Edition, George W. Lugg, ed., reprint of 1920 publication; Moore Haven, Florida: Rainbow Books, 1987, or 2001.

• ERN: Eiseley, Loren

• Loren Eiseley, The Flow of the River pp. 15–27, The Judgment of the Birds pp. 163–78, The Bird and the Machine pp. 179–93, and The Secret of Life pp. 195–210, from The Immense Journey, and The Star Thrower pp. 67–92, from The Unexpected Universe (or reprinted in The Star Thrower). The Small Death pp. 139–49, and The Coming of the Giant Wasps” (pp. 236–47), and The Other Player (258–66) from All the Strange Hours.

Readings (grads)

• Rebecca Gould, At Home in Nature, pp. 1–138 (ch. 1–4).

Recommended

• ERN: Darwin, Charles

Students not in class on 13 October will receive a one grade deduction on the essay portion of the mid term that is due prior to that class.

(Week 8) 13 October

Aldo Leopold, the Wilderness Society, and the breakthrough of explicitly biocentric environmental ethics.

Recommended: Wild By Law (The American Experience/PBS, 1992): on Marshall, Leopold & Zanheiser and the Wilderness Society.

Documentary: Green Fire / Aldo Leopold (2011)

* Special note: Fall 2016, these documentaries (and the one on Rachel Carson listed next weeks) will be shown on 20 October during a special documentary festival.

Assignment

• Reading summaries due by the end of Tuesday, 18 October. Since these will cover two weeks, undergraduates may take up to 1,000 and graduates up 1,500 words

Readings (all)

• ERN: Environmental Ethics

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “Aldo Leopold: Prophet,” pp. 182–99, “Decisions for Permanence,” pp. 200–237, (chs. 11–12)

• Aldo Leopold, from A Sand County Almanac: Foreword, Arizona and New Mexico (especially sub-section, Thinking like a Mountain) and The Land Ethic. (Note: The Oxford University Press edition (1949/1968) does not have Part III, which includes the Round River and Goose Music essays. For these, see the Ballentine Books (1970) paperback edition.

• Strongly Recommended: read widely, esp. “A Sand County Almanac” and “Wilderness” and “Conservation Esthetic.”

Readings (grads)

• ERN: Leopold, Aldo; Ouspensky, Pyotr Demianovich

(Week 9) 20 October

Rachel Carson, the environmental Era, the environmental justice movement, and the rising influence of nature writing.

Documentary: Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring (The American Experience, 1993)

Assignment

• Reading summaries due by the end of Tuesday, 25 October.

Readings (all)

• ERN: Carson, Rachel; Environmental Justice & Environmental Racism; Williams, Terry Tempest

• Rachel Carson, Nature Religion Selections. See also selections and commentary on Silent Spring. Recommended, peruse Under the Sea Wind, about which she ruminated in the hyperlinked selections, or read Preface and The Marginal World (pp. 1–7), and The Enduring Sea (pp. 249–50), in The Edge of the Sea (1955), or read widely from The Sea Around Us or Silent Spring (in this, her most famous book, see especially the introductory Fable for Tomorrow (pp. 1–3), and the concluding section, The Other Road pp. 177–97, esp. its concluding two pages).

Readings (grads)

• Kathleen Dean Moore, The Truth of the Barnacles: Rachel Carson and the Moral Significance of Wonder.In Rachel Carson: Legacy and Challenge.

Readings (grads/recommended)

• ERN: Dillard, Annie; Berry, Wendell; Lopez, Barry

• Sarah McFarland Taylor, Land as Lover: Mormon eco-eroticism and planetary plural marriage in the work of Terry Tempest Williams Nova Religio vol. 8 no 1 (July 2004): 39–56

• Terry Tempest Williams,Epilogue: The clan of the one-breasted women, pp. (pp. 281–90), in Refuge: an Unnatural History of Family and Place. New York: Pantheon, 1991. Also, see Desert Quartet: an erotic landscape. New York: Pantheon, 1995.

• Recommended: Gatta, Making Nature Sacred, “Post-Darwinian Visions of Divine Creation,” pp. 143–173, “Imagined Worlds: the lure of numinous exoticism,” 175–198, “Reclaiming the sacred commons,” 199–224, “Learning to love creation: the religious tenor of contemporary ecopoetry,” 225–243, (chs. 7–10), and “Afterword,” 245–46.

• Lisa Sideris and Kathleen Dean Moore, eds. Rachel Carson: Legacy and Challenge. State University of New York Press, 2008.

(Week 10) 27 October

Developments from & since the 1960s.

Documentary: American Buffalo: Spirit of a Nation (PBS/Nature, 1998)

Assignment

• No reading summaries due this week.

Readings (required)

• ERN: Deloria, Vine Jr.

• Vine Deloria (Jr.) God is Red (peruse/skim the entire book, reading carefully 1–113 (ch 1- 6), pp. 185–202 (ch 11); pp. 236–282 (ch. 14–16).

Readings (grads)

• ERN: Bison Restoration and Native American Traditions; Black Elk; Black Mesa; Cowboy Spirituality; Holy Land in Native North America; Mother Earth; Native American Languages; Peyote; Plastic Medicine Men; Romanticism and Indigenous Peoples; Savages; Seattle (Sealth), Chief (ca. 1790–1866)

• Cornell, George L. “The Influence of Native Americans on Modern Conservationists.” Environmental Review9, no. 2 (1985): 104–17.

• Weaver, Jace, ed., especially Introduction (pp. 1–26 and Afterward (pp. 177–191), in Defending Mother Earth: Native American Perspectives on Environmental Justice. Maryknoll, New York: Orbis, 1996.

(Week 11) 3 November

Paganism and the New Age

Assignment

• Reading summaries due by the end of Tuesday, 1 November. Since these will cover two weeks, undergraduates may take up to 1,000 and graduates up 1,500 words. Focus especially on Native American traditions and Paganism.

Readings (all)

• ERN: Paganism-Contemporary; Odinism; Celestine Prophecy; New Age; Harmonic Convergence; Harmonic Convergence and the Spiritualization of the Biosphere; Wicca.

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “Toward a Philosophy of Wilderness,” pp. 238–271

Readings (grads)

• Pike, Sarah. New Age and Neopagan Religions in America (pp. 3–172)

Documentary

• In the Light of Reverence (PBS/POV, 2001)

• For background and an interview with film maker Christopher McLeod, see http://www.pbs.org/pov/pov2001/inthelightofreverence/thefilm.html

• See also the filmmaker‘s website, http://www.sacredland.org/

(Week 12) 10 November

Wilderness victories and the intensification of social conflict over nature religions, wildlands, and sacred space claims.

Assignments

• Reading summaries due by the end of Tuesday, 8 November; focus on the religious dimensions of radical environmentalism and wilderness protection movements.

Readings (all)

• ERN: Radical Environmentalism; Earth First! and the Earth Liberation Front; Indigenous Environmental Activism and the Indigenous Environmental Network; Law, Religion, and Native American Lands

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “The Irony of Victory” pp. 316–341 (ch. 15)

Readings (grads)

• Taylor, Bron. Resacralizing Earth: Pagan Environmentalism and the Restoration of Turtle Island. In American Sacred Space, eds. David Chidester and Edward T. Linenthal, 97- 151. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1995.

• ERN: Black Mesa; G-O Road; Devil’s Tower, Mato Tipi, or Bear Lodge (Wyoming); James Bay Cree and Hydro-Quebec

Documentaries

• Wrenched: How Edward Abbey lit the flame of environmental activism and gave the movement its soul (2014)

• Rage over Trees (Audubon, 1994)

• Pickaxe (Independent, 2000)

• Road Use Restricted (Independent, 1987).

(Week 13) 17 November (Thanksgiving is 24 November)

The “Greening” of Mainstream Religions?

Readings (all)

• Bron Taylor, The Greening of Religion Hypothesis (Part One): From Lynn White, Jr. and claims that religions can promote environmentally destructive attitudes and behaviors to assertions they are becoming environmentally friendly, Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, 10 (3) 2016; available at: https://florida.academia.edu/BronTaylor

• Bron Taylor, Gretel Van Wieren & Bernard Zaleha, The Greening of Religion Hypothesis (Part Two): Assessing the Data from Lynn White, Jr. to Pope Francis, Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, 10 (3) 2016; available at: https://florida.academia.edu/BronTaylor

Readings (grads) Recommended:

• ERN: “World religions” sections (especially Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism and Daoism, then following as many cross-references as possible). For recent religious resistance to these developments, see Paganism: a Jewish Perspective, and Wise Use Movement.

• Albanese, Nature Religion ..., re. “Recapitulating Pieties,” pp. 153–198 (ch. 5), and “Epilogue,” pp. 199–201.

Documentaries

• Journey of The Universe (2011)

• Renewal: Amerca’s Emerging Religious Environmental Movement (2007)

• Renewal (project website)

No more reading reviews will be due, but do keep up with the readings, for they will need to be well in hand to do well on your final exam. This is not a bluff.

SCIENTIFIC AND OTHER FORMS OF CONTEMPORARY NATURE RELIGION:

Music Videos (all)

• Symphony of Science Music Videos (view “We’re All Connected” and “The Unbroken Thread”, at least).

Readings (all)

• ERN: Conservation Biology; Disney Worlds at War; Epic of Evolution; Mountaineering; Rock Climbing; Yoga

• Thomas Berry, The Human Presence pp. 13–23 (ch. 3), The New Story pp. 194–215 (ch. 15), in Dream of the Earth. (Alternatively, read the selections from The Great Work, immediately below.)

Readings (grads)

• Bron Taylor, Ecology and Nature Religions Encyclopedia of Religion, v. 4, 2^nd ed., Lindsay Jones, ed., MacMillan Reference, New York: 2005, pp. 2661–2668

• ERN: Natural History as Natural Religion; Restoration Ecology and Ritual; Process Philosophy (and Theology cross-reference); Sagan, Carl; Space Exploration.

Motion Pictures (possible film night)

Recommended

• Thomas Berry, pp. 1–71 and 166–201, * from The Great Work. New York: Bell Tower, 1999.

• ERN: Berry, Thomas (and adjacent to this entry): Thomas Berry on Religion and Nature

(Week 14) 1 December (last class)

The international influence of American, nature-related Religion

Film: Welcome Ceremony, United Nations World Summit on Sustainable Development (Johannesburg 2002). View: Part One. Part Two.

Readings (required)

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “The International Perspective,” pp. 342–378 (ch. 16) and “Epilogue,” pp. 379–390.

• ERN: United Nation’s ‘Earth Summits’; Earth Charter; Biosphere Reserves and World Heritage Sites

• Bron Taylor, Civil Earth Religion versus Religious Nationalism, The Immanent Frame, or better, Dark Green Religion, chapters 7–9, especially chapter 8, “Terrapolitan Earth Religion.”

Readings (recommended)

• Robert Paelke’s Environmentalism and the Future of Progressive Politics (Yale U.P, 1989), 273–283

• Martin Lewis, Green Delusions (Duke U.P., 1992), p. 150–90 & 242–51.

Documentary

If time, from list, below.

In-class portion of final exam administered in class 1 December. The essay portion will be made available no later than 1 December and will be due by midnight 11 December.

RESOURCES

Writing Well

• Bron Taylor’s Writing Well Guide

Documentaries

• American Values / American Wilderness (High Plains Films/2005)

• Battle for Wilderness (1989)

• Call of Life (Species Alliance/2010)

• Disneynature

• Edward Abbey: A Voice in the Wilderness (1993)

• Dave Foreman, Radical Environmentalism talk, the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh (1990)

• Earth First!, on 60 Minutes (1990)

• If a Tree Falls: A story of the Earth Liberation Front (2011)

• Greenfire (2011) [Aldo Leopold]

• Lessons from the Rainforest (1991) [Lou Gold]

• The Faithkeeper [Oren Lyons with Bill Moyers]

• Holmes Rolston Lecture on Leopold, Greenfire, and Earth Ethics (2013)

- **Gaia-Goddess of the Earth (1986) <verbatim>PBS

Nova</verbatim> (1995)**

- **Ecopsychology-Restoring the <verbatim>Earth

Healing</verbatim> the Self (1995)**

• Thinking like a Watershed

• Faithkeeper (Bill Moyers/PBS/1991)

• In the Light of Reverence (Sacred Land Film Project/Christopher McLeod/2001)

• The National Parks / Americas Best Idea (Ken Burns/PBS/2009)

• Renewal: America’s Emerging Religious Environmental Movement (2007)

• Spirit & Nature’ (PBS/Moyers, 1991); (viewable, here, online)

• Sweating Indian Style: Conflicts Over Native American Ritual (Society for Visual Anthropology/1994

Motion Pictures (theatrical)

• Dances With Wolves (1990)

• The Color Purple (1985)

• Contact (1991)

• Pocahontas (Disney/1995)

• Avatar (2009)

• The East (2013)

Television

• Game of Thrones

• Many productions on Discovery, Animal Planet, PBS, Disney channels.

Websites

ACADEMIC ORGANIZATIONS AND INITIATIVES INVOLVED IN ENVIRONMENTAL ETHICS:

• The International Society for Environmental Ethics (ISEE)

• International Society for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture

• Environmental Ethics(Journal)

• Environmental Values (Journal)

• Forum on Religion and Ecology at Yale University

• Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture

Additional resources, such as links to podcasts, music, slideshows, video, music, and websites, will be made available here during the course. Students are encouraged to send their own ideas for resources to the course instructors.

EXPLORING AND STUDYING ENVIRONMENTAL ETHICS & HISTORY, NATURE RELIGION,
RADICAL ENVIRONMENTALISM, SURFING SPIRITUALITY, DEEP ECOLOGY AND MORE

Fall 2016: Religion and Nature (Graduate Seminar)

Source:

<http://brontaylor.com/test_site/102-2/courses/fall-2016-religion-and-nature/>

• Readings

• Requirements

• Evaluation

• Schedule

• Resources

SECTIONS

REL 6107: Tuesday, (5:10–8:10 p.m.), Anderson 34

INSTRUCTOR

Professor Bron Taylor (Ph.D.)
Email: bron@religion.ufl.edu
Office: Anderson 121
Office hours: Thursday 1:00 — 3:00 and by appointment

DESCRIPTION

Brief Course Description (in UF Catalogue)

Religious dimensions of relationships between what humans call “nature” and “culture.”

Purpose and Objectives

Rousseau

This course explores theoretical approaches and understandings regarding the complex relationships between ecosystems, religions and cultures. It will prepare religion graduate students from diverse disciplines to make informed decisions regarding the unique contributions they might make to the nascent and emerging “religion and nature” field. It will enable other graduate students to appreciate the extent to which the “religion” variable is involved in shaping nature-related behaviors, and to integrate the study of religion into their own chosen fields, whether these are more theoretically or practically inclined.

While the course will examine religious environmental ethics through a variety of critical lenses and such subjects will certainly be discussed regularly, the coursework and focus of classroom discussions will primarily be historical and scientific rather than normative: the effort will be to understand what has been and is going on in the realm of religions and nature, and how perceptions of nature and religion interactions are understood and contested by scholars, rather than upon what we think ought to occur. Ethics is the focus of another of the core, Religion and Nature seminars, as well as of a variety of electives offered.

The course will draw on a number of sources. Introductions to a variety of theoretical approaches, and background articles on a wide range of nature-related religious phenomena, will be provided in readings from The Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature (2005). Books and articles works by key figures will provide an opportunity for in-depth exposure to some of the approaches discussed in the materials introduced in the encyclopedia. Guest scholars will serve as resource people during the course.

The course shall be conducted in collaboration with its participants and will be in a seminar format. This syllabus is, therefore, tentative. It may be revised during the course and updated at the course website. The online version will be the one governing the course, including its schedule, readings, and requirements, and it should be consulted weekly. To further facilitate communication, students must provide a valid email address and download messages every 48 hours or so during the semester, so as to not miss important announcements or requests for help from other course participants.

This syllabus provides the usual course outline, assignments, and grading information, as well as extended introductions and resources to explore further, beyond what is possible in this course, its major conundrums and themes. By do doing, it also provides a starting point for a variety of research projects pertinent to this course and the study of religion, nature, and culture more generally. This syllabus is subject to modification as we discover additional or superior resources to consider. Course assignments will include intensive reading and the preparation of critical analyses of them prior to class, written responses to periodically-given, take-home essay questions, and a major research paper (or in some, negotiated cases, through a take-home final exam). Details will appear in subsequent versions of this syllabus.

Course Outline in Five Modules

1. Nature as the Habitat of Religion and Culture

• Biology and the Roots of Religion & Ecological Approaches to the Study of Religion — Primate Spirituality, Paleolithic Religions, and the “Worship of Nature”

2. World Environmental History & Religion

• Agriculture and The Birth of the Gods — Occidental History, Religions, and Nature — Asian Civilizations, Religions, and Nature

3. Scientific Paradigms and the Transformation of “Religion and Nature” Discourses

4. “Religion and Nature” in twentieth century scholarship (from the Sacred and the Profane to “Ecological Anthropology” and “Religion and Ecology”)

• Mircea Eliade, cultural geography, and theories of ‘sacred space’ — Religions as adaptive and maladaptive ecological strategies — Environmental Concern, Religious Studies, the “Religion and Ecology” field, and debates about the environmental tendencies of religious types. — Religion’s role in the environmental & social collapse; environmental reform?

5. Religion, Nature, and the Future of Religion and Nature

• Social Scientific Perspectives on Environmentalism, Nature, and Religion, from Quantitative Data to Colin Campbell’s “Cultic Milieu” Theory. — Green Nazis and the Shadow Side of Nature Religions — Contemporary Construction of Nature Religions and Pagan Spiritualities — Secularization Theories and ‘Spiritualities of Connection’ to Nature

READINGS

Note: most of the required books can be found inexpensively from online and other used booksellers. Wherever available, required book readings will also be available on reserve at the library. Additional articles will be available online via links found in the course schedule.

Required Texts

• Bellah, Robert N. Religion in Human Evolution: From the Paleolithic to the Axial Age. Cambridge. Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2011

• Schaefer, Donovan. Religoius Affects: Animality, Evolution, and Power. Durham & London: Duke University Press, 2011

• Glacken, Clarence. Traces on the Rhodian Shore: Nature and Culture in Western Thought. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967

• Wilson, David Sloan. Darwin’s Cathedral: Evolution, Religion, and the Nature of Society. University of Chicago Press, 2003

• Rappaport, Roy A. Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 1999.

• Shepard, Paul. Coming Home to the Pleistocene. San Francisco: Island Press, 1998.

• Taylor, Bron. Dark Green Religion: Nature Spirituality and the Planetary Future. Berkeley & Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2010. (Assigned chapters available for free from the instructor.)

• Worster, Donald. Nature’s Economy: A History of Ecological Ideas. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 1993 (second edition).

REQUIREMENTS

Course Assignments

• Consistent, quality preparation for class by reading, taking notes, and completing weekly assignments (20% of course grade).

• Preparation and presentation of the designated “Special Assignment” reading (5%).

• Two take-home essay exams (25% each).

• Final research paper or review essay (as negotiated with instructor) (25%).

Weekly Reading Assignments

One of the most important skills for a scholar to master is being able to understand the most important aspects various writings and being able to communicate the key points to readers and students. This course is structured to enhance these skills. Nearly every week you will be asked to write a 500–750 word review of that week’s main reading or readings. These must be written in single spaced word or rich text documents, and emailed to my gmail address (provided in class), by no later than Sunday night before the next class. You should also bring a copy to class.

As you read, these are the questions you should be sure you can answer before moving from section to section and author to author:

• What are the main questions the author is trying to answer?

• What are author’s main arguments in this regard?

• What sorts of evidence does the author muster in advancing this perspective?

• Who (individuals, groups, schools of thought) are the main proponents of views the author is defending or contesting? In other words, who are his or her intellectual allies and adversaries? (In this course, more specifically: What are the main approaches to understanding the relationships between religion and nature that the author is explicitly or implicitly promoting or criticizing?)

• What are the chief objections that these others would raise about the author’s argument and evidence?

• What do the people on the various sides of these arguments think is at stake? Put simply, why does it matter, if it does, and if it does not, why do they think it does?

There is little doubt that students will have their own opinions about the course readings. I am not interested in reading about your opinions in your written work responding to the weekly reading assignments, especially if this distracts you from lucid and fair-minded exposition in response to the preceding questions. The premium in this class will be to understand the arguments in the readings, the fault-lines between them, and what the authors think is at stake in the debates. There will be ample time for us to express our own views in class, and possibly as well, in your final research paper.

Discussion in class will be, first and foremost, a process of wrestling with the six questions stated above. Come well prepared to do so.

Writing Quality

It is not possible to separate the quality of one’s thinking from its written expression. Evaluation of written work will reflect this so it is strongly recommended that all students review and consult regularly the course’s writing well primer.

“Special Assignment” Readings & Exams

Every student will read and an extra book that is important theoretically to the questions engaged in this class, and carefully present to the class what they learned in this book, both orally and in writing. Students will negotiate with the instructor and jointly select the books and time for their presentations, which will be added to the course schedule.

Research Paper

You will write a research paper (or in some, negotiated cases a review essay) in which you identify and analyze one or more scholarly approaches to understand the relationships among what people various call “religion,” “culture”, and “nature.” Given the extensive reading list of the course itself, the expectation is not that you will write a long paper, but rather, that you will select an area you’re most interested in and read as deeply into it as time allows, writing a 5,000–10,000 word paper in which you explain the approach(es) explored and whether and why you find it/them compelling. This can provide you with a platform for further deepening your engagement with a subfield so that you could extend this interest into future work. You will make a 15–20 minute presentation of what you’ve learned in class, and must be prepared to answer questions afterward.

EVALUATION

Points Possible for Required Assignments

This chart shows the points it is possible to earn for each assignment:

Assignment	Points per Assignment	Total Possible Points
Weekly Assignments and participation	(10 points by 8 times collected)	80
Special Assignment Reading	20 points	20
Two Take-home Essay Exams	100 points each	200
Final Research Paper or Review Essay	100 points	100
	Total Points / Course =	400

Course instructor reserves the right to lower or raise course grades based on classroom contributions or upon absences. Instructor also reserves the right to change course requirements.

Late or Missing Assignments

Students who do not turn in study guides or reading analyses on the days they are collected will not receive points. The total number of points possible for the review essay will be reduced by 20% for each day it is late.

Returned Assignments

Assignments will usually be returned to students no later than one week after they were due. At the end of the semester, unreturned course work will be available for pickup in the Religion Department office in Anderson 107 for 30 days after the official date that grades are posted by the registrar. After this time, they will be recycled.

Academic Dishonesty

Students engaged in any form of academic dishonesty, as defined under the “Academic Misconduct” section of the Student Honor Code, will be subject to other disciplinary measures. Students are expected to know what constitutes plagiarism and to understand and avoid inadvertent forms of it that can occur by cutting and pasting quotations from various texts on the world wide web and elsewhere.

SCHEDULE

WEEKS

Note: All readings are to be completed before the class date/week under which they are listed. This schedule is subject to change so rather than printing it, I recommend bookmarking this online syllabus and consulting it regularly.

Module I: Nature as the Habitat of Religion and Culture

• “Religion and Nature” as a field

• Biology and the Roots of Religion; and Ecological Approaches to the Study of Religion

• Primate Spirituality, Paleolithic Religions, and the “Worship of Nature

Introduction: We begin this course by introducing the “Religion and Nature” field and illuminating how the graduate program in Religion and Nature seeks to explore it.

This module continues by introducing evolutionary/ecological approaches to the complex relationships between Homo sapiens and their habitats. This module, although brief, is critically important and will undergird much of the subsequent readings and discussion.

(Week 1) 23 August
Religion & Nature in an Evolutionary Context

Assignment

1) Come at class ready to discuss all this week’s readings in depth. Really!!

Readings

• Bron Taylor, “Introduction,” Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature (ERN). This provides a broad overview of the religion and nature field. Recommended also: the Project History, and Readers Guide

• Bron Taylor, Exploring Religion, Nature and Culture: Introducing the Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, JSRNC 1.1 (2007): 5–14.

• Joseph Bulbulia, “The cognitive and evolutionary psychology of religion” Biology and Philosophy 19: 655–86, 2004.

• Raymond Williams, “Ideas of Nature” in Problems in Materialism and Culture (London: Verso, 1980).

Required Core Readings

• Bellah, Religion in Human Evolution, Preface, and 1–264. IMPORTANT: SEE ALSO Reading Guide to Bellah Book

• Schaefer, Religious Affects, Introduction, ch 1, ch 2

Continue with Background and Comparative Reading (bold are the most important)

• From the ERN: Animism; Animism: A Contemporary Perspective; Anthropologists; Goodall, Jane; Primate Spirituality.

(Week 2) 30 August
Religion & Evolution (part II)

Assignment

1) Email first assignment by one hour before class. Come to class ready to discuss all this week’s readings in depth.
2) Be prepared to present ideas for special readings assignments; and all assigned readings, below.

Readings

• Larry Sullivan, “Worship of Nature” from in the Encyclopedia of Religion (2^nd ed., 2005)

• Steven Kellert, Connecting with Creation: the Convergence of Nature, Religion, Science and Culture, JSRNC 1.1 (2007): 23–37.

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN: Hunting and the Origins of Religion; Magic; Paleolithic Religions and Paleolithic Art; “Rock Art”; Wonder toward Nature.

Required Core Readings

• Bellah, Religion in Human Evolution, 265–606.

• Schaefer, ReligiousAffects, ch 4, 6, 7 & Conclusion

Special Assignment Reading

• Frazer, Sir James George. The Golden Bough: A History of Myth and Religion. London: Chancellor Press, 1994.

Web Resources

• Pascal Boyer’s website (great to peruse)

(Week 3) 6 September
(Religion as evolutionary adaptation?)

Assignment

1) Be prepared to discuss all readings to date. By midnight 4 September send by mail attachment a 500–750 word analysis of Darwin’s Cathedral.

Background and Comparative Readings

• Burhenn, Herbert. “Ecological Approaches to the Study of Religion.” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 9, no. 2 (1997): 111–26 (optional reading, handout or emailed document).

• From the ERN: Creation Myths of the Ancient World; Creation Stories in the Hebrew Bible; Delphic Oracle; Domestication; Egypt–ancient; Egypt–pre-Islamic; Greco-Roman World; Greece–Classical; Greek Paganism; Mesopotamia–Ancient; Ovid’s Metamorphoses; Roman Britain; Roman Natural Religion; Roman Religion and Empire

Required Core Reading

• Bron Taylor, “Ecology and Nature Religions” from the Encyclopedia of Religion (2^nd ed., 2005

• David Sloan Wilson’s Darwin’s Cathedral

Module I: Further and Future Reading

Evolution and Religion (focus on origins and the emergence of the scholarly discussion)

• Atran, Scott. In Gods We Trust: The Evolutionary Landscape of Religion. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002

• Bloch, Maurice. Prey Into Hunter: The Politics of Religious Experience. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Cambridge University Press, 1992.

• Boyer, Pascal. The Naturalness of Religious Ideas: A Cognitive Theory of Religion. Berkeley, CA: The University of California Press, 1994.

• Boyer, Pascal. Religion Explained: The Evolutionary Origins of Religious Thought. New York: Basic, 2002.

• Burhenn, Herbert. “Ecological Approaches to the Study of Religion.” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 9, no. 2 (1997): 111–26.

• Burkert, Walter. Creation of the Sacred: Tracks of Biology in Early Religions. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1996.

• Cauvin, Jacques. The Birth of the Gods and the Origins of Agriculture. Translated by Trevor Watkins. Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 2000.

• Dennett, Daniel C. Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon. New York City: Viking, 2006.

• Frazer, Sir James George. The Golden Bough: A History of Myth and Religion. London: Chancellor Press, 1994.

• _______. The Worship of Nature. London: MacMillian, 1926.

• Guthrie, Stewart. Faces in the Clouds: A New Theory of Religion. New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993.

• Hultkrantz, Ake. “Ecology of Religion: Its Scope and Methodology.” In Science of Religion Studies in Methodology, ed. Lauri Honko, 221–36. Berlin: Mouton, 1979.

• Kellert, Stephen R. and Edward O. Wilson, eds. The Biophilia Hypothesis. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1993.

• Lewis-Williams, David. Conceiving God: the cognitive origin and evolution of religion.London: Thames & Hudson, 2010.

• Olson, Carl. “Chapter 3: The Quest for the Origins of Religion.” In Theory and Method in the Study of Religion, ed. Carl Olson, 49–99. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 2003.

• _______. Chapter 9: “Ecological/Biological Approaches.” In Theory and Method in the Study of Religion, ed. Carl Olson, 439–75. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 2003.

• Taves, Ann. Religious experience reconsidered: a building-block approach to the study of religion and other special things. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2011.

• Wilson, David Sloan. Darwin’s Cathedral: Evolution, Religion, and the Nature of Society. Chicago & London: Chicago University Press, 2002.

• Wilson, Edward Osborne. Biophilia. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1984.

• _______. Sociobiology: The New Synthesis. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2000.

Module II: Occidental History, Religion, & Nature

Introduction: We have thus far seen some ways in which an evolutionary approach can be deployed to wonder about the origins of religion and to consider the importance of nature as the habitat in which humans wonder about, make sense of, and cope with, their wide, wild world. An examination with ecological lenses of the emergence and evolution of “occidental” and “oriental” civilizations, suggests that, as religions emerged, split, fought, lived, died, splintered, and fused, nature was more than a physical resource for the combatants; nature was a wellspring for reflection, a ubiquitous symbolic resource, the very humus out of which religious life emerged and grew. This did not lead, however, to an ethical valuing of nature. Indeed, a case can be made that while religions were inevitably and inexorably rooted in nature, the more “civilized” they became, the less intrinsically valuable nature became. Instead, the world became a place of religious trial in a broad narrative in which the climax of the story was, in one way or another, divine rescue from this world.

(Week 4) 13 September
Ancient Occidental Religions

Assignment

1) By midnight 11 September send by mail attachment a 500–750 word analysis of the Glacken’s treatment of the The Ancient World (noting continuties and discontinuities with Bellah and other readings about the period).

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN, essential readings in bold: Eden and other Gardens; Eden’s Ecology; Hebrew Bible; Jewish Intertestamental Literature; *Judaism; Christianity-main entries; *Book of Nature; *Natural Law and Natural Rights; Islam; Muhammad; The Qur’an; Gardens in Islam.

Required Core Reading

• Glacken, Clarence. Traces on the Rhodian Shore: Nature and Culture in Western Thought. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967. Part I, “The Ancient World” (1–168).

Special Assignment Reading

• Boyer’s Explaining Religion

Further and Future Reading

• Foltz, Richard C., Frederick M. Denny and Azizan Baharuddin, eds. Islam and ecology: a bestowed trust. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2003.

• Hessel, Dieter T. and Rosemary Reuther. Christianity and Ecology: Seeking the Well-Being of Earth and Humans. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.

• Tirosh-Samuelson, Hava, ed. Judaism and Ecology: Created World and Revealed World. Religions of the World and Ecology. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2002.

(Week 5) 20 September
Occidental Religions through the Middle Ages

Assignment

1) By midnight 18 September send by mail attachment a 500–750 word analysis of the Glacken’s treatment of the The Christian Middle Ages (noting continuties and discontinuities with other pertinent readings about the period).

Required Core Reading

• Glacken, Clarence. Traces on the Rhodian Shore: Nature and Culture in Western Thought. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967. Part II, “The Christian Middle Ages” 171–351.

Special Assignment Reading

• Guthrie’s Faces in the Clouds

Further and Future Reading

• Bernard, Rosemarie. Shinto. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2004.

• Chapple, Christopher Key, ed. Jainism and Ecology. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2002.

• Chapple, Christopher Key and Mary Evelyn Tucker. Hinduism and Ecology: The Intersection of Earth, Sky, and Water. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2000.

• Girardot, N. J., James Miller and Xiaogan Liu. Daoism and Ecology: Ways within a Cosmic Landscape. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001.

• Tucker, Mary Evelyn and Duncan Ryuken Williams, eds. Buddhism and Ecology: The Interconnection of Dharma and Deeds. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1997.

(Week 6) 27 September
Emerging Civilizations

Assignment

1) Be prepared to discuss and schedule your special reading assignment and your research paper topic.
2) Read ahead into Module III if possible. Note: No additional readings assigned during take home week.
3) Take Home Exam’s distributed in class 27 September; due 4 October before class. Those late lose ½ each day (cumulative) it is late.

Special Assignment Reading

• Eisenberg or Lansing (below)

• Robert Pogue Harrison, Forests: The Shadow of Civilization, University of Chicago Press, 1992.

Module II: Further and Future Reading

Evolution and Religion (focus on origins and the emergence of the scholarly discussion)

• Carrasco, Davíd, ed. The Imagination of Matter: Religion and Ecology in Mesoamerican Traditions. Oxford: BAR International Series, 1989.

• Eisenberg, Evan. The Ecology of Eden. New York: Random House, 1998.

• Harris, Marvin. “The Myth of the Sacred Cow.” In Man, Culture, and Animals, eds. Anthony Leeds and Andrew P. Vaya, 217–28. Washington, DC: American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1965.

• _______. Cows, Pigs, Wars and Witches: The Riddles of Culture. New York: Random House, 1974.

• _______. Cannibals and Kings: The Origins of Cultures. New York: Random House, 1977.

• _______. “The Cultural Ecology of India’s Sacred Cattle.” Current Anthropology 7 (1966): 51–66.

• Lansing, J. Stephen. Priests and Programmers: Technologies of Power in the Engineered Landscape of Bali. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1991.

• Lansing, J. Stephen and James N. Kremer. “A Socioecological Analysis of Balinese Water Temples.” In The Cultural Dimension of Development: Indigenous Knowledge Systems, eds. D. M. Warren, L. Jan Slikkerveer and David Brokensha, 258–68. London: Intermediate Technology Publications, 1995.

• Lodrick, Deryck O. Sacred Cows, Sacred Places: Origins and Survivals of Animal Homes in India. Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 1981.

• Oelschlaeger, Max. The Idea of Wilderness: From Prehistory to the Age of Ecology. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1991.

• Simoons, Frederick J. “Questions in the Sacred Cow Controversy.” Current Anthropology 20 (1979): 467–93.

Module III: Scientific Paradigms and the Transformation of “Religion and Nature” Discourses

Introduction: The advent of natural science through a monkeywrench into the mainstreams of religious perception and identity by, as much as anything else, challenging human understanding of nature itself. The scientific worldview, where it took root, eroded earlier religious understandings and certainties, transforming both religions themselves, and kindling an entire, new, discussion of the relationships between nature and religion. Broadly understood, the encounter between “Religion and Science” has had far reaching impacts that have only just begun, and whose impacts are only in their infancy. Among the most dramatic results is the grafting of scientific understandings onto already existing religious forms, and the invention of entirely new religious forms based on these new understandings.

This and the subsequent two modules explore the cultural earthquake brought on by the transformation of scientific paradigms, and wrestles with questions regarding the possible long-term impacts, including environmental impacts, of these developments

(Week 7) 4 October
Science, Religion, and “Paradigm Shifts”

Assignment

1) Take Home Exam’s due before class 4 October; see above
2) Be prepared to discuss all readings to date. By midnight 9 October send by email attachment a 500–750 word analysis of the periods covered in the assigned week’s readings.
3) Be prepared to explain to the class the significance of the required readings below in “background and comparative readings”

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN: Philosophy of Nature; Western Esotericism; (physics): Bateson, Gregory; Berman, Morris; Bohm, David; Burroughs, John; Capra, Fritjof; Chaos; Complexity Theory;Einstein, Albert; Linnaeus, Carl; Pauli, Wolfgang; Peat, F. David; Prigogine, Ilya; Sheldrake, Rupert (biosphere and ecosystem science):Darwin, Charles; Haeckel, Ernst; Holism; Leopold, Aldo; Carson, Rachael; Gaia; Gaian Pilgrimage; Ouspensky, Pyotr Demianovich; Pantheism; Panentheism; Smuts, Jan Christiaan; Thoreau, Henry David;Wilson, Edward O. (reactionary responses): Creationism and Creation Science; Wise Use Movements.

Required Core Reading

• Glacken, Clarence. Traces on the Rhodian Shore, part III “Early Modern Times” (read carefully: 355–497, then read quickly and/or peruse the rest of the volume to discern its main argument).

• Worster, Donald. Nature’s Economy: A History of Ecological Ideas Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press. Read the entire book, but especially carefully Parts I, and III — VI. (If you have the first edition, borrow the second edition and read part VI (pp. 340–433), which is an expansion of the Epilogue in the first edition.

Special Assignment Reading

• Midgley, Mary. Evolution as a Religion

• Gunderson, Lance H. and C. S. Holling. Panarchy: Understanding Transformations in Systems of Humans and Nature

• James Gleich, Chaos: Making a New Science (NY: Penguine, 1987)

• Bramwell, Anna. Ecology in the 20^th Century: A History

Module III: Further and Future Reading

Scientific Paradigms, Religion, and Nature

• Bateson, Gregory. Steps to an Ecology of Mind. New York: Ballantine, 1972.

• Berman, Morris. The Reenchantment of the World. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 1981.

• Berry, Thomas. The Dream of the Earth. San Francisco: Sierra Club Books, 1988.

• Bramwell, Anna. Ecology in the 20^th Century: A History. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989.

• Capra, Fritjof. The Tao of Physics. third ed. Boston: 1975; reprint, Boston: Shambhala, 1991.

• Capra, Fritojf. The Turning Point: Science, Society, and the Rising Culture. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1982.

• Fortey, Richard. Life: A Natural History of the First Four Billion Years of Life on Earth. New York: Knopf, 1998.

• Gleick, James. Chaos: Making a New Science. New York: Penguin, 1987.

• Golley, Frank Benjamin. A History of the Ecosystem Concept in Ecology. New Haven & London: Yale University Press, 1993

• Gunderson, Lance H. and C. S. Holling. Panarchy: Understanding Transformations in Systems of Humans and Nature. Covelo, CA: Island Press, 2002.

• Heisenberg, Werner. Physics and Philosophy. New York: Harper and Row, 1962.

• Lovelock, James. Gaia: A New Look At Life on Earth. revised ed. Oxford: 1979; reprint, Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press, 1995.

• Macy, Joanna. World As Lover, World As Self. Berkeley, CA: Parallax Press, 1991.

• Midgley, Mary. Evolution as a Religion. London: Routledge (1985, revised with new introduction, 2002).

• McGrath, Alister E. Science and Religion: An Introduction. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 1999.

• Odum, Howard T. Environment, Power, and Society. New York: Wiley-Interscience, 1971.

• Primavesi, Anne. Gaia’s Gift. London & New York: Routledge, 2003.

• Real, L. A. and J. H. Brown, eds. Foundations of Ecology. Chicago, Illinois: University of ChicagoPress.

• Sagan, Carl. Carl Sagan’s the Cosmic Connection. second ed. 1974; reprint, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.

• Swimme, Brian and Thomas Berry. The Universe Story: From the Primordial Flaring Forth to the Ecozoic Era: A Celebration of the Unfolding of the Cosmos. San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1992.

Module IV: “Religion and Nature” in twentieth-century scholarship (from the Sacred and the Profane and “Ecological Anthropology” to “Religion and Ecology”)

• Religions as adaptive and maladaptive ecological strategies (with special reference to the indigenous societies and “traditional ecological knowledge.”)

• Mircea Eliade, cultural geography, and theories of ‘sacred space’

• Environmental Concern, Religious Studies, the “Religion and Ecology” field, and debates about the environmental tendencies of the “world religions” of the east and west.

• Religion’s role in the environmental & social collapse; and environmental reform?

Introduction: not only were there upheavals in science during the 20^th century, anthropology and religious studies went through their own dramatic transformations. Among the most significant that were directly nature-relevant were analyses of the importance of human perceptions of sacred space, and the role of such perceptions in religious and environmental practices. In the latter part of the 20^th century, some anthropologists and religious studies scholars began not only to analyze the relationships between religions, cultures, and environments, but they began to, in some cases explicitly, in others implicitly, promote what they had come to believe were environmentally beneficent forms of religion. This module explores these developments, correlating them with the changing scientific paradigms encountered in the previous one, which sets the stage for asking in the next module about the future of nature-related religion and its likely impacts on nonhuman nature.

(Week 8) 11 October
Religion, Ritual and Ecological Adaptation

Assignment

1) Be prepared to discuss all readings to date. By midnight 9 October send by email attachment a 500–750 word analysis of the periods covered in the assigned week’s readings.
2) Be prepared to summarize up front in class the readings from the ERN and Rappaport’s reading, thus far.

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN: *Ecological Anthropology; *Ecology and Religion; Ethnobotany; Evolutionary Biology, Religion, and Stewardship; Harris, Marvin; Rappaport, Roy; A Religio-Ecological Perspective on Religion and Nature; Sky.

Required Core Reading

• Rappaport, Roy A. Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity (chs. 1–5, pp. 1–168)

Special Assignment Reading

• Jared Diamond’s Collapse, esp, prologue, ch 6–9, and part IV

(Week 9) 25 October
Indigenous Peoples and “Traditional Ecological Knowledge”

Assignment

1) Be prepared to discuss all readings to date. By midnight 19 October send by email attachment a 500–750 word analysis of the periods covered in the assigned week’s readings.
2) Be prepared to discuss Rappaport’s book and the following readings.

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN: Mother Earth; Native American Languages; Noble Savage (various); *Traditional Ecological Knowledge; Traditional Environmental Knowledge among Aboriginal Peoples in Canada

Required Core Reading

• Rappaport, Roy A. Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity (chs 6–9, pp. 169–312).

Special Assignment Reading

• Berkes, Fikret. Sacred Ecology: Traditional Ecological Knowledge and Resource Management. Philadelphia: Taylor and Francis, 1999 [or 2^nd or 3^rd edition]. Pages 1–55 are especially important.

• David Abram. The Spell of the Sensuous

(Week 10) 1 November
“Sacred Ecology” and Sacred Geography

Assignment

1) By midnight 30 October send by email attachment 750 word summary/analysis this week’s readings, with special attention to the fault lines between the idea of American Indians as “First Ecologists” and other, relevant, ERN entries you have read.

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN: American Indians as “First Ecologists”; Nobel Savage; Sacred Geography in Native North America; Sacred Mountains; Sacred Groves in Africa; Sacred Sites in England; Sacred Space/Place; Savages.

Required Core Reading

• Rappaport, Roy A. Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity (chs 10–14, pp. 313–461).

Recommended Readings

• John Sears, Sacred Places, re. nature appreciation and pilgrimage, first 1⁄2 19^th century, pp. 1–71

• Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Nature” and other selections.

• Henry David Thoreau, Selections from Bron Taylor’s Thoreau Collection (Dr. Taylor will provide this via email)

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “Preserve the Wilderness” and “Wilderness Preserved,” pp. 96–121 (chs. 6 & 7 (read quickly)

Special Assignment Reading

• Animism & Conservation in the Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture 1/4 (December 2007)

• Krech, Shepard (3^rd). The Ecological Indian: Myth and History. New York: Norton, 1999

Further Reading

• Bender, Barbara and Margot Winer, eds. Contested Landscapes: Movement, Exile and Place. Oxford & New York: Berg, 2001.

• Carmichael, David L., Jane Hubert, Brian Reeves and Audhild Schanche. Sacred Sites, Sacred Places. Londond & New York: Routledge, 1994.

• Chidester, David and David Linenthal, eds. American Sacred Space. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1995.

• Gregory, Derek. Geographical Imaginations. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Blackwell, 1994.

• Hirsh, Eric and Michael O’Hanlon. The Anthropology of Landscape: Perspectives on Place and Space. Oxford, United Kingdom: Clarendon Press, 1995.

• Ivakhiv, Adrian. Claiming Sacred Ground: Pilgrims and Politics at Glastonbury and Sedona. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 2001.

• Jones, Lindsay. The Hermeneutics of Sacred Architecture: Experience, Interpretation, Comparison --Monumental Occasions: Reflections on the Eventfulness of Religious Architecture (V. 1 of 2). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2000.

• Lane, Beldon. Landscapes of the Sacred: Geography and Narrative in American Spirituality. New York: Paulist, 1988.

• Schultes, R. E. and S. Reis. Ethnobotany: Evolution of a Discipline. Portland, Oregon: Timber Press, 1995.

• Schultes, R. E. “Reasons for Ethnobotanical Conservation.” In Traditional Ecological Knowledge: A Collection of Essays, ed. R. E. Johannes. Geneva: International Union for the Conservation of Nature, 1989.

• Sears, John. Sacred Places: American Tourist Attractions in the Nineteenth Century. New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989.

• Shepard, Paul. Man in the Landscape: A Historic View of the Esthetics of Nature. second ed. 1967; reprint, College Station: Texas A & M University Press, 1991.

• Tuan, Yi-Fu. “Discrepancies Between Environmental Attitude and Behaviour: Examples From Europe and China.” The Canadian Geographer 12 (1968): 176–91.

• _______. Landscapes of Fear. Oxford, England: Blackwell, 1980.

• _______. Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1977.

• _______. Topophilia: A Study of Environmental Perception, Attitudes, and Values. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1974.

• Turner, Victor. “Pilgrimages as Social Processes,” 166–230, in Dramas, fields, and metaphors: symbolic action in human society (Cornell University Press, 1974).

• Williams, Raymond. The Country and the City. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 1975.

(Week 11) 8 November
“Sacred Space” Theories, and Environmental Conservation (Recognizing / Constructing / Contesting Natural Places as Sacred Spaces)

Assignment

1) By midnight 6 November send by mail attachment a 500–750 word analysis of the various perspectives in this week’s readings. Do this in two parts:
(a) discuss the fault lines between Eliade and his progeny, religion scholars interested in promoting green religion and their critics.
(b) Summarize the faultlines between Chidester and Linenthal in their introduction to American Sacred Space and other theorists on sacred space, including Eliade and those discussed by Anttonen.

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN: Earth Mysteries; Eliade, Mircea; *Religious Studies and Environmental Concern (and adjacent entry): Critical Perspectives on “Religions of the World and Ecology”; Religious Environmentalist Paradigm.

Required Core Reading

• Ingold, Tim. The Perception of the Environment: Essays in Livelihood, Dwelling and Skill. London: Routledge, 2000.Tim. Peruse: Introduction & Chapter 1; Chapter 2; Chapter 4; and read carefully Chapter 8, Chapter 21.

• David Chidester and Edward Linenthal, “Introduction” in American Sacred Space (ed. Chidester & Linenthal); Veikko Anttonen, “Sacred” in W. Braun and R. T. McCutcheon, eds., Guide to the Study of Religion.

Recommended Readings

• Mircea Eliade, The Sacred and the Profane

• J. Z. Smith, To Take Place

• Lane, Beldon. Landscapes of the Sacred: Geography and Narrative in American Spirituality

Further and Future Readings ~ Evolution and Religion (focus on indigenous socities and traditional ecological knowledge”)

• Anderson, Eugene N. Ecologies of the Heart: Emotion, Belief, and the Environment. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 1996.

• Berkes, Fikret. Sacred Ecology: Traditional Ecological Knowledge and Resource Management. Philadelphia, PA: Taylor and Francis, 1999.

• Berkes, Fikret, Johan Colding and Carl Folke. Navigating Social-Ecological Systems: Building Resilience for Complexity and Change. Cambridge, United Kindom: Cambride University Press, 2003.

• Berkes, Fikret and Carl Folke. Linking Social and Ecological Systems. Cambridge, United Kindom: Cambridge University Press, 2002.

• Bloch, Maurice. “People Into Places: Zafimaniry Concepts of Clarity.” In The Anthropology of Landscape: Perspectives on Place and Space, eds. Eric Hirsh and Michael O’Hanlon, 63–77. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995

• _______. Prey Into Hunter: The Politics of Religious Experience. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Cambridge University Press, 1992.

• Carrasco, Davíd, ed. The Imagination of Matter: Religion and Ecology in Mesoamerican Traditions. Oxford: BAR International Series, 1989.

• Eisenberg, Evan. The Ecology of Eden. New York: Random House, 1998.

• Grim, John A. Indigenous Traditions and Ecology: The Interbeing of Cosmology and Community. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001.

• Harris, Marvin. “The Myth of the Sacred Cow.” In Man, Culture, and Animals, eds. Anthony Leeds and Andrew P. Vaya, 217–28. Washington, DC: American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1965.

• _______. Cows, Pigs, Wars and Witches: The Riddles of Culture. New York: Random House, 1974.

• _______. Cannibals and Kings: The Origins of Cultures. New York: Random House, 1977.

• _______. “The Cultural Ecology of India’s Sacred Cattle.” Current Anthropology 7 (1966): 51–66.

• Hughes, J. Donald. Pan’s Travail: Environmental Problems of the Ancient Greeks and Romans. Baltimore, Maryland: John Hopkins University Press, 1994.

• Ingold, Tim. The Perception of the Environment: Essays in Livelihood, Dwelling and Skill. London: Routledge, 2000.

• Krech, Shepard (3^rd). The Ecological Indian: Myth and History. New York: Norton, 1999.

• Lansing, J. Stephen. Priests and Programmers: Technologies of Power in the Engineered Landscape of Bali. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1991.

• Lansing, J. Stephen and James N. Kremer. “A Socioecological Analysis of Balinese Water Temples.” In The Cultural Dimension of Development: Indigenous Knowledge Systems, eds. D. M. Warren, L. Jan Slikkerveer and David Brokensha, 258–68. London: Intermediate Technology Publications, 1995.

• Lawson, E. Thomas and Robert M. McCauley. Rethinking religion: connecting cognition and culture. Cambride University Press, 1993.

• Lodrick, Deryck O. Sacred Cows, Sacred Places: Origins and Survivals of Animal Homes in India. Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 1981.

• Messer, Ellen and Michael Lambek. Ecology and the Sacred: Engaging the Anthropology of Roy A. Rappaport. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2001.

• Moran, Emilio, ed. The Ecosystem Approach in Anthropology. Ann Arbor, Michigan: University of Michigan Press, 1990.

• Oelschlaeger, Max. The Idea of Wilderness: From Prehistory to the Age of Ecology. New Haven: YaleUniversity Press, 1991.

• Rappaport, Roy A. Ecology, Meaning and Religion. Richmond, California: North Atlantic, 1979.

• _______. Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 1999.

• Simoons, Frederick J. “Questions in the Sacred Cow Controversy.” Current Anthropology 20 (1979): 467–93.

Module V: Religion, Nature, and the Future of Religion and Nature

• Social Scientific Perspectives on Environmentalism, Nature, and Religion, from Quantitative Data to Colin Campbell’s “Cultic Milieu” Theory.

• Green Nazis and the Shadow Side of Nature Religions.

• Contemporary Construction of Nature Religions and Pagan Spiritualities.

• Secularization Theories and ‘Spiritualities of Connection’ to Nature.

Introduction: Clearly, during the second half of the 20^th century some lay observers and scholarly analysts were hoping for, and in some cases romantically expecting, a revitalization or invention of religious forms and practices that would lead human cultures toward environmentally sustainable lifeways and livelihoods. During the same period, more cautious voices arose questioning whether religion could evolve into an environmentally progressive social force, or even wondering whether religion is an important variable in culture-nature interactions. Other voices expressed alarm at the apparent growth of nature-related spiritualities, noting that such religion has sometimes been closely connected to pernicious political ideologies such as Nazism. Still others wondered whether secularization, fueled by the slow if steady advance of scientific understandings of the universe, would erode religious belief altogether, and thus the influence of nature-related religion. And yet others asserted that the future of religion, if there is to be any millennia from now, would and must be fused to such scientific understandings. All of this raises anew questions about the future of religion.

There is already some evidence of scientific understandings of the universe being consecrated in contemporary religion. In some cases sacralized scientific narratives are grafted onto pre-existing religious forms while in other cases they are emerging and evolving with little explicit reference to previous forms. The question with which we leave this course is whether such forms of “religion” or “spirituality” are likely to be main streams in the future of religion, or rather, small this tributaries from the mainstreams, which then dry up quickly. The answer to that question is one that may well preoccupy much future scholarship inquiring into the nature of the relationships between human cultures, religions, and environments. The answer may also play a role in whether and to what extent humans continue to simplify and degrade the earth’s living systems.not only were there upheavals in science during the 20^th century, anthropology and religious studies went through their own dramatic transformations. Among the most significant that were directly nature-relevant were analyses of the importance of human perceptions of sacred space, and the role of such perceptions in religious and environmental practices. In the latter part of the 20^th century, some anthropologists and religious studies scholars began not only to analyze the relationships between religions, cultures, and environments, but they began to, in some cases explicitly, in others implicitly, promote what they had come to believe were environmentally beneficent forms of religion. This module explores these developments, correlating them with the changing scientific paradigms encountered in the previous one, which sets the stage for asking in the next module about the future of nature-related religion and its likely impacts on nonhuman nature.

(Week 12 & 13) 15 & 22 November
Social Science, Religion and Nature (and considering Nature Religions and their “Shadow Side”)

Assignment

1) By 13 November send 500–750 word analysis of Paul Shepard’s book; by 22 November write an analysis/reaction to the articles by Bron Taylor and his collaborators on Lynn White and the Greening of Religion Hypothesis. Note: no class 22 November due to Thanksgiving

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN: ATWA, Corrington, Robert; Elves and Land Spirits in Pagan Norse Religion; *Fascism; Heathenry (Ásatrú); Odinism; Paganism; Neo-paganism and Ethnic Nationalism in Eastern Europe; Protestant Ethic; Savitri, Devi; *Social Science on Religion and Nature; *White, Lynn–Thesis of; Wicca; Unitarianism.

Required Core Reading

• Bron Taylor, The Greening of Religion Hypothesis (Part One): From Lynn White, Jr. and claims that religions can promote environmentally destructive attitudes and behaviors to assertions they are becoming environmentally friendly, Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, 10 (3) 2016; available at: https://florida.academia.edu/BronTaylor

• Bron Taylor, Gretel Van Wieren & Bernard Zaleha, The Greening of Religion Hypothesis (Part Two): Assessing the Data from Lynn White, Jr. to Pope Francis, Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, 10 (3) 2016; available at: https://florida.academia.edu/BronTaylor

• Shepard, Paul, Coming Home to the Pleistocene, read 1, skim 2–5; read 6, skim 7, and read 8, 9.

Recommended Readings

• Tuan, Yi Fu. “Discrepancies between environmental attitude and behavior: examples from Europe and China” from the Canadian Geographer 12(3): 176–91, 1968.

Special Assignment Reading

• Carolyn Merchant, Reinventing Eden: The Fate of Nature in Western Culture. New York & London: Routledge, 2003.

• Michael York, Pagan Theology. Washington Square, New York: New York University Press, 2004.

Further Reading

• Corrington, Robert S. Nature’s Religion. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, 1997.

• Crosby, Donald A. A Religion of Nature. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press, 2002

• Pike, Sarah. New Age and Neopagan Religions in America. New York: Columbia University Press, 2004.

• Gregory, Derek. Geographical Imaginations. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Blackwell, 1994.

• York, Michael. Pagan Theology. Washington Square, New York: New York University Press, 2004.

Further Reading ~ Right-Wing Ideology and Religions of Nature

• Bramwell, Anna. Ecology in the 20^th Century: A History. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989.

• _______. Blood and Soil: Walter Darré and Hitlers Green Party. Buckinghamshire, UK: Kensal, 1985.

• Ferry, Luc. The New Ecological Order. Paris: 1992; reprint, Chicago & London: University of Chicago Press, 1995.

• Gardell, Mattias. Gods of the Blood: The Pagan Revival and White Separatism. Durham, North Carolina: Duke UniversityPress, 2003.

• Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas. Hitler’s Priestess: Savitri Devi, the Hindu-Aryan Myth and Neo-Nazism. New York: New YorkUniversity Press, 1998.

• Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas. The Occult Roots of Nazism: Secret Aryan Cults and Their Influence on Nazi Ideology. New York: New York University Press, 1994.

• Goodrich-Clarke, Nicholas. Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity. New York & London: New York University Press, 2002

• Kaplan, Jeffrey. “Savitri Devi and the National Socialist Religion of Nature.” The Pomegranate, no. 7 (February 1999): 4–12

• Zimmerman, Michael E. Contesting Earth’s Future: Radical Ecology and Postmodernity. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994.

(Week 14) 29 November
Religion, Nature, and the Future

Assignment

1) By midnight 27 November send 500–750 word summary of the argument in B. Taylor’s Dark Green Religion, identifying other course readings that appear to have affinity with the described phenomena, as well as the religious forms that do not, and be sure to note connections with the views of Paul Shepard
2) Student presentations may begin tonight and continue next week.

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN: Radical Environmentalism; Berry, Thomas; Biosphere Reserves and World Heritage Sites; *Christianity (9)—Christianity’s Ecological Reformation; *Epic of Evolution; Evolutionary Evangelism; Religious Naturalism;Natural History as Natural Religion; Restoration Ecology and Ritual; Process Philosophy (and Theology cross-reference); Sagan, Carl; Space Exploration.

Required Core Reading

• Taylor, Bron, Dark Green Religion, chs 1–9 (Thoreau Appendix strongly recommended) [chapters will be made available for free from instructor.]

Optional Readings

• from www.earthcharter.org, www.ethologicalethics.org, and see The Great Story for the website of ‘evolutionary evangelist’ Michael Dowd.

• Thomas Berry, “The human presence” pp. 13–23 (ch. 3), “The new story” pp. 194–215 (ch. 15), in Dream of the Earth. (Alternatively, read the selections from The Great Work, immediately below.)

Special Assignment Reading

• Atlee, Tom. The Tao of Democracy: Using Co-Intelligence to Create a World That Works for All. Cranston, RI: The Writer’s Collective, 2003.

DVDs

• ‘Journey of the Universe’ documentary

Further Reading

• Bruce, Steve, ed. Religion and Modernization: Sociologists and Historians Debate the Secularization Thesis. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2001.

• _______. God is dead: secularization in the west. Oxford, England: Blackwell, 2002.

• Campbell, Colin. “The Cult, the Cultic Milieu and Secularization.” A Sociological Yearbook of Religion in Britain 5 (1972): 119–36.

• Stark, Rodney and William Baines Bainbridge. The Future of Religion: Secularization, Revival, and Cult Formation. Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 1985.

• Warner, R. Stephen. “Work in Progress Toward a New Paradigm for the Sociological Study of Religion in the United States.” American journal of sociology 98 (1993): 1044–93.

• Wilson, Bryan. “Secularization: The Inherited Model.” In The Sacred in a Secular Age, ed. Phillip Hammond, 9–20. Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 1985.

Further Reading ~ Right-Wing Ideology and Religions of Nature

• Bramwell, Anna. Ecology in the 20^th Century: A History. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989.

• _______. Blood and Soil: Walter Darré and Hitlers Green Party. Buckinghamshire, UK: Kensal, 1985.

• Ferry, Luc. The New Ecological Order. Paris: 1992; reprint, Chicago & London: University of Chicago Press, 1995.

• Gardell, Mattias. Gods of the Blood: The Pagan Revival and White Separatism. Durham, North Carolina: Duke UniversityPress, 2003.

• Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas. Hitler’s Priestess: Savitri Devi, the Hindu-Aryan Myth and Neo-Nazism. New York: New YorkUniversity Press, 1998.

• Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas. The Occult Roots of Nazism: Secret Aryan Cults and Their Influence on Nazi Ideology. New York: New York University Press, 1994.

• Goodrich-Clarke, Nicholas. Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity. New York & London: New York University Press, 2002.

• Kaplan, Jeffrey. “Savitri Devi and the National Socialist Religion of Nature.” The Pomegranate, no. 7 (February 1999): 4–12.

• Zimmerman, Michael E. Contesting Earth’s Future: Radical Ecology and Postmodernity. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994.

(Week 15) 6 December [Last day of class]
Student Presentations

Assignment

1) Student presentations completed tonight, with course wrap up.
2) Non-attendance incurs one grade deduction on research paper and final take home exam.
3) Research Papers Due.
4) Take home essay final distributed in class. Due by midnight, Tuesday, 13 December, delivered by email.

EXPLORING AND STUDYING ENVIRONMENTAL ETHICS & HISTORY, NATURE RELIGION,
RADICAL ENVIRONMENTALISM, SURFING SPIRITUALITY, DEEP ECOLOGY AND MORE

FALL 2017: Radical Environmentalism (undergraduate & graduate sections)

Source:

<http://www.brontaylor.com/courses/pdf/re--gateway(f17).pdf>

Anyone who will read the anarchist and radical environmentalist journals will see that opposition to the industrial-technological system is widespread and growing.

Theodore Kaczynski, aka the Unabomber

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Course Gateways:

_Syllabus_ (The additional, direct access links, below, are also found in this syllabus.)

_Schedule of Readings and Assignments_

_Documentary Readings_

_Bron Taylor’s Print History and Digital Archive of Earth First!, Wild Earth, Live Wild or Die, and Alarm_

_Music_

_Bibliography_

_WWW Sites_

Anyone who will read the anarchist and radical environmentalist journals will see that opposition to the industrial-technological system is widespread and growing Theodore Kaczynski, aka the Unabomber

Course Description

Critical examination of the emergence and social impacts of Radical Environmentalism, with special attention to its religious and moral dimensions, and the ecological and political perceptions that undergird its controversial strategies designed to arrest environmental degradation.

Course Overview and Objectives

During the 1980s and much of the 1990s and beyond, thousands of environmental activists were arrested for resisting through civil disobedience and creative blockades deforestation and other forms of environmental destruction, especially in North

America, Australia, and England. Some took up sabotage concluding that civil disobedience was not enough, driving spikes into trees to prevent them from being cut down and torching heavy equipment and buildings, for example. Since the early 1990s, activists from the “Earth Liberation Front” destroyed over 120 million dollars worth of property in a campaign against those engaged in genetic engineering, habitat destruction, and animal exploitation. This group, and the Animal Liberation Front with which it sometimes cooperates, is considered by some law enforcement authorities to be the #1 domestic terrorism threat in the United States and England. Indeed, the most radical of these groups wonder when the time will come to emulate confessed Unabomber Ted Kaczynski, whom they consider a folk hero. Some envision a violent anti-industrial revolution, such as those who threw bricks through the windows of multinational corporations during the 1999 World Trade Organization meeting in Seattle. Whatever their chosen tactics, the radical environmentalists leading the anti-globalization resistance claim that corporations and governments are engaged in a sinister, profit-driven mission that fuels environmental degradation and species extinctions, while corrupting if not destroying democracy and violating human rights.

This course seeks to understand the worldviews (ecological understandings, cosmologies, religious perceptions, and political ideologies). and to assess the impacts (past and future), of the subcultures that constitute radical environmentalism, as they engage in trenchant struggles over the earth’s living systems.

Specifically, in this class we will explore:

1. The historical emergence and diverse forms of radical environmentalism (social ecological, deep ecological, ecofeminist, anarcho-primitivist, bioregionalist, and animal liberationist, to name a few).

2. The ecological and political views that typify radical environmentalists.

3. The metaphysical, spiritual and ethical beliefs and perceptions that animate radical environmentalists.

4. How the radical environmental forms cross-fertilize and the limits of such cross-fertilization.

5. The internal disputes and factions among and within radical environmental groups, and the contested nature of the various approaches.

6. The criticisms of radical environmental groups by political conservatives and liberals, whether environmentalist or not.

7. The role that radical environmentalism plays or is likely to play in the future in violent conflicts over natural systems.

8. The likely futures for humans and nature in the context of intensifying, environment-related social conflict, where radical environmentalists play an increasing role.

Through such exploration students will be ready to assess the extent to which radical environmentalism and the dynamics it produces is a positive or negative social movement.

Required Readings:

Readings preceded by an asterisk should be purchased; all others will be on reserve or otherwise made available, but purchase is recommended of the major ones, such as by Bender, Abbey, Zakin, and Devall/Sessions

• Abbey, Edward. The Monkeywrench Gang. New York City: Avon, 1975.

_________. Desert Solitaire University of Arizona Press, 1968/1988.

Devall, Bill and George Sessions, eds. Deep Ecology: Living As If Nature Mattered. Salt Lake City, UT: Peregrine Smith, 1985.

• Foreman, Dave. Rewilding North America: A Vision for Conservation in the 21^st Century. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 2004.

Taylor, Bron, ed. Ecological Resistance Movements: The Global Emergence of Radical and Popular Environmentalism. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press, 1995. (also on reserve)

Zakin, Susan. Coyotes and Town Dogs: Earth First! and the Environmental Movement. New York: Viking, 1993.

Special research archive, hosted by the Rachel Carson Center:

Bron Taylor’s Print History and Digital Archive of Earth First!, Wild Earth, Live Wild or Die, and Alarm Schedule ~ Overview

Module I (weeks 1–5)

Tributaries and the Early Years: A historical overview of the sources, worldview, and mythic structure of Radical Environmentalism, with special attention to ethical and ecological claims, ritualizing, and political impacts. (10 year period, through 1980).

Module II (weeks 6–9)

The Critique and Negative Reaction: From “wise use” partisans to environmental and other philosophers, to law enforcement authorities.

Module III (weeks 10–12)

Distributaries and fellow Travelers: from Bioregionalism, to Conservation Biology, to the Earth Liberation Front and Green Anarchism.

Module IV (weeks 13–15)

Key issues in the Future of Radical Environmentalism: including foci on social philosophy, biocentric axiology, violence, globalization, and spirituality.

_Schedule ~ Details_

Requirements and Evaluation

The requirements, indicated below, and the reading schedule that follows, may be modified during the course. This will occur sometimes because new developments will be documented or sources discovered that will be added to and or supplant existing readings. For this reason, students should consult the online syllabus every week to access the current version of the syllabus.

Some students will negotiate with the course instructor deviations from these standard requirements and readings. Individual course contracts will then be operative, which better focus this course’s work on an aspect of radical environmentalism particularly relevant to a given student’s research agenda.

Undergraduate Section:

Periodic quizzes or short essays on the week’s readings and classroom experiences. These will constitute 20% of the course grade and some of them will not be announced previous to their administration. The lowest score will be dropped.

Take Home Examinations. There will be two intensive take home essay examinations, which students will have one week to complete. Each will constitute 30% of the course grade.

Reflection Paper. Each student will complete a reflective paper about radical environmentalism. This paper will have two dimensions: the first will be a personal reflection based on their own experimentations during the course with the epistemologies typically found in radical environmentalism; the second will be a critical evaluation of what the student takes to be the essential features of such social phenomena. Worth 20% of the course grade. Papers should be between 1,500 and 2,000 words. This assignment will be discussed further in class.

Research Option: Ambitious students wishing to read more deeply and write a research paper may, with the permission of the instructor, fulfill the course requirements for the Graduate Section. Those who do so conscientiously will receive an upgrade up to a one full grade from that which would result from the points alone.

Graduate Section:

Course Participation. It is expected that all readings will be completed and assimilated prior to Monday evening’s class, and that graduate students will participate actively in classroom discussions, demonstrating this careful preparation. Unusually strong or weak preparation and classroom contributions may affect the final course grade.

Take Home Examinations. There will be two intensive take home essay examinations, which students will have one week to complete. Each will constitute 25% of the course grade.

Reflection Paper. Same as above, but worth 10% of the course grade.

Research Paper. Each student will complete a research paper and must be prepared to present material from this research to the discussion section of either the undergraduate or graduate seminar, sometime during the semester, by arrangement with Dr. Taylor. A rough draft should be turned in by week 12. Research Topics should have something directly to do with radical environmentalism — potential subjects include its inspirations, activists, campaigns, spirituality, ethics, attitudes toward ‘wilderness’, gendered or ethnic dimensions, other social causes, social philosophies, ecological views, strategies and tactics (including violence and civil disobedience), forms Ecological Resistance Movements outside of North America,” and more. Articles must be carefully researched and consistently cited according to a standard, scholarly format (e.g. Chicago A or B, American Psychological Association, Modern Language Association).

Note: All students are required to abide by the Student Honor Code, which governs academic honesty and more. Read it.

All students are expected to attend every class session. Much that happens in class cannot be conveyed afterward, and the instructor will not revisit lectures during office hours. Unexcused absences negatively affect course grades. Except in the case of medical emergency, excused absences require prior prior notification. All excused absences require documentation, such as a doctor’s notice.

Additional Required Readings for Graduate Section

Bender, Frederic L. The Culture of Extinction: Toward a Philosophy of Deep Ecology. Humanity Books, 2003 (also on reserve).

Katz, Eric, Andrew Light and David Rothenberg. Beneath the Surface: Critical Essays on Deep Ecology. MIT Press, 2000 (also on reserve).

Lewis, Martin W. Green Delusions: An Environmentalist Critique of Radical Environmentalism. Durham: Duke University Press, 1992 (also on reserve).

Recommended Movement Anthologies (widely available online)

Best, Steven and Anthony Nocella, eds., Igniting a Revolution: Voices in Defense of the Earth. (Oakland, CA: AK Press, 2006).

Burks, David Clarke, ed. Place of the Wild: A Wildlands Anthology. Washington D.C.: Island Press, 1994.

Butler, Tom. Wild Earth: Wild Ideas for a World Out of Balance. Minneapolis, MN: Milkweed, 2002.

Davis, John, ed. The Earth First! Reader: Ten Years of Radical Environmentalism. Salt Lake City, UT: Gibbs Smith, 1991.

Drengson, Alan and Yuichi Inoue, eds. The Deep Ecology Movement: An Introductory Anthology. Berkeley, California: North Atlantic, 1995.

List, Peter C., ed. Radical Environmentalism: Philosophy and Tactics. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1993.

Sessions, George, ed. Deep Ecology for the 21^st Century. Boston: Shambhala Publications, 1995.

Selected Course Bibliography

Abbey, Edward. 1990. Hayduke lives! Boston: Little, Brown.

_________. The Monkeywrench Gang. New York City: Avon, 1975.

_________. Desert Solitaire University of Arizona Press, 1968/1988.

Arnold, Ron. 1997. Ecoterror: The Violent Agenda to Save Nature--the World of the Unabomber.

Bellvue, Washington: Free Enterprise.

Best, Steven, and Anthony J. Nocella, eds. 2004. Terrorists or freedom fighters: reflections on the liberation of animals. New York: Lantern.

Best, Steven, and Anthony J. Nocella, eds. 2006. Igniting a revolution: voices in defense of the Earth. Oakland & Edinburgh: AK Press.

Bey, Hakim. T.A.Z. 1991. The Temporary Autonomous Zone, Ontological Anarchy, Poetic Terrorism. Autonomedia.

Bishop, James. 1994. Epitaph for a desert anarchist: the life and legacy of Edward Abbey. New York & Toronto: Atheneum.

Cahalan, James M. 2001. Edward Abbey: a life. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.

Boggs, Carl. 2012. Ecology and revolution: global crisis and the political challenge, Environmental politics and theory. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Bradford, George. 1989. How Deep Is Deep Ecology? A Challenge to Radical Environmentalism. Ojai, California: Times Change Press.

Cahalan, James M. 2001. Edward Abbey: a life. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.

Carter, Alan. 1999. A Radical Green Political Theory. London: Routledge.

Crist, Eileen. 2008. “Against the social construction of wilderness.” In The wilderness debate rages on: continuing the great new wilderness debate, edited by Michael P. Nelson and J.

Baird Callicott, 500–525. Athens, Georgia: University of Georgia Press.

Davis, John, ed. 1991. The Earth First! Reader: Ten Years of Radical Environmentalism. Salt Lake City, UT: Peregrine Smith.

Diehm, Christian. 2011. “Ecotage, ecodefense, and deep ecology.” The Trumpeter: Journal of Ecosophy 27 (2).

Farrell, Justin. 2015. The battle for Yellowstone: morality and the sacred roots of environmental conflict, Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Foreman, Dave. 1991. Confessions of an Eco-Warrior. New York: Harmony Books.

_________. 2004. Rewilding North America: a vision for conservation in the 21^st century. Washington, D.C.: Island Press.

_________. Take back conservation. Durango, Colo.: Raven’s Eye Press.

Foreman, Dave, and Laura Carroll. 2014. Man swarm: how overpopulation is killing the wild world. 2^nd ed: Live True Books.

Jensen, Derrick. A Language Older Than Words. New York: Context, 2000.

Jensen, Derrick. 2006. Endgame. Seven Stories Press. 2 vols (New York: Seven Stories Press). Kaczynski, Ted. Industrial Society and Its Future. (Click title; widely available on the internet.) Kuipers, Dean. 2009. Operation bite back: Rod Coronado’s war to save American wilderness.

LeVasseur, Todd. “Decisive ecological warfare: triggering industrial collapse via deep green resistance.” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture 11 (1, 2017):109–130.

Levine, Margarita, and Michael Levine. 2001. “A critique of ecofeminism.” In Environmental ethics: readings in theory and application., edited by Louis Pojman. Wadsworth.

Lewis, Martin. 1992. Green Delusions: An Environmentalist Critique of Radical Environmentalism. Durham: Duke University Press.

Loeffler, Jack. 2002. Adventures with Ed. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.

Mallory, Chaone. 2006. “Ecofeminism and forest defense in Cascadia: gender, theory, and radical activism.” Capitalism, Nature, Socialism 17 (1):32–49.

Manes, Christopher. 1990. Green Rage: Radical Environmentalism and the Unmaking of Civilization. Boston: Little, Brown and Company.

McBay, Aric, Lierre Keith, and Derrick Jensen. 2011. Deep green resistance: strategy to save the planet. New York: Seven Stories Press.

Merchant, Carolyn. 2005 [1992]. Radical ecology: the search for a livable world. New York & London: Routledge.

Mies, Maria, and Vandana Shiva. 1993. Ecofeminism. London: Zed, 1993.

Murray, John A., ed. 2015. Abbey in America: a philosopher’s legacy in a new century.

Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press.

Nocella, Anthony J., Richard J. White, and Erika Cudworth. 2015. Anarchism and animal liberation: essays on complementary elements of total liberation. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers.

Nocella, Anthony J. 2014. Defining critical animal studies: an intersectional social justice approach for liberation, Counterpoints: studies in the postmodern theory of education. New York: Peter Lang.

Parson, Sean. 2008. “Understanding the ideology of the Earth Liberation Front.” Green Theory & Praxis: The Journal of Ecopedagogy 4 (2):50–66.

Pellow, David N. 2014. Total liberation: the power and promise of animal rights and the radical earth movement. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Pickering, Leslie James. 2003. The Earth Liberation Front, 1997–2002. South Wales, NY: Arissa.

Pike, Sarah M. 2017. For the wild: ritual and commitment in radical eco-activism. Berkeley & Los Angeles: University of California Press.

Roselle, Mike, and Josh Mahan. 2009. Tree spiker: from Earth First! to lowbagging: my struggles in radical environmental action. New York: St. Martin’s Press.

Scarce, Rik. 1990. Ecowarriors: understanding the radical environmental movement. Chicago: Noble.

Shepard, Paul. 1998, Coming Home to the Pleistocene. San Francisco: Island Press.

Speece, Darren. 2017. Defending giants: the redwood wars and the transformation of American environmental politics. Seattle: University of Washington Press.

Taylor, Bron. 1991. “The religion and politics of Earth First!” The Ecologist 21 (6):258–66.

_________. 1995. “Resacralizing earth: pagan environmentalism and the restoration of Turtle Island.” In American Sacred Space, edited by David Chidester and Edward T. Linenthal, 97–151. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

_________. 1996. “Ecological resistance movements; not always deep but if deep, religious: reply to Devall.” The Trumpeter 13 (2):98–103.

_________. 1997. “Earth First! Fights Back.” Terra Nova 2 (2 [Spring]):29–43.

_________. 1997. “Earthen spirituality or cultural genocide?: Radical environmentalism’s appropriation of Native American spirituality.” Religion 17 (2):183–215.

_________. 1998. “Religion, Violence, and Radical Environmentalism: From Earth First! to the Unabomber to the Earth Liberation Front.” Terrorism and Political Violence 10 (4):10–42.

_________. 1999. “Green apocalypticism: understanding disaster in the radical environmental worldview.” Society and Natural Resources 12 (4):377–386.

_________. 2000. “Deep Ecology and its social philosophy: a critique.” In Beneath the surface: critical essays on Deep Ecology, edited by Eric Katz, Andrew Light and David Rothenberg, 269–299. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press.

_________. 2000. “Bioregionalism: an ethics of loyalty to place.” Landscape Journal 19 (1&2): 50–72.

_________. 2001. “Earth and nature-based spirituality (part II): from deep ecology and bioregionalism to scientific paganism and the New Age.” Religion 31 (3):225–245.

_________. 2001. “Earth and nature-based spirituality (part I): from deep ecology to radical environmentalism.” Religion 31 (2):175–193.

_________. 2002. “Diggers, wolves, Ents, elves and expanding universes: bricolage, religion, and violence from Earth First! and the Earth Liberation Front to the antiglobalization resistance.” In The cultic milieu: oppositional subcultures in an age of globalization, edited by Jeffrey Kaplan and Heléne Lööw, 26–74. Lanham, Maryland: Altamira/Rowman and

Littlefield.

_________. 2003. “Earth First!: From primal spirituality to ecological resistance.” In Worldviews, religion, and the Environment, edited by Richard C. Foltz, 447–455. Belmont, California: Wadsworth.

_________. 2004. “Revisiting Ecoterrorism.” In Religionen im Konflikt, edited by Vasilios N.

Makrides and Jörg Rüpke, 237–48. Münster, Germany: Aschendorff.

_________. 2004. “Threat Assessments and Radical Environmentalism.” Terrorism and Political Violence 15 (4):172–183.

_________. 2008. “The tributaries of radical environmentalism.” Journal of Radicalism 2 (1): 27–61.

_________. 2002. “Diggers, Wolves, Ents, Elves and Expanding Universes: Bricolage, Religion, and Violence from Earth First! and the Earth Liberation Front to the Anti-Globalization Resistance.” In Jeffrey Kaplan and Helene Loow, editors. The Cultic Milieu: Oppositional Subcultures in an Age of Globalization. Altimura, pp. 26–74.

Taylor, Bron, ed. 1995. Ecological Resistance Movements: The Global Emergence of Radical and Popular Environmentalism. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press.

Tokar, Brian. 1997. Earth for Sale: Reclaiming Ecology in the Age of Corporate Greenwash. Boston: South End Press.

Wall, Derek. 1999. Earth First! and the Anti-Roads Movement: Radical Environmentalism and the Anti-Roads Movement. London: Routledge.

Wuerthner, George, Eileen Crist, and Tom Butler, eds. 2014. Keeping the wild: against the domestication of earth. Washington, DC: Island Press.

Wuerthner, George, Eileen Crist, and Tom Butler, eds. 2015. Protecting the wild: parks and wilderness, the foundation for conservation. Washington, Covelo, London: Island Press.

Zakin, Susan. 1993. Coyotes and Town Dogs: Earth First! and the Environmental Movement. New York: Viking.

Zubrin, Robert. 2011. Merchants of despair: radical environmentalists, criminal pseudo-scientists, and the fatal cult of antihumanism. New York: New Atlantis/Encounter.

_Schedule ~ Details_

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_Back to the syllabus overview_

Radical Environmentalism Weekly Schedule & Readings

Rigorous, college-level courses typically require two to three hours outside of class for every hour in class; graduate courses even more. This said, there may be weeks in which the assigned readings will be extensive enough that it will be difficult to read everything slowly and carefully. Develop your ability to peruse and skim as well as read. Some materials require slow, thoughtful reading. Others, one can skim and get the pertinent feel and main points without perseverating on every detail. Books like the historical overview by Susan Zakin can and should be worked through quickly, as should many of the primary reading sources (such as deep ecology and from the Earth First! journal). Scholarly journal articles will generally be more demanding and require more careful and analytical reading. In summary, figure out the different ways to read different sorts of things so you can get the most out of the readings within the time constraints of the semester. Readings during especially heavy weeks, which are the most critical to read, will be preceded by an asterisk. Focus on perceiving the main assertions, arguments, and evidence the authors are making, understanding what they perceive the stakes to be (why they think what they are saying matters), and what the various schools of thought (and action) are, what the fault lines are among them, and why. Do this well and you will flourish in this class.

Please bookmark this URL and consult this page every week for assignments, due dates, special guests, and extra-credit opportunities, some of which may change or appear suddenly.

Module I (weeks 1–5) ~ Tributaries and the Early Years

Week 1 (23 August) ~ Introducing the Monkeywrench Gang

The Tributaries to and Genesis of Radical Environmentalism

Poetic prologue, including Robinson Jeffers’ “The Answer”

Video: “60 Minutes” on Earth First (1990); Dave Foreman Roadshow (UWO, Spring 1990).

Undergraduate and graduate section readings

Prologue to B Taylor’s draft volume On Sacred Ground: Radical Environmentalism from Earth First! to the Earth Liberation Front (draft) [NOTE: ALL OF B. TAYLOR’S CHAPTERS ARE DRAFTS, FOR CLASS PARTICIPANT’S EYES ONLY, AND NOT FOR QUOTATION (BEYOND THIS COURSE) WITHOUT PRIOR PERMISSION]

Radical Environmentalism (7), Deep Ecology (3.5), Arne Naess (3), Earth First! and the Earth

Liberation Front (5), Social Ecology (2), Edward Abbey (2), Black Mesa (3), Anarchism (6), Ecofeminism (5), Bioregionalism and the North American Bioregional Congress;(2) (these are all from primers on the subjects, from the Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature).

Week 2 (30 August) ~ Encountering the Godfather of Radical Environmentalism

NOTE: There will be an in-class quiz on the previous week’s assigned readings.

Edward Abbey and the roots of Radical Environmentalism.

Video: Wrenched. Alternative: Edward Abbey: A Voice in the Wilderness.

Undergraduate and graduate section readings

Abbey, Edward, Desert Solitaire (selections; starred chapters especially recommended and double starred or more required & hyperlinked): *First Morning, *Solitaire, *Serpents of Paradise, *Cliffrose and Bayonets, ** Polemic on Industrial Tourism, Cowboys & Indians, **Cowboys and Indians (part II), Water, The Heat of Noon, The Moon-Eyed Horse, *****Down the River [sets up MW gang], ***Havasu, ** Dead Man at Grandview Point, *Tukuhnikivats,

Island in the Desert, *****Episodes & Visions, Terra Incognita, **Bedrock and Paradox Loeffler, with Abbey, on Glenn Canyon Dam, in Adventures with Ed, 101–05

• Abbey’s The Monkey Wrench Gang: Prologue, Origins I/Sarvis, Origins II/Hayduke, OriginsIII/ Seldom Seen, OriginsIV/MsAbbzug, The Wooden Shoe Conspiracy

• Abbey, on ranching and public lands, in “Preliminary remarks” (1–6) and “Free speech: the cowboy and his cow,” from One Life at a Time, Please, 7–19

• Abbey, “Theory of Anarchy” (25–28) and “Ecodefense_” 29–32 [also and originally as “Forward!” in Dave Foreman’s Ecodefense] from One Life at a Time, Please

• Abbey, “Preface & Benedicto” to 1998 edition to Desert Solitaire Additional graduate readings

Loeffler, with Abbey, on Anarchism, in Adventures with Ed, 202–06

Loeffler, with Abbey, on mysticism, peyote, and Abbey’s epiphany at Havasupai, in Adventures with Ed, 241–247, 196, 34.

Hopiland to the Rainforest Action Network (Randy Hayes)

Optional reading

Animals in the Woods (ch 1) in B Taylor’s draft volume On Sacred Ground: Radical Environmentalism from Earth First! to the Earth Liberation Front

Week 3 (6 September) ~ From Underground Resistance to a Resistance Movement (The Elders of & Tributaries to Radical Environmentalism)

Begin Radical Environmentalism through images and sound (including live field recordings and tunes such as Animal, Habitat, Sea Shepherd, & Manley Men). Background to include primers on the Conservation movement in North America: Gifford Pinchot, John Muir, and their respective progeny; The Fox, Bolt Weevils, The RARE II process and its role in the Genesis of Radical Environmentalism.

Video: Damnation (2014)

Undergraduate and graduate section readings

Tributaries (ch 2) in B Taylor’s draft volume On Sacred Ground: Radical Environmentalism from Earth First! to the Earth Liberation Front

Complete The Monkey Wrench Gang (initial 5 chapters provided by links, above).

Aldo Leopold

Pyotr Ouspensky

Conservation Biology

Foreman, Rewilding, 1–60 (part I, first 1/2)

Additional graduate readings

“_Earth First!’s Religious Radicalism,” in Ecological Prospects: Scientific, Religious, and Aesthetic Perspectives. Ed. C. Chapple. (State University of New York Press, 1994), 185–209.

Susan Zakin, Coyotes & Town Dogs, (1–100) (Read quickly/peruse Zakin’s book.) [Note: this book has just gone back in print with University of Arizona Press and can be easily acquired online and in some bookstores.]

Week 4 (13 September) ~ The First Decade of Earth First!

Lectures: on the tributaries and early years of EF!

Background Presentations on the argument that “Its so bad that…” radical action is necessary... and digging into the ecological and anthropological reasons for resistance

Books Focused on Bill Devall, ed., Clearcut: The Tragedy of Industrial Forestry, and Re-wilding.

Poetry & Prose: Gary Snyder from Turtle Island and in Clearcut

Possible Video: “Lou Gold” & Lessons from the Forest (Bald Mountain, Oregon, Case Study)

Undergraduate reading

Susan Zakin, Coyotes & Town Dogs, (1–101) With Zakin’s book, the goal is to get a broad feeling for the movement, its campaigns, internal disputes, and political impacts; read quickly.

Undergraduate and graduate readings

Foreman, Rewilding, 61–108 (part I, concluded)

Additional graduate readings

Foreman, Rewilding, 109–176 (part II)

Susan Zakin, Coyotes & Town Dogs, (102–215) and (216–315)

Additional Recommended Readings

Davis, John, ed. The Earth First! Reader: Ten Years of Radical Environmentalism. Salt Lake City, UT: Gibbs Smith, 1991.

Foreman, Dave. Confessions of an Eco-Warrior. New York: Harmony Books, 1991.

Week 5 (20 September) ~ Digging Underneath the History – Uncovering the Perceptual, Affective, Spiritual, and Ethical Motivations

Video: Rage over Trees and/or Video: Road Use Restricted (28min)

Undergraduate & graduate readings

* B. Taylor, “Resacralizing Earth: Environmental Paganism and the Restoration of Turtle Island,” in American Sacred Space. Eds. D. Chidester and E.T. Linenthal. (Indiana University Press, Religion in America Series, 1995), 97–151.

On Epistemology, Religion, Spirituality, and Ritual

There here are many antecedents to the countercultural spirituality of radical environmentalism, including Emil Rousseau (in 17^th c. France) and the so called Romantic movements wrote which followed (including the poet Robinson Jeffers in America, who published in the mid-20^th c and influenced many ardent and radical environmentalists), the Transcendentalists and esp. H. D. Thoreau, early conservationists including John Muir, Bob Marshall, Aldo Leopold, Rachael Carson, and indeed, most of the most passionate 20^th c. conservationists, and poets From the late 1950s, the most important early voices were Edward Abbey, Paul Shepard, and Gary Snyder. Less well known figures including Freeman House, Dolores LaChapelle, and Peter Berg made some of the more remarkable early and influential statements. In addition to the books by them cited above in the main bibliography, the following books and articles in movement tabloids and magazines were especially important. Below are some readings in this section of the courses’ documentary reader. Skim through these to get a field for the ‘spiritual ferment’ in the early movement.

Paganism

Graham Harvey, Animism

• Daniel Quinn, Animism: Humanity’s Original Worldview (ERN entry), which provides the novelist’s views of animistic foraging societies and reflects the central cosmogony and mythic structure of the movement.

Paul Watson and the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society

• Paul Watson’s A Call for Biocentric Religion

Barry Lopez, “The Language of Animals.” In Wild Earth, ed. Tom Butler, 296–305. Minneapolis, MN: Milkweed, 2002.

David Abram’s Depth Ecology and Magic and Animism (ERN entries)

David Abram, “Returning to our animal senses,” 209–15, in Tom Butler, ed., Wild Earth

Additional graduate readings

Susan Zakin, Coyotes & Town Dogs, (316–443) (Coyotes/Notes)

G-O Road

David Chidester, Animism

Primary sources: read as many as possible

The importance of spirituality early in Earth First! is illustrated in the following:

• Dave Foreman, “Around the Campfire.” Earth First! 2, no. 8 (21 September 1982): 2. Argues,

“Deep Ecology is the most important philosophical current of our time,” promising to make Earth First! a forum for such philosophy, as well as for diverse “Earth religion in whatever guise.”

Dave Foreman (under pseud. Chim Blea),”What Are We Fighting For?” Earth First! 3, no. 2 (22 December 1982): 17.

• Dave Foreman. “Dear George.” Earth First! 7, no. 1 (1 November 1986): 3. In this follow up to his August 1985 “Around the campfire” editorial, and responding to criticism of it by social ecologist George Bradford, Foreman writes in a way that illustrated his fundamental epistemological presuppositions: “My criticism of Murray Bookchin in ‘Around the Campfire’ (‘I think Murray would do well to get out of his stuffy libraries and encounter the wilderness.’) ... is a fundamental critique of Bookchin and anyone else who relies excessively on scholarship instead of direct wilderness experience for wisdom. [No one] can fully understand human society or the relationship to the natural world without regularly encountering the wilderness and finding instruction there.”

Dave Foreman (under pseud. Chim Blea), “Spirituality.” Earth First! 7, no. 7 (1 August 1987): 23.

Dave Foreman, “Review of The Spiral Dance_.” Earth First! 9, no. 1 (1 November 1988): 35.

Gary Snyder and the Invention of Bioregional Spirituality

Gary Snyder, “Song of the Taste.” Earth First! 5, no. 1 (1 November 1984): 21.

Gary Snyder, “Reinhabitation.” Earth First! 7, no. 8 (23 September 1987): 28. Snyder himself promotes bioregionalism and this central aspect of this decentralist, green, social philosophy. Hundredth Monkey (ERN entry).

By 1983, the peace and anti-nuclear counterculture, left over as the cold war ebbed, was drawn to the movement. The ‘hundredth monkey’ story illustrates the spirituality of some of this stream, a bricolage of anti-dualistic, “new science,” Gandhian, New Age, and other forms of nature-related spirituality

Week 6 (27 September) ~ Ritual, Ecofeminism, Eros, Genderwork ~ and the possibility of a New Age

Take home midterm exam distributed in class 27 September 2017 (due Sunday, 8 October 2017, see below).

Video possibility: “Butterfly”, re. Julia Butterfly Hill

Undergraduate reading

Read Susan Zakin, Coyotes & Town Dogs, (102–215) and (216–315) (skim/read quickly/ peruse)

Undergraduate & graduate readings

Many movement figures believe that ritualizing is critical to proper perception regarding the sacredness and interdependence of all life, and some such ritual involves ecofeminist premises. The following articles and entries introduce such a perspective and give examples of the kinds of ritual experimentation that has characterized much of radical environmentalism.

Merchant, Carolyn. 1992. “Ecofeminism.” In Radical ecology: the search for a livable world, 193–222. New York & London: Routledge.

Dolores LaChapelle, “Thoughts on Autumn Equinox about the Importance of Ritual.” Earth First! 9, no. 8 (22 September 1989): 30.

• Joanna Macy’s Council of All Beings (from 1985) and biography Joanna Macy (ERN entries)

Will Keepin’s Breathwork (ERN entry)

• John Seed, Re-Earthing and biography John Seed (ERN entries)

For more information on the Council of All Beings, do a web search, and see especially the

Rainforest Information Centre’s site: http://www.rainforestinfo.org.au/deep-eco/coab.htm

Additional graduate readings

* B. Taylor. “Diggers, Wolfs, Ents, Elves and Expanding Universes: Bricolage, Religion, and Violence From Earth First! and the Earth Liberation Front to the Antiglobalization Resistance.” In The Cultic Milieu: Oppositional Subcultures in an Age of Globalization, eds. Jeffrey Kaplan and Heléne Lööw, 26–74. Lanham, Maryland: Altamira/Rowman and Littlefield, 2002.

Week 7 (4 October) ~ Earth First! & Deep Ecology

All students must turn in their take home exams, sending them as word documents by email attachment no later than 5:00 p.m., Sunday 8 October, to Bron Taylor. There will class between when these exams are distributed and when they are due. As student energy and participation is a key to this course, students who do not attend and who do not have a pre-confirmed medical excuse will have their mid-term exam reduced one full grade.

Lectures: Field notes from the Council of All Beings and the First International Re-Gendering Workshop.

Possible Video: The Hundredth Monkey Undergraduate readings

Susan Zakin, Coyotes & Town Dogs, (316–443) (skim/read quickly/peruse) (Coyotes/Notes)

Graduate readings

* Bender, The Culture of Extinction: Toward a Philosophy of Deep Ecology, 15–230.

Strongly recommended optional readings:

Katz, Light and Rothenberg. Beneath the Surface: Critical Essays on Deep Ecology. Read the introduction (1–3), Clark (3–14), *Katz (17–39), *Plumwood (59–81), Light (125–143), Zimmerman (169–191), Gare (195–212); Jacobsen (231–246), and Curtin (253–26).

Further readings

Terry Tempest Williams, Unseen Hunger, esp. “Undressing the Bear” (51–59), “Yellowstone: the erotics of place” (81–87), “Testimony” and “The Wild Card” (125–141).

Merchant, Carolyn. The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology and the Scientific Revolution. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1980.

Week 8 (11 October): Judi Bari, Ecofeminism, and Revolutionary Deep Ecology

Video: Judi Bari on “Revolutionary Ecology” (at UWO) & “Ecofeminism Now” (1996) [optional videos: “Who Bombed Judi Bari” (Steve Talbot)] If no link Prof. Taylor will provide.

Undergraduate readings

Devall and Sessions, Deep Ecology. (Peruse the entire book, reading as much as possible.) Section one (pp. 1–77); Section two (pp. 78–129); Section three (pp. 130–77); Section four (pp. 178–267) Undergraduate & graduate readings

Judi Bari was an influential Earth First! activist who claimed to have turned it in a feminist direction, argued for what she called “revolutionary ecology,” who led a campaign to save some of California’s remaining redwood forests in the late 1980s and early 1990s. She was critically injured when a bomb exploded under the seat of her car in 1990, which she blamed on her political enemies. Much of her writing was originally published in Earth First!, and then reprinted in Timber Wars. Some important examples include:

*“The Feminization of Earth First!” (219–225), and

*“The Secret History of Tree Spiking” (in two parts, 264–270, 271–82).

“_Breaking up is hard to do” (55–59).

*“1990: a year in the life of Earth First!” and *“Why I am not a misanthrope” (82–84), “_Review: Dave Foreman’s Confessions of an Eco-Warrior_,” 103–108. This collection includes background on the car bombing, “Earth First Car Bombing” (286–328) and “Redwood Action Week” (165–173).

For contrast, see

**Wolke, Howie. “Thoughtful Radicalism.” Earth First! 10, no. 2 (21 December 1989): 29.

CM. “An Appraisal of Monkeywrenching.” Earth First! 10, no. 3 (2 February 1990): 30.

(also in 20^th Anniversary issue of Earth First!)

(See also week 11 readings, esp. “Cult of Nonviolence” and “Pacifism as Pathology,” which directly challenged the “Ecotopians” who rejected tree spiking.)

Bari, Judi. “Revolutionary Ecology.” Alarm: A Voice of Revolutionary Ecology, no. 12 (1995): 6–7, 29. A summary of Bari’s fusion of biocentrism with a Marxism-inspired revolutionary socialism.

Graduate readings

• Bender, The Culture of Extinction: Toward a Philosophy of Deep Ecology, 231–450. Mallory, Chaone. 2006. “Ecofeminism and forest defense in Cascadia: gender, theory, and radical activism.” Capitalism, Nature, Socialism 17(1):32–49.

• Prof. Taylor has a extensive bibliography on ecofeminism, which is available on request.

Strongly recommended optional readings:

Katz, Light and Rothenberg. Beneath the Surface: Critical Essays on Deep Ecology. Read Zimmerman (169–191), Gare (195–212); Jacobsen (231–246), Curtin (253–26)

Eaton, Heather and Lois Ann Lorentzen. Ecofeminism and Globalization: Exploring Culture, Context, and Religion. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, 2003, especially the chapters by Mellor (11–22), Nyamweru (41–56), and Lorentzen (57–77).

Sturgeon, Noel. 1997. Ecofeminist natures: race, gender, feminist theory and political action. London: Routledge,1997, esp. valuable are the early, background, chapters (available on request from Prof. Taylor)

Week 9 (18 October) ~ Anarcho-Primitivism and the Earth Liberation Front

Video possibilities: “When a Tree Falls”, “Pickaxe” & Biotic Backing Brigade, and Video: “60 Minutes” on “The Earth Liberation Front” (2001)

Undergraduate & graduate section readings

Begin by reading about the recent arrests and convictions of Earth Liberation Front/Animal Liberation Front Activists (one or more of these articles):

The most in-depth article was run in the Eugene Weekly:

Kera Abraham, “Flames of Dissent_” (five part series), Eugene Weekly, November & December 2006). (This is a large document, if it will not download for you, try the newspaper’s archives at: http://www.eugeneweekly.com/2006/index.html, and then search for the series in these, archived issues: 2, 9, 22 November and 7 & 21 December.

Also worth reading:

Vanessa Grigoriadis, “The Rise and Fall of the Eco-Radical Underground,” Rolling Stone, July 2006

Matt Rasmussen, “Green Rage,” Orion, January/February 2007

Then peruse and read widely the following materials to get a feel for ‘anarcho-primitivism’ or ‘green-anarchism,’ and how it relates to the Earth Liberation Front and the Animal Liberation Front. Be sure to grasp the challenge of Schmookler’s views, published in Parable of the Tribes, and discussed in a number of the articles, below. Be ready to comment on whether Ted Kaczynski’s views are in synch with anarcho-primitivism and/or radical environmentalism.

Visit the Primitivism website. Start with “What is Primitivism” by John Filiss, and then turn to and read the essays by John Zerzan within the primitivism web domain, and after this, read his article (*)“Future Primitive” in this domain’s section titled Anthropology. Then see also the excerpts from Stanley Diamond’s “In Search of the Primitive”, and prowl around the site as you wish. Also relevant is Zerzan’s “The Catastrophe of Postmodernism_” at www.primitivism.com

From Stephen Best and Anthony Nocella, eds., Terrorists or Freedom Fighters: Reflections on the Liberation of Animals (Lantern 2004):

“_Introduction_” (9–49)

Rod Coronado, “Direct Actions Speak Louder than Words_” (178–184)

Tom Regan, “How to justify violence” (231–36)

From Stephen Best and Anthony Nocella, eds., Igniting the Revolution (AK Press 2006)

Best and Nocella, “Introduction_”

Jeff Leurs, “From Protest to Resistance” (211–223)

Anarchism and Revolutionary Ecology ...

... debates over the extent to which radical environmentalism is or should be considered revolutionary, and if so: What is the nature of that revolution?

*Australopithecus. “Review of The Parable of the Tribes_.” Earth First! 5, no. 8 (22 September 1985): 24. In this article then Earth First! editor John Davis, writing under his favorite pseudonym, reviewed an important book which contradicts the anarchistic tendencies of both the libertarian “rednecks for wilderness” and the more communitarian green anarchists. This sets off the first (and last) extended debate on social philosophy in the pages of Earth First! Formanistas from Davis, Manes, Abbey, and others, defend anarchism, while Schmookler more than holds his own.

• Schmookler, Andrew Bard. “Schmookler Replies to Australopithecus.” Earth First! 6, no. 2 (21 December 1985): 25.

• Schmookler, Andrew Bard. “Schmookler on Anarchy.” Earth First! 6, no. 5 (1 May 1986): 22.

Manes, Christoph. “Ascent to Anarchy.” Earth First!, 6, no 6, 1 August 1986, 21.

Schmookler, Andrew Bard.”Schmookler Replies to the Anarchists.” Earth First! 7, no. 2 (21 December 1986): 24–5.

Manes, Christoph.”An Anarchist Replies to Schmookler’s Reply to the Anarchists.” Earth First! 7, no. 8 (23 September 1987): 23.

Schmookler, Andrew Bard. “Schmookler Replies to Anarchist’s Replies to Schmookler’s Reply to the Anarchists.” Earth First! 7, no. 8 (23 September 1987): 26–7.

• Roselle, Mike.”Forest Grump.” Earth First! 15, no. 2 (21 December 1994): 23. Roselle urges “jihad”-like rebellion in criticism of Foreman’s claims that radical environmentalism is not revolutionary.

The Unabomber

• Kaczynski, Theodore. “Industrial Society and its Future.” First published in the Washington Post, 19 September 1995, beginning p. A1.

Graduate readings

Peter Kropotkin

Peter Kropotkin, “Anarchism.” Encyclopedia Britanica, 11^th ed., pp. 914–19, 1910–1911. (Biographical entry)

Sahlins, Marshal. Stone Age Economics. Chicago: Aldine, 1968. Read the online chapter: “The Original Affluent Society”

Kropotkin, Peter. Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution. Boston: n.d.; reprint, Montreal: Black Rose, 1914. (Online)

Bey, Hakim. T.A.Z. The Temporary Autonomous Zone, Ontological Anarchy, Poetic Terrorism. Autonomedia, 1991. Internet link

Recommended readings

Schmookler, Andrew Bard. The Parable of the Tribes: The Problem of Power in Social Evolution. Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 1984.

Chase, Alston. Harvard and the Unabomber: The Education of an American Terrorist. New York: Norton, 2003; especially Ch 13: Harvard’s Culture of Despair,

207–213 and Ch 25: Ted Kaczynski and the Rise of Modern Terrorism, 358–372.

Read ahead as much as possible and from the online document bank of movement literature.

Week 10 (25 October): Critical perspectives on radical environmentalism and deep ecology: critique and rejoinders regarding the idea of wilderness

Undergraduate and Graduate Readings (* read first/most important)

• Michael Nelson, “An amalgamation of Wilderness Preservation Arguments” (154–198) in Callicott & Nelson, eds, the Great Wilderness Debate.

• J. Baird Callicott, “A critique of an alternative to the wilderness idea_” (172–86) in Tom Butler, ed., Wild Earth

Reed Noss, “Wilderness—now more than ever_” (187–94) in Tom Butler, ed., Wild Earth

Gary Snyder, “Is Nature Real_?” (195–98) in Tom Butler, ed., Wild Earth

Dave Foreman, “Wilderness: From Scenery to Nature_” (15–33) in Tom Butler, ed., Wild Earth.

• Edward Abbey, “Freedom & Wilderness, Wilderness & Freedom” (227–238) in The Journey Home, NY: Penguin, 1977

• Ramachandra Guha, “Radical Environmentalism and Wilderness Preservation: a third world critique” (231–235), in Callicott & Nelson, eds, the Great Wilderness Debate. [Originally as “Radical American Environmentalism and Wilderness Preservation: A

Third World Critique.” Environmental Ethics 11 (1989): 71–83.]

• David Johns, “The relevance of Deep Ecology to the Third World” (246–270), in Callicott &

Nelson, eds, the Great Wilderness Debate. [Originally as “The Relevance of Deep

Ecology to the Third World.” Environmental Ethics 12, no. 3 (1990): 233–52.]

Ken Wu, “Ecoforestry or protected status? Some words in defense of parks” (199–08), in Tom Butler, ed., Wild Earth

Ramachandra Guha, “Radical Environmentalism Revisited” (271–279) in Callicott & Nelson, eds., The Great Wilderness Debate.

Graduate Readings

Cronon, William. “The Trouble with Wilderness; Or, Getting Back to the Wrong Nature.” In Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature, ed. William Cronon, 69–90. New York: Norton, 1995.

Soulé, Michael. “The social siege of nature.” In Reinventing Nature? Responses to Postmodern Deconstruction, eds. M. Soulé and G. Lease, 137–70. San Francisco: Island Press, 1995.

Donald Worster, “The wilderness of history” (221–229) in Tom Butler, ed., Wild Earth Bill Cronon. “The Trouble with Wilderness: A Response.” Environmental History 1, no. 1 (1996): 47–57.

Recommended

Neil Evernden, The social construction of Nature

Wuerthner, George, Eileen Crist, and Tom Butler, eds. 2015. Protecting the wild: parks and wilderness, the foundation for conservation. Washington, Covelo, London: Island Press.

Wuerthner, George, Eileen Crist, and Tom Butler, eds. 2014. Keeping the wild: against the domestication of earth. Washington, DC: Island Press.

Week 11 (1 November) ~ On Tactics I: The ethics & politics of ecotage, arson, and violence

Video: Yellowstone to Yukon (possible/tentative) Edward Abbey, 1988 speech in Utah

Undergraduate Reading:

One article attempting to wrestle with the moral permissibility of extra-legal resistance, based on two direct action campaigns (Cove/Mallard Idaho and Warner Creek, Oregon), is:

B. Taylor, “Earth First! Fights Back: Contextual Reflections on Resistance and Democracy,” Terra Nova: Nature & Culture 2(2):29–43, Spring 1997.

The following primary sources explore using arson and violence as a tactic (peruse these primary sources).

**Foreman, Dave and Bill Haywood (pseud.), eds. Ecodefense: A Field Guide to Monkeywrenching. 2 ed. Tucson, Arizona: Ned Ludd, 1987 (first edition 1985).

• *“Forward!” by Edward Abbey, 7–9

• *“Strategic Monkeywrenching” by Dave Foreman, 10–17. Additional versions in Earth First! 5, no. 6 (21 June 1985): 22–3, and Confessions of an Ecowarrior, 161–166 - *“The Future of Monkeywrenching” by T. H. Hellenbach (pseud.), 18–23

*Foreman, Dave.”Violence and Earth First!_” Earth First! (20 March 1982), 4.

Aitken, Robert. “Dear Earth First!_” Earth First! 2, no. 5 (1 May 1982): 2.

Foreman, Dave. “Foreman Replies (to Robert Aitken).” Earth First! 2, no. 5 (1 May 1982): 2.

*Snyder, Gary. “Dear Dave.” Earth First! 2, no. 7 (1 August 1982): 2–3.

* Snyder, Gary, “A letter to Ed Abbey,” Resist Much/Obey Little (1985: 118–23)

Dustrud, Pete. “Dear Readers, You Now Have a New Editor.” Earth First!, 1 August 1982, 2.

*Foreman, Dave. “Earth First! and Non-Violence.” Earth First! 3, no. 7 (1 August 1983): 11.

*Wolke, Howie. “On Violence.” Earth First! 3, no. 7 (23 September 1983): 12.

*Wuerthner, George. “Tree Spiking and Moral Maturity.” Earth First!, 1 August 1985, 20.

A willingness to risk harming humans, at least in self-defense, was present from the earliest moments of Earth First! But by the late 1980s, even more radical voices pushed for more revolutionary strategies and tactics, arising in part to criticize what they considered to be an anthropocentric fetish about non-violence among some movement activists. Some examples include:

*Stoddard, Tom. “How Far Should We Go?_” Earth First! 9, no. 2 (21 December 1988): 27.

Live Wild or Die began publishing in 1988 to give expression to the wilder, more extreme Earth First! voices, funded in part with Michael Roselle’s support through the Earth First! direct action fund. See especially:

Jakubal, Mikal. “Why I Did It, Why I’ll Never Do It Again.” Live Wild or Die, no. 1 (1989): 2. Nickette. “Nick It!_” Live Wild or Die, no. 1 (1989): 8,10.

*Feral Faun. “Beyond Earth First!: Toward a Feral Revolution of Desire.” Live Wild or Die, no. 1 (1989): 15, and “To Be in Love with Everything That Lives: The Orgy That Is the Earth.” Live Wild or Die, no. 1 (February1989): 25.

*Anonymous. “Pacifism as Pathology (Article and Graphic).” Live Wild or Die, no. 5 (1994): 15. Also republished in Beware/Sabotage.

*McFarlane, Gary and Gary Echt. “Cult of Nonviolence.” Earth First! 18, no. 1 (NovemberDecember 1997): 3, 17. Graduate Readings:

Bron Taylor, “Earthen Spirituality or Cultural Genocide?: Radical Environmentalism’s Appropriation of Native American Spirituality,” Religion 27(2):183–215, April 1997.

Recommended further readings on violence and sabotage

Bron Taylor, “Religion, Violence, and Radical Environmentalism: from Earth First! to the Unabomber to the Earth Liberation Front,” Terrorism and Political Violence 10(4):1–42, Winter 1998.

Martin, Michael. “Ecotage and Civil Disobedience.” Environmental Ethics 12, no. 4 (1990): 291–310.

Week 12 (8 November) ~ On Tactics II: Population prescriptions, immigration disputes & ethnic issues, and apocalyptic solutions.

Undergraduate Reading

• Garrett Hardin, “Gregg’s Law,” 265–267), “Nobody every dies of overpopulation” (262–264),

“Living on a Lifeboat” and “Trouble in the Lifeboat” (295–98) , “Carrying Capacity as an

Ethical Concept” (299–318), “Population Skeletons in the Environmental Closet” (237–49)“Population Control: Dare we Face the Taboo?” (343–350), from Stalking the Wild Taboo.

Undergraduate and Graduate Readings (primary sources ~ read into this as widely as time allows to gain a sense of movement perspectives and internal controversies about these issues)

Edward Abbey’s views and responses

• Abbey, on “Immigration and Liberal Taboos”, from One Life at a Time, Please, 41–44 Loeffler, with Abbey, on population, technology, lifestyle, and G. Hardin, in Adventures with Ed, 148–50.

Loeffler, with Abbey, on immigration, in Adventures with Ed, 109–11.

Loeffler, with Abbey, on Indians, in Adventures with Ed, 136–37.

Luis Alberto Urrea, “Down the highway with Edward Abbey,” from Resist Much, Obey Little,

40–47.

Barbara Kingsolver, adios, final thoughts, from Resist Much, Obey Little, 232–33.

• Terry Tempest Williams, “A Eulogy for Edward Abbey,” from Resist Much, Obey Little, 199–203

Misc movement articles on population and immigration

• Dave Foreman (under pseudo. Chim Blea. “Reducing Population.” Earth First! (1 August 1983):

3.

Noss, Reed. “Deep Ecology, Elitism and Reproduction.” Earth First! 4, no. 5 (1 May 1984): 16.

• Christopher Manes (under pseudo. Miss Ann Thropy). “Technology and Mortality.” Earth First! 7, no. 1 (1 November 1986): 18. Criticizes technological innovations that prolong life and suggests that they, and the western religious ideas that accompany such efforts, must go. Foreman comments in support telling bleeding heart Christians, humanists or Marxists, need not bother to send rejoinders.

• Stoddard, Tom. “Oh, What a Wonderful Famine!” Earth First! 6, no. 5 (1 May 1986): 26.

• Miss Ann Thropy (pseud. for Christopher Manes). “Overpopulation and Industrialism.” Earth First! 7, no. 4 (20 March 1987): 29.

• Christopher Manes (under pseudo. Miss Ann Thropy). “Population and AIDS.” Earth First! 7, no. 5 (1 May 1987): 32. Beginning “If radial environmentalists were to invent a disease to bring human population back to ecological sanity, it would probably be something like AIDS”, Manes offered “an ecological perspective on the disease” premised on the axiom “that the only real hope ... is an enormous decline in human population.” This is one of the most controversial articles ever published in Earth First!, and while qualifications in it were widely ignored, it arguably suggested genocidal solutions to the population-fueled environmental crisis. Such articles were used against the movement by social ecologists and social justice advocates alike and, combined with Foreman’s and others anti-immigration statements, were taken by many to represent the movement’s mainstreams.

Foreman, Dave. “Is Sanctuary the Answer_?” Earth First! 8, no. 1 (1 November 1987): 21–2. Concluded controversially: “In the long run the most humane solution is the one advanced by Edward Abbey; send every illegal alien home with a rifle and a thousand rounds.” (He later apologized for being insensitive.)

Flowers, Will. “_This Is Pro Life_?” Earth First! 9, no. 5 (1 May 1989).

Barnes, James. “Dieback: A Vision of Darkness.” Earth First! 17, no. 8 (1997): 3,13. On overshoot/population dynamics as natural law/remedy; natural selection will continue.

Tara the Sea Elf. “The Earth Liberation Front.” Earth First! 16, no. 7 (September-October 1996): 18. Denounces reactionary anti-immigration positions of American Earth First! movement, while discussing the emergence of the Earth Liberation Front.

Stoddard, Tom. “The Human Horde.” Earth First! 10, no. 1 (1 November 1989): 23.

• Sandy Irvine, “The great denial: puncturing pronatalist myths,” 45–62, in Tom Butler, ed., Wild Earth

• MacDougall, Kent, “Humans as Cancer,” Wild Earth , Fall 1996, 81–88.

• Terry Tempest Williams, “Labor,” from Red (originally in National Geographic), October 2000. Kelpie Wilson, The Lysistrata Strategy, originally in Wild Earth (Winter 1997/98).

Additional graduate readings:

• Garrett Hardin, Living within Limits, if possible, peruse the entire book, reading carefully: ch1, ch 3, ch 4, ch 6, ch 9, ch 10, ch 11

Further readings

Miller, Monique A. “Population Growth and the Wildlands Vision.” In Place of the Wild: A Wildlands Anthology, ed. David Clarke Burks. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1994.

Sessions, George. “The Sierra Club, Immigration, and the Future of California.” Wild Duck Review, 1998, 24–5.

Martin Lewis, Green Delusions, “Introduction & ch. 1 (1–26), read ch 2 (43–81).

Joel Cohen, How many people can the earth support? (Norton 1995)

Bouvier, Leon F and Lindsey Grant. How Many Americans? Population, Immigration, and the Environment. San Francisco: Sierra Club, 1995.

Weiner, Myron. Global Migration Crisis: Challenge to State and Human Rights. New York: HarperCollins, 1995.

Beck, Roy. The Case Against Immigration. New York: Norton, 1996.

Week 13 (15 November) ~ Radical Environmentalism and social philosophy – including conservation science and considering the possibility (promise?) of reformist environmentalism.

During the 2017 semester, Native American scholar Phil Deloria will present a lecture during our regular class time. In addition to focusing on social philosophy, readings on native American and radical environmental resistance to oil pipelines and telescope projects will be distributed.

Undergraduate & Graduate Readings

Bron Taylor, “Deep Ecology and its Social Philosophy: A Critique,” in Beneath the Surface: Critical Essays on Deep Ecology. Eds. E. Katz. A. Light, D. Rothenberg. (Boston: MIT Press, 2000), 269–299.

Foreman, Rewilding, 109–176 (part II)

Additional Graduate readings

Lewis, Martin, ch 3, “A question of scale” (82–116), from Green Delusions

Taylor, Bron, ed. Ecological Resistance Movements: The Global Emergence of Radical and Popular Environmentalism, Wapner (300-314-127), Taylor (334–349).q

Week 14 (29 November) ~ Ecotopian and dystopian visions & strategies

Graduate Student research papers due by midnight 26 November 2017, emailed to

Professor Taylor. Graduate students will present their research to the class on 29 November or 6 December. Undergraduate and Graduate reflection papers due 29 November by email, before class.

Undergraduate Readings

From Stephen Best and Anthony Nocella, eds., Igniting the Revolution (AK Press 2006) *** Derrick Jensen, “What goes up must come down” (284–300).

Foreman, Rewilding, 177–229 (part III)

Environmental Review 2001 Interview with Dave Foreman (recommended)

Turner, Jack. “The Quality of Wildness: Preservation, Control, and Freedom.” In Place of the Wild: A Wildlands Anthology, ed. David Clarke Burks, 175–89. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1994. Turner here, and in his subsequent book, criticized the scientific/ conservation biology turn of some radical environmentalism, fearing the central knowledge that comes from direct perception in wild places is being lost. Cf. The Abstract Wild. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1996. For contrast, see:

Reed Noss (as pseud. Diamondback, “Scientific Ecology and Deep Ecology.” Earth First! 10, no. 1 (1 November 1989): 21.

Additional Graduate readings

Lewis, Martin, ch 4, “Technophobia_…” (117–149) and ch 5 “The Capitalist Imperative_” (150–190)

Merchant, Carolyn, “Anti-globalization & sustainability.” Radical Ecology

Recommended

*** Lewis, Martin, ch 6 “Third World Development_” (191–241) Week 15 (6 December) ~ (last day of class)

I will distribute the take home portion of the final exam by Friday 1 December. There will likely be a short, in-class identification portion of this exam administered on 6 December.

The take home portion will be due by Sunday, 11:59 p.m., 10 December.

Radical Environmentalism ~ The Initial Decades**

A Historical, Documentary Bibliography

This resource continues to be refined – some links may not be created yet.

This bibliography provides a partially annotated, thematic review the central religious, ethical, and political dimensions, and the key historical watersheds, which occurred during the initial decades of the radical environmental movement. It focuses especially on Earth First!, but seeks also to illuminate kindred movements and its splinter group, such as the Earth Liberation Front.

*** The Critique of Western, Industrial Civilization, the Case against Anthropocentrism and Humanism, and “Deep Ecology” as a Proposed Alternative Worldview.

Radical environmentalism articulated a comprehensive critique of western civilization, both its religions and philosophical underpinnings as well as its agricultural and industrial modes of production. Soon after Earth First! was founded to advance a biocentric ethics and militant strategy, in early 1982, its founders became acquainted with “deep ecology.” They quickly deep ecology as a convenient trope for their own ethical perspectives. The following articles provide a representative sample of those articulating the radical environmental social critique, fledgling articulation of the alternative worldview and required militant tactics, and manifesto-like calls to action. From the mid-1980s, the articles deal increasingly with tensions in the growing movement, as authors begin criticize and defend aspects deep ecology and radical environmental ideology, as they had been articulated in the early years of Earth First.

**Foreman, Dave. “Earth First!_” The Progressive 45, no. 10 (October 1981): 39–42. An important manifesto and call for environmental activists to put the Earth First! and take on the earth’s destroyers with direct action resistance. This article which drew many to the movement at its earliest stages.

**Blea, Chim (pseud. for Dave Foreman). “The Heritage of Western Civilization.” Earth First! Newsletter 2, no. 5 (1982): 6.

**Foreman, Dave.” Around the Campfire.” Earth First! 2, no. 8 (21 September 1982): 2. In this important editorial

Foreman states “Deep Ecology is the most important philosophical current of our time,” promising to make Earth First! a forum for such philosophy, as well as for diverse “Earth religion in whatever guise.” He concludes “all of us are religious, even atheists like Howie Wolke who deifies grizzly bears and hopes to become one.”) A number of articles follow essentially adopting deep ecology as the movement’s spiritual philosophy.

**Foreman, Dave. “An Environmental Strategy for the 80s.” Earth First! 2, no. 8 (21 September 1982): 7. In the same issue in which he endorses deep ecology, Forman announces a new, radical strategy, which is striking for its militant and even violent rhetoric.

**Blea, Chim. “On Domestication (Cat Tracks)_” Earth First! 3, no. 3 (21 March 1983): 3. Here Foreman echoes the most Paul Shepard, introducing the radical environmental myth that views Eden as a foraging paradise and links the fall with the advent of agriculture and animal husbandry. With such domestication people became separated from nature and each other as forms of domination supplanted earlier, egalitarian lifeways.

**Manes, Christopher. “In Defense of Western Civilization.” Earth First! 5, no. 3 (2 February 1985): 19.

**Blea, Chim (pseud. for Dave Foreman). “The Arrogance of Enlightenment.” Earth First! 3, no. 7 (23 September 1983): 13.

**Blea, Chim. (pseud. for Dave Foreman). “On Domestication (Cat Tracks).” Earth First! 3, no. 3 (21 March 1983):

3.

**Seed, John. “Anthropocentrism.” Earth First! 3, no. 6 (1 August 1983): 15. This Australian Buddhist and deep ecology activist argues for strategies that prioritize spiritual consciousness change. He argues that this helps to transcend anthropocentrism such that “I am protecting the rainforest” develops into “I am part of the rainforest protecting myself. I am that part of the rainforest recently emerged into thinking.” Dave Foreman and others borrow and popularize this idea, which provides a powerful rational for ecodefense as “self-defense.”

**Devall, Bill. “The Edge: The Ecology Movement in Australia.” Earth First! 4, no. 5 (1 May 1984): 12–3. Devall, who with Sessions would co-author an important early book on deep ecology, describes how quickly environmental activists adopted the term in Australia during a visit there, and comments on the limits of western, scientific rationality.

*Sessions, George and Arne Naess. “The Basic Principles of Deep Ecology.” Earth First! 4, no. 6 (20 June 1984):

19. From the founder of deep ecology and one of the most prominent popularizers of this philosophy in the U.S.

**Circles, Lone Wolf. “_Poetry: Voice of Deep Ecology_.” Earth First! 6, no. 1 (1 November 1985): 27.

**Seed, John. “Thinking Like a Rainforest.” Earth First! 6, no. 2 (21 December 1985): 13.

**Devall, Bill. “Primal Peoples and Deep Ecology.” Earth First! 7, no. 7 (1 August 1987): 26.

**Circles, Lone Wolf. “The Poetics of Deep Ecology.” Earth First! 6, no. 3 (2 February 1986): 24.

**Foreman, Dave. “Around the Campfire.” Earth First! 6, no. 7 (1 August 1986): 2. Forman writes as “a member of the Catastrophist School of Deep Ecology” promoting paganism and industrial collapse.

**Foreman, Dave. “.Editor’s Reply.” Earth First! 7, no. 2 (21 December 1986): 3.

**Sessions, George. “Deep Ecology and the New Age.” Earth First! 7, no. 8 (23 September 1987): 27, 29.

**Lines, W.J. “Is ‘Deep Ecology’ Deep Enough?_” Earth First! 7, no. 5 (1 May 1987): 31. But by 1987, Foreman was agreeing with much of the critique of deep ecology in this article, which criticized deep ecology for its “New Age cant” and “wishful thinking,” asserting that it “is both anthropocentric (expressing a viewpoint centered on humans) and anthropomorphic (attributing human characteristics to the natural world” and naively asserting “The myth that primitive humankind existed in amity with nature” and promoting the “sentimental myth of the noble savage”

**Blea, Chim. “Why the Venom?” Earth First! 8, no. 1 (1 November 1987): 19. Forman responds to charges of fascistic tendencies in deep ecology/Earth First!

**Devall, Bill. “Deep Ecology and Its Critics.” Earth First! 8, no. 2 (22 December 1987): 18–20.

**Roselle, Mike. “Deep Ecology and the New Civil Rights Movement.” Earth First! 8, no. 5 (1 May 1988): 9,14,.

**Diamondback (pseud. for Reed Noss). “Scientific Ecology and Deep Ecology.” Earth First! 10, no. 1 (1 November 1989): 21.

On Epistemology, Religion, Spirituality, and Ritual

There here are many antecedents to the countercultural spirituality of radical environmentalism, including Emil Rousseau (in 17^th c. France) and the so called Romantic movements wrote which followed (including the poet Robinson Jeffers in America, who published in the mid-20^th c and influenced many ardent and radical environmentalists), the Transcendentalists and esp. H. D. Thoreau, early conservationists including John Muir, Bob Marshall, Aldo Leopold, Rachael Carson, and indeed, most of the most passionate 20^th c. conservationists, and poets From the late 1950s, the most important early voices were Edward Abbey, Paul Shepard, and Gary Snyder. Less well known figures including Freeman House, Dolores LaChapelle, and Peter Berg made some of the more remarkable early and influential statements. In addition to the books by them cited above in the main bibliography, the following books and articles in movement tabloids and magazines were especially important.

The novelist Daniel Quinn’s views of animistic foraging societies reflect the central cosmogony and mythic structure common to the movement, so a good start for this section would be to read his own ERN entry, Animism: Humanity’s Original Worldview (Cf. especially, Quinn, Daniel. Ishmael. New York: Bantam, 1992.)

Snyder, Gary. Earth House Hold: Technical Notes and Queries to Fellow Dharma Revolutionaries. New York: New Directions, 1957.

Abbey, Edward. Desert Solitaire. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1968.

Snyder, Gary. Turtle Island. New York: New Directions, 1969. (See especially the essay “Four Changes,” which is a remarkable early expression of radical environmentalism. This book wins the Pulitzer prize, which magnifies its influence.

House, Freeman. “Totem Salmon.” In North Pacific Rim Alive. San Francisco: Planet Drum, Bundle No. 3, 1974. Republished in Home!: A Bioregional Reader, eds. Van Andruss, Christopher Plant, Judith Plant and Eleanor Wright, 65–72. Philadelphia: New Society, 1990. A truly remarkable document considering its original date.

House, Freeman. “To Learn the Things We Need to Know: Engaging the Particulars of the Planet’s Recovery.” In Home!: A Bioregional Reader, eds. Van Andruss, Christopher Plant, Judith Plant and Eleanor Wright, 111–20. Philadelphia: New Society, 1990.

**Blea, Chim. “What Are We Fighting For?” Earth First! 3, no. 2 (22 December 1982): 17.

**Snyder, Gary.”Song of the Taste.” Earth First! 5, no. 1 (1 November 1984): 21.

Hundredth Monkey (ERN entry).

By 1983, the peace and anti-nuclear counterculture, left over as the cold war ebbed, was drawn to the movement.

This entry illustrates the spirituality of some of this stream, a bricolage of anti-dualistic, “new science,” Gandhian, New Age, and other forms of deviant spirituality and politics. It was this stream that led to those viewing spiritual consciousness change as the most important strategy for positive change. This accounts for some movement tensions and early splits, as for example, when in Southern Oregon the Cathedral Forest Action Group (CFAG) breaks off from Earth First! to due to its commitment to non-violence.

Joanna Macy’s Council of All Beings (from 1985) and biography Joanna Macy (ERN entries)

John Seed, Re-Earthing and biography John Seed (ERN entries)

LaChapelle, Dolores. “Random Notes on February Pagan Festivals.” Earth First! 6, no. 3 (2 February 1986): 19.

Stoddard, Tom. “Bury Me Not in a Lead Lined Coffin.” Earth First! 6, no. 3 (19 February 1986): 19.

Manes, Christoph. “The Cult of Tree-Cutters.” Earth First! 6, no. 7 (1 August 1986): 22. Call’s Christianity a “cult of tree cutters” while urging a return to Asatru, “the indigenous religion of Northern Europe.”

Foreman, Dave. “Around the Campfire.” Earth First! 6, no. 7 (1 August 1986): 2.

**Foreman, Dave. “Dear George.” Earth First! 7, no. 1 (1 November 1986): 3. In this follow up to his August 1985 “Around the campfire” editorial, and responding to criticism of it by social ecologist George Bradford, Foreman writes in a way that illustrated his fundamental epistemological presuppositions: “My criticism of Murray Bookchink in ‘Around the Campfire’ (‘I think Murray would do well to get out of his stuffy libraries and encounter the wilderness.’) ... is a fundamental critique of Bookchin and anyone else who relies excessively on scholarship instead of direct wilderness experience for wisdom. [No one] can fully understand human society or the relationship to the natural world without regularly encountering the wilderness and finding instruction there.”

**Blea, Chim. “Spirituality.” Earth First! 7, no. 7 (1 August 1987): 23.

**Snyder, Gary. “Reinhabitation.” Earth First! 7, no. 8 (23 September 1987): 28. Snyder himself promotes bioregionalism and this central aspect of this decentralist, green, social philosophy.

Manes, Christoph. “A Ritual to Sol.” Earth First! 7, no. 8 (23 September 1987): 32. Manes notes affinities between paganism in general, and specifically Asatru, to deep ecology.

**Abram, David. “Deep Ecology and Magic: Notes of a Sleight-of-Hand Sorcerer.” Earth First! 8, no. 3 (2 February 1988): 25, 27. Abram became an influential and provocative deep ecology theorist, linking sorcery, magic, and shamanism to the kind of animistic and pantheistic perceptions commonly found in deep ecology.

**Drengson, Alan. “Paganism, Nature, and Deep Ecology.” Earth First! 8, no. 5 (1 May 1988): 19–20. Drengson, the long-term editor of the deep ecology journal, The Trumpeter, who also edited a good deep ecology anthology, here links deep ecology to primitive or “primal” or “pagan” spiritualities, which he also labels “the Old Ways,” following Gary Snyder. Both deep ecology and paganism stress “direct contact with Nature” as the “main source of inspiration” because “everything in Nature is a teacher.”

**Manes, Christoph. “Paganism as Resistance.” Earth First! 8, no. 5 (1 May 1988): 21–2. From the Author of Green Rage.

**Wolke, Howie. “The Grizzly Den.” Earth First! 9, no. 1 (1 November 1988): 28. Promotes pluralism and criticizes the pagan names in the journal’s masthead.

**Foreman, Dave. “Review of The Spiral Dance_.” Earth First! 9, no. 1 (1 November 1988): 35.

**LaChapelle, Dolores. “Thoughts on Autumn Equinox about the Importance of Ritual.” Earth First! 9, no. 8 (22 September 1989): 30.

Faulstich, Paul. “Shaman--Ritual--Place.” Earth First! 9, no. 8 (21 September 1989): 26.

LaChapelle, Dolores. “Our Mutual Love of Mountains.” The Trumpeter 9, no. 2 (Spring 1992): 66–7.

Manes, Christopher. “A Natural History of Silence.” In Place of the Wild, ed. David Clarke Burks. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1994.

Foreman, Dave. “Becoming the Forest in Defense of Itself.” In Turtle Talk, eds. Christopher Plant and Judith Plant, 58–65. Santa Cruz, California: New Society, 1990. The title echoes John Seed’s early Earth First! article.

Nabhan, Gary Paul. “The Far Outside.” In Place of the Wild: A Wildlands Anthology, ed. David Clarke Burks, 19–27. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1994. The lead article in this anthology appropriately reflects the central epistemology of the movement: that the most important knowledge comes through direct perception in wild nature, a premise widely found in this series of articles on spirituality.

Turner, Jack. “The Quality of Wildness: Preservation, Control, and Freedom.” In Place of the Wild: A Wildlands Anthology, ed. David Clarke Burks, 175–89. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1994. In his subsequent book he is even more critical of the scientific turn of some radical environmentalism, fearing the central knowledge that comes from direct perception in wild places is being lost. See The Abstract Wild. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1996.

Barlow, Connie. “Because It Is My Religion.” Wild Earth 6, no. 3[Fall] (1996): 5–11.

** Barry Lopez, “The Language of Animals.” In Wild Earth, ed. Tom Butler, 296–305. Minneapolis, MN: Milkweed, 2002. For more contemporary animism, compare this with Freeman House’s “Totem Salmon” essay, C. Mane’s “A Natural History of Silence,” David Abram’s articles (including the two ERN articles immediately below).

The following ERN entries similarly explore spiritualities akin to radical environmentalism.

David Abram’s Depth Ecology and Magic and Animism (ERN entries)

Daniel Quinn, Animism: Humanity’s Original Worldview (ERN entry)

*** Upping the Ante – Moving Beyond or Supplementing Deep Ecology with more radical political Critiques and more Revolutionary Tactics.

Ecotage, ethics, and violence (early to mid 1980s)

During the early 1980s much attention was devoted to ecotage, its rationale, ethics, and whether it was violent and if so, would still be justifiable

**Foreman, Dave and Bill Haywood (pseud.), eds. Ecodefense: A Field Guide to Monkeywrenching. 2 ed. Tucson, Arizona: Ned Ludd, 1987 (first edition 1985).

• **“Forward!” by Edward Abbey, 7–9

• **“Strategic Monkeywrenching” by Dave Foreman, 10–17. Additional versions in Earth First! 5, no. 6 (21 June 1985): 22–3, and Confessions of an Ecowarrior, 161–166

• **“The Future of Monkeywrenching” by T. H. Hellenbach (pseud.), 18–23

**Foreman, Dave. “Violence and Earth First!_” Earth First! (20 March 1982), 4.

**Aitken, Robert. “Dear Earth First!_” Earth First! 2, no. 5 (1 May 1982): 2.

**Foreman, Dave. “Foreman Replies (to Robert Aitken).” Earth First! 2, no. 5 (1 May 1982): 2.

**Snyder, Gary. “Dear Dave.” Earth First! 2, no. 7 (1 August 1982): 2–3.

**Dustrud, Pete. “Dear Readers, You Now Have a New Editor.” Earth First!, 1 August 1982, 2.

**Foreman, Dave. “Earth First! and Non-Violence.” Earth First! 3, no. 7 (1 August 1983): 11.

**Wolke, Howie. “On Violence.” Earth First! 3, no. 7 (23 September 1983): 12.

**Wuerthner, George. “Tree Spiking and Moral Maturity.” Earth First!, 1 August 1985, 20.

Diversity, Disputes and Schisms

Debates between anarchists and mass movement activists versus ecoteurs, biocentric activists versus animal liberationists, conservation scientists and anti-scientists, pagans and non-pagans, social justice advocates and misanthropes (often over population and immigration policies), are reflected in movement articles. These illuminate the schisms that unfold over the next five or so years.

**Blea, Chim. (pseud. for Dave Foreman). “Individualism and Ecology.” Earth First! 6, no. 6 (21 June 1986): 21,

23. A good example of Foreman trying to hold the biocentric line against the influx of animal rights activists.

Foreman, Dave. “Reinhabitation, Biocentrism, and Self Defense.” Earth First! 7, no. 7 (1 August 1987): 22. Foreman, noting the diversity, in another effort to keep the movement’s radical edge, discusses how bioregional and radical environmental movements can complement each other.

**Foreman, Dave. “Whither Earth First!?” Earth First! 8, no. 1 (1 November 1987): 20–1. This represents Foreman’s seminal statement on his vision for the movement, urging tolerance within the parameters he sets forth, urging those with other versions to start their own groups. This time he also offers to leave if his vision is not shared. In less than three years he would take his own advice.

Endorsing arson and considering violence

A willingness to risk harming humans, at least in self-defense, was present from the earliest moments of Earth First! By the late 1980s, even more radical voices keep pushing for more revolutionary strategies and tactics, arising in part to criticize what they considered to be an anthropocentric fetish about non-violence among some movement activists. Some examples include:

**Stoddard, Tom. “How Far Should We Go?_” Earth First! 9, no. 2 (21 December 1988): 27.

Live Wild or Die begins publishing in 1989 to give expression to the wilder, more extreme Earth First! voices, funded in part with Michael Roselle’s support through the Earth First! direct action fund.

See especially:

• **Jakubal, Mikal. “Why I Did It, Why I’ll Never Do It Again.” Live Wild or Die, no. 1 (1989): 2.

• **Nickette. “Nick It!” Live Wild or Die, no. 1 (1989): 8,10.

• **Feral Faun. “Beyond Earth First!: Toward a Feral Revolution of Desire.” Live Wild or Die, no. 1 (1989): 15, and **"To Be in Love with Everything That Lives: The Orgy That Is the Earth.” Live Wild or Die, no. 1 (February1989): 25.

• **Anonymous. “Pacifism as Pathology (Article and Graphic).” Live Wild or Die, no. 5 (1994): 15.

The stakes involved in disputes over tactics and whether the movement was or was not “revolutionary” were raised dramatically with the arrests of Dave Foreman, Mark Davis, Peg Millett, and two others in late May and early June 1989).

Another layer of tension was between activists located largely in the southwestern deserts and Northern Rockies, and those from Northern California’s “Ecotopia Earth First!” and their sympathizers who, generally speaking, were especially strong in Northern California and to a lesser extent in Oregon. Judi Bari was the most charismatic and prominent of the “ecotopians.” She had been a leftist labor organizer in the Eastern U.S. before moving west and falling in love with the redwood forests. Bari soon became a lightning rod for movement tensions, in part because she orchestrated a “renunciation” of tree spiking, arguing that it was counterproductive. Many EF! activists resented greatly what they took to be a presumptuous act. Soon after, while traveling to promote the “Redwood Summer” campaign with Earth First! musician Darryl Cherney, on 24 May 1990, a bomb exploded in Bari’s car, in which they were traveling. It permanently disabled Bari, and made many in Earth First! feel vulnerable. Moreover, it seemed to increase the importance of every disputed issue

Sometimes the debates that characterized these movements during the late 1980s focused on whether ecotage was compatible with the building of a mass movement. And much of this discussion centered around tree spiking.

Bari, Judi. Timber Wars. Monroe, Maine: Common Courage, 1994.

Background including on the bombing, 11–54, “Redwood Action Week” (165–173)

Against such even more radical streams of anti-state and anti-capitalist anarchism, the Foremanistas push back.

**Foreman, Dave. “Whither Monkeywrenching?_” Earth First! 10, no. 1 (1 November 1989): 32.

**Foreman, Dave. “The Perils of Illegality.” Earth First! 10, no. 1 (1 November 1989): 25. Additional versions in

Earth First! 10, no. 1 (1 November 1989): 25, and as “The Perils of Illegal Action” in Confessions of an Ecowarrior, 167–170. (Asserts the value of law against the anarchists; read with anarchism debate)

**Wolke, Howie. “Thoughtful Radicalism.” Earth First! 10, no. 2 (21 December 1989): 29.

CM. “An Appraisal of Monkeywrenching.” Earth First! 10, no. 3 (2 February 1990): 30. (Reprinted in 20^th Anniversary Edition of Earth First!)

** Much of Bari’s writing was reproduced in Timber Wars and focused on movement disputes,* “breaking up is hard to do” (55–5),* “1990: a year in the life of Earth First!” and *“Why I am not a misanthrope” (67–84), *“Review: Dave Foreman’s Confessions of an Eco-Warrior_” 103–108.

Compare this controversial article, which is, in part, what Bari was criticizing:

Manes, Christopher. “Why I Am a Misanthrope.” Earth First! 11, no. 2 (21 December 1990): 29.

1990 – Foreman and the Formanistas Depart

**Foreman, Dave. “The Question of Growth in Earth First!” Earth First! 8, no. 6 (21 June 1988): 32.

**Foreman, Dave. “Some Thoughts on True Believers, Intolerance, Diversity, and Ed Abbey.” Earth First! 9, no. 5 (1 May 1989): 20.

**Diamondback. “Scientific Ecology and Deep Ecology.” Earth First! 10, no. 1 (1 November 1989): 21.

**Foreman, Dave and Nancy Morton. “Good Luck Darlin’. It’s Been Great.” Earth First! 10, no. 8 (22 September 1990): 5.

Earth First!’s remnant processes the departure – but the same sorts of disputes continue

Bari, Judi. “Expand Earth First!” Earth First! 10, no. 8 (22 September 1990): 5–6.

Articles and graphics that appear to promote violence remain contentious, e.g.:

[need to find this] Pajama. “Bombthrowing: A Brief Treatise.” Wild Rockies Review 6, no. 1 (1993): 9, republished in Beware! Sabotage, ed. Graybill, 128. Eugene, Oregon: Unknown, 1996.

**Bari’s reflections on the breakup were published by Dave Foreman in , republished in Timber Wars:

• “_Breaking up is hard to do” (55–9)

• “_1990: a year in the life of Earth First!” and “Why I am not a misanthrope” (67–84),

• “_Review: Dave Foreman’s Confessions of an Eco-Warrior_*” 103–108 **[USE HANDOUT MASTER]***

Bari, Judi. “Spiking: It Just Doesn’t Work.” Earth First! 15, no. 3 (2 February 1995): 8,11.

Nagasaki Johnson (pseud. For Mike Roselle). “Roadkill.” Earth First! 10, no. 3 (2 February 1989): 27–8.

Bari, Judi. “The Secret History of Tree Spiking.” Earth First! 15, no. 2 (21 December 1994): 11, 15.

Bari, Judi. “Monkeywrenching.” Earth First! 14, no. 3 (2 February 1994): 8.

... further debate over the ethics of ecotage (some ethicists/philosophers weigh in)

Hargrove, Eugene. “Ecological Sabotage: Pranks or Terrorism?” Environmental Ethics 4 (1982): 291–92.

Martin, Michael. “Ecotage and Civil Disobedience.” Environmental Ethics 12, no. 4 (1990): 291–310.

Taylor, Bron. “Earth First! Fights Back.” Terra Nova 2, no. 2 [Spring] (1997): 29–43.

Anarchism and Revolutionary Ecology ...

... debates over the extent to which radical environmentalism is or should be considered revolutionary, and if so: What is the nature of that revolution?

**Australopithecus. “Review of The Parable of the Tribes_.” Earth First! 5, no. 8 (22 September 1985): 24. Earth First! editor John Davis, writing under his favorite pseudonym, reviews an important book which contradicts the anarchistic tendencies of both the libertarian “rednecks for wilderness” (residing primarily in the desert southwest and northern Rockies) and the more communitarian green anarchists (flowing into the movement primarily from California and Oregon. This sets off the first (and last) extended debate on social philosophy in the pages of Earth First! Formanistas from Davis, Manes, Abbey, and others, defend anarchism, while Schmookler more than holds his own.

**Schmookler, Andrew Bard. “Schmookler Replies to Australopithecus.” Earth First! 6, no. 2 (21 December 1985):

25.

**Schmookler, Andrew Bard. “Schmookler on Anarchy.” Earth First! 6, no. 5 (1 May 1986): 22.

**Manes, Christoph. “Ascent to Anarchy.” Earth First!, 6, no 6, 1 August 1986, 21.

**Schmookler, Andrew Bard. “Schmookler Replies to the Anarchists.” Earth First! 7, no. 2 (21 December 1986): 24–5.

**Manes, Christoph. “An Anarchist Replies to Schmookler’s Reply to the Anarchists.” Earth First! 7, no. 8 (23 September 1987): 23.

**Schmookler, Andrew Bard. “Schmookler Replies to Anarchist’s Replies to Schmookler’s Reply to the Anarchists.” Earth First! 7, no. 8 (23 September 1987): 26–7.

**Roselle, Mike. “Forest Grump.” Earth First! 15, no. 2 (21 December 1994): 23.

• Roselle urges “jihad” like rebellion in criticism of Foreman’s claims that radical environmentalism is not revolutionary.”

Bari, Judi. “Revolutionary Ecology.” Alarm: a Voice of Revolutionary Ecology, no. 12 (1995): 6–7, 29. This summary of Bari’s fusion of biocentrism with a Marxism-inspired revolutionary socialism, published in a short-lived journal written by Oren Langelle and Anna Peterman, two long-term, Vermont-based, movement anarchists.

**McFarlane, Gary & Gary Echt. “Cult of Nonviolence.” Earth First! 18, no. 1 (November-December 1997): 3, 17.

• Cove Mallard defender Gary McFarlane, and Gary Echt, criticize what they consider to be a movement fetish in its commitment to nonviolence. Among its key points is that non-violent civil disobedience is an especially weak tactic “in areas where few people are there to support such a campaign”, such as in rural Idaho and Montana. The article expresses the resentment of many northern Rockies activists toward “ecotopians” from California and Oregon, who they feel inappropriately sought to impose a rigid non-violence code on the entire movement.

**Roselle, Mike. “Movement Building Basics: Please Open to Michael 3:16.” Earth First! 18, no. 4 (20 March 1998): 8. Roselle seems to backtrack in criticizing McFarlane and Echt, insisting that violence is counterproductive.

**Snyder, Gary. “Reinhabitation.” Earth First! 7, no. 8 (23 September 1987): 28.

On population growth as central problem and population dynamics as a prospective, natural solution

**Blea, Chim. “Reducing Population.” Earth First! (1 August 1983): 3.

**Noss, Reed. “Deep Ecology, Elitism and Reproduction.” Earth First! 4, no. 5 (1 May 1984): 16.

**Miss Ann Thropy. “Technology and Mortality.” Earth First! 7, no. 1 (1 November 1986): 18. Criticizes technological innovations which prolong life and suggests that they, and the western religious ideas that accompany such efforts must go. Foreman comments in support telling bleeding heart Christians, humanists or Marxists, need not bother to write in protest for he won’t publish their letters.

** Stoddard, Tom. “Oh, What a Wonderful Famine!” Earth First! 6, no. 5 (1 May 1986): 26.

**Miss Ann Thropy (pseud. for Christopher Manes). “Overpopulation and Industrialism.” Earth First! 7, no. 4 (20 March 1987): 29.

**Miss Ann Thropy (pseud. for Christopher Manes). “Population and AIDS.” Earth First! 7, no. 5 (1 May 1987): 32. Beginning “If radial environmentalists were to invent a disease to bring human population back to ecological sanity, it would probably be something like AIDS.” Manes offered “an ecological perspective on the disease” premised on the axiom “that the only real hope... is an enormous decline in human population.” This is probably the most controversial article ever published in Earth First!, and while qualifications in it were widely ignored, it arguably suggested genocidal solutions to the population-fueled environmental crisis. This and other controversial articles were used against the movement to great effect by social ecologists and social justice advocates alike and, combined with Foreman’s and others anti-immigration statements, were taken by many to represent the movement’s mainstreams.

**Foreman, Dave. “Is Sanctuary the Answer_?” Earth First! 8, no. 1 (1 November 1987): 21–2. Concludes with controversial statement related to United States support for Central American dictatorships and the illegal immigration this precipitates: “In the long run the most humane solution is the one advanced by Edward Abbey; send every illegal alien home with a rifle and a thousand rounds.”

**Flowers, Will. “_This Is Pro Life_?” Earth First! 9, no. 5 (1 May 1989).

**Barnes, James. “Dieback: A Vision of Darkness.” Earth First! 17, no. 8 (1997): 3,13. On overshoot/population dynamics as natural law/remedy; natural selection will continue.

[locate it] Miller, Monique A. “Population Growth and the Wildlands Vision.” In Place of the Wild: A Wildlands Anthology, ed. David Clarke Burks. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1994.

Irvine, Sandy. “The Great Denial: Puncturing Pronatalist Myths.” In Wild Earth, ed. Tom Butler. Minneapolis, MN: Milkweed, 2002.

Many of these population-related articles, directly or indirectly, draw on the work of Garrett Hardin (see master bibliography).

Tara the Sea Elf. “The Earth Liberation Front.” Earth First! 16, no. 7 (September-October 1996): 18. Denounces reactionary anti-immigration positions of American Earth First! movement, while discussing the emergence of the Earth Liberation Front.

Stoddard, Tom. “The Human Horde.” Earth First! 10, no. 1 (1 November 1989): 23.

Sessions, George. “The Sierra Club, Immigration, and the Future of California.” Wild Duck Review, 1998, 24–5.

... compare these articles to book-length analyses of immigration and the environment

Bouvier, Leon F and Lindsey Grant. How Many Americans? Population, Immigration, and the Environment. San Francisco: Sierra Club, 1995.

Cohen, Joel E. How Many People Can the Earth Support? New York: Norton, 1995.

Weiner, Myron. Global Migration Crisis: Challenge to State and Human Rights. New York: HarperCollins, 1995.

Beck, Roy. The Case Against Immigration. New York: Norton, 1996.

Radical Environmentalism ~ Music Links

Note: all of the following are to illustrate course themes. If you enjoy the music and wish to listen to it after this class, please pay for it; where possible I have provided links to musician websites. (If highlighted, not yet linked.)

Ballads, Theme songs

Defend the Earth (Alice DiMicelle)

Earth First (Darryl Cherney)

Burn that Dozer (anonymous)

Socio-ecological-spiritual criticism (usually humorous)

Manly Men (Greg Keeler) [Live from 1993 Mt. Graham Rendezvous] Manley Men Lyrics

12 Days of Solstice

TV God (Dana Lyons)

Ecological & Homo Sapiens

Animal (Dana Lyons); Lyrics

Habitat (Bill Oliver); Lyrics

Rebellion, Civilization Collapse

Riff-Raff (Casey Neill)

Dancin on the Ruins (Casey Neill)

Apocalyptic Themes, including post-apocalyptic hope

Time Bomb (Dana Lyons)

End of the World (Danny Dollinger)

Ghost of a Chance (Danny Dollinger)

Spirituality--Animistic

Never Alone (Jesse “Wolf” Hardin and Joanne Rand)

The Tree (Dana Lyons); and for the story about this song, see Tree Music

Wild Ones (Joanne Rand)

Hallowed Be Thy Ground (Casey Neill Trio)

Forever Wild (Peg Millett) (song by Walkin Jim Stotz)

Spirituality--Pantheistic

Magic (Dana Lyons)

Mother Earth (John Trudell)

Listen to the Earth (Walkin’ Jim Stoltz)

Spirituality--Pagan (explicitly)

Burning Times (Rumors of the Big Wave/Charlie Murphy).

Spirituality—misc, and Religious Studies Theory!)

Expanding Universe (John Seed and Dana Lyons)

Free the Dead (Darryl Cherney)

Hillbilly Hippie (Danny Dollinger)

Wilderness & Wildness

_Forever Wild_ (Walkin’ Jim Stoltz, or cover by Peg Millett)

Radical Environmental Music (by Fellow Travellers)

I Shall Not Be Moved (Greg Brown)

Field Recordings from 1993 Earth First! Rendeavous at Mt. Graham,

Arizona. These field recordings reveal the ribald revelry, as well as some of key themes and spirituality, that characterized Earth First!, especially during the 1980s and early 1990s. Listening to them in order can give you a feel for what it would be like around large, boisterous campfires early in the evening, and smaller, more reverent ones, in the early morning hours.

Earth First!

12 Days of Solstice

Have a Nice Day

Manley Men

Animal/Habitat

Turn of the Wrench

Dancin in the Dirt

Green Fire

Drop of Water

Burn that Dozer

Ancient Mother

Mother Earth

Island in the Sky

We Who Believe in Freedom

Websites for movement musicians:

Darryl Cherney

Dana Lyons

Jesse (Wolf) Hardin

Joanne Rand

Casey Neill

Bill Oliver

Greg Keeler

Danny Dollinger

Also important

Cecelia Ostrow, “I know a Tree,” “The day the forest died,” “I am a Warrior of the Earth”

Radical Environmentalism Bibliography**

(By Subject)

* recommended and especially relevant to the study of radical environmentalism.

** most highly recommended and relevant to the study of radical environmentalism.

Historical and Analytical Sources — Books

Bishop, James. 1994. Epitaph for a desert anarchist: the life and legacy of Edward Abbey. New York & Toronto: Atheneum.

Cahalan, James M. 2001. Edward Abbey: a life. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.

Chase, Alston. 1995. In a Dark Wood: The Fight over Forests and the Rising Tyranny of Ecology (New York: Houghton Mifflin Co.).

• Cohen, Michael P. The Pathless Way: John Muir and American Wilderness. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1984.

Coleman, Kate. The Secret Wars of Judi Bari: A Car Bomb, the Fight for the Redwoods, and the End of Earth First! Encounter Books: San Francisco, 2005.

• Dowie, Mark. Losing Ground: American Environmentalism at the Close of the Twentieth Century. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press, 1995. (Many radical environmentalists found vindication in its analysis of the failures of reform environmentalism, even though this book is at most indirectly about radical environmentalism.

Farrell, Justin. 2015. The battle for Yellowstone: morality and the sacred roots of environmental conflict, Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Kuipers, Dean. 2009. Operation bite back: Rod Coronado’s war to save American wilderness. Blomsbury.

** Fox, Stephen. The American Conservation Movement: John Muir and His Legacy. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1981.

Gottlieb, Robert. Forcing the Spring: The Transformation of the American Environmental Movement. Washington D.C.: Island Press, 1993. (Excellent history spotlighting the significance and emergence of the ‘environmental justice’ movement.)

Hays, Samuel P. A History of Environmental Politics Since 1945. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2000.

Pezeshki, Charles. 1998. Wild to the Last: Environmental Conflict in Clearwater Country (Pullman, Washington:

Washington State University Press).Lee, Martha F. Earth First!: Environmental Apocalypse. Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press, 1995. (A book based on little field work and significantly derived Taylor’s early article in The Ecologist.)

Loeffler, Jack. 2002. Adventures with Ed. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.

Losure, Mary. Our Way or the Highway: Inside the Minnehaha Free State, 2002. Minnesota University Press, St. Paul, Minnesota. (A good journalistic account of the direct action campaign versus a road in Minnesota, on terrain considered sacred by some indigenous people and a variety of Earth First!ers. Provides a window into the character of Earth First! by the late 1990s.)

Merchant, Carolyn. 2005 [1992]. Radical ecology: the search for a livable world. New York & London: Routledge.

Mies, Maria, and Vandana Shiva. 1993. Ecofeminism. London: Zed, 1993.

Murray, John A., ed. 2015. Abbey in America: a philosopher’s legacy in a new century. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press.

Nash, Roderick Frazier. The Rights of Nature: A History of Environmental Ethics. Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1989.

• _______. Wilderness and the American Mind. 4^th ed. 1967; reprint, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1967. (A classic work that convinced many radical environmentalists that Chrstianity is anti-nature.)

Nash, Roderick Frazier, ed. American Environmentalism: Readings in Conservation History. Third ed. New York: McGraw Hill, 1990.

Pellow, David N. 2014. Total liberation: the power and promise of animal rights and the radical earth movement. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Pike, Sarah M. 2017. For the wild: ritual and commitment in radical eco-activism. Berkeley & Los Angeles: University of California Press.

Ronald, Ann. 2000. The New West of Edward Abbey. 2^nd ed (Reno: University of Nevada Press).

• Scarce, Rik. Ecowarriors: Understanding the Radical Environmental Movement. Chicago: Noble, 1990. (An excellent early journalist book, based on a year worth of the ground field work, from an author who spent several

months in jail for refusing to testify about his sources to a grand jury, and who went on into the field of

Environmental Sociology, and who is now at Skidmore College rscarce@skidmore.edu.)

Shabecoff, Philip. A fierce green fire: the American environmental movement. Washington D.C.: Island Press, 2003.

** Taylor, Bron, ed. Ecological Resistance Movements: The Global Emergence of Radical and Popular Environmentalism. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press, 1995.

Speece, Darren. 2017. Defending giants: the redwood wars and the transformation of American environmental politics. Seattle: University of Washington Press.

** Zakin, Susan. Coyotes and Town Dogs: Earth First! and the Environmental Movement. New York: Viking, 1993. Wall, Derek. Earth First! and the Anti-Roads Movement: Radical Environmentalism and the Anti-Roads Movement. London:Routledge, 1999. (An activist-scholar involved in the United Kingdom’s Earth First! writes about it drawing on social movement theory; good description of UK scene, but marred by misleading stereotypes of the movement in the United States.)

Historical and Analytical Sources — Articles

LeVasseur, Todd. “Decisive ecological warfare: triggering industrial collapse via deep green resistance.” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture 11 (1, 2017):109–130.

Mallory, Chaone. 2006. “Ecofeminism and forest defense in Cascadia: gender, theory, and radical activism.” Capitalism, Nature, Socialism 17 (1):32–49.

Parson, Sean. 2008. “Understanding the ideology of the Earth Liberation Front.” Green Theory & Praxis: The Journal of Ecopedagogy 4 (2):50–66.

Taylor, Bron. “The Religion and Politics of Earth First!” The Ecologist 21, no. 6 [November/December] (1991): 258–66.

** _____. “Resacralizing Earth: Pagan Environmentalism and the Restoration of Turtle Island.” In American Sacred Space, eds. David Chidester and Edward T. Linenthal, 97–151. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1995.

** Taylor, Bron. “Earth First!‘s Religious Radicalism.” In Ecological Prospects: Scientific, Religious, and Aesthetic Perspectives, ed. Christopher Key Chapple, 185–209. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press, 1994.

_______. “Evoking the Ecological Self: Art as Resistance to the War on Nature.” Peace Review 5, no. 2 (1993): 225–30.

_______. “Ecological Resistance Movements; Not Always Deep But If Deep, Religious: Reply to Devall.” The Trumpeter 13, no. 2 (1996): 98–103. This criticizes, among other things, the claim by Bill Devall that Deep Ecology ought not be considered religions a religious movement.

_______. “Earth First! Fights Back.” Terra Nova 2, no. 2 [Spring] (1997): 29–43.

• ______. “Earthen Spirituality or Cultural Genocide: Radical Environmentalism’s Appropriation of Native American Spirituality.” Religion 17, no. 2 (1997): 183–215.

• ______. “Religion, Violence, and Radical Environmentalism: From Earth First! to the Unabomber to the Earth Liberation Front.” Terrorism and Political Violence 10, no. 4 (1998): 10–42.

_______. “Green Apocalypticism: Understanding Disaster in the Radical Environmental Worldview.” Society and Natural Resources 12, no. 4 (1999): 377–86. This is largely a critique of the book by Martha Lee.

**_______. “Deep Ecology and Its Social Philosophy: A Critique.” In Beneath the Surface: Critical Essays on Deep

Ecology, eds. Eric Katz, Andrew Light and David Rothenberg, 269–99. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press, 2000.

• _____. “Bioregionalism: An Ethics of Loyalty to Place.” Landscape Journal 19, no. 1&2 (2000): 50–72.

_______. “Review of Derek Wall’s Earth First! and the Anti-Roads Movement: Radical Environmentalism and the Anti-Roads Movement.” Environmental Ethics 23, no. 1 (2001): 87–90.

** ______. “Diggers, Wolfs, Ents, Elves and Expanding Universes: Bricolage, Religion, and Violence From Earth First! and the Earth Liberation Front to the Antiglobalization Resistance.” In The Cultic Milieu: Oppositional Subcultures in an Age of Globalization, eds. Jeffrey Kaplan and Heléne Lööw, 26–74. Lanham, Maryland: Altamira/Rowman and Littlefield, 2002.

_______. “Threat Assessments and Radical Environmentalism.” Terrorism and political violence 15, no. 4 (Winter 2004): 183–172.

_______. “Revisiting Ecoterrorism.” In Religionen Im Konflikt, eds. Vasilios N. Makrides and Jörg Rüpke, tba. Münster, Germany: Aschendorff, 2004.

_________. 2008. “The tributaries of radical environmentalism.” Journal of Radicalism 2 (1):27–61.

Taylor, Bron, ed. Ecological Resistance Movements: The Global Emergence of Radical and Popular

Environmentalism. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press, 1995. (also on reserve)

Zakin, Susan. Coyotes and Town Dogs: Earth First! and the Environmental Movement. New York: Viking, 1993.

Special research archive, hosted by the Rachel Carson Center:

Bron Taylor’s Print History and Digital Archive of Earth First!, Wild Earth, Live Wild or Die, and Alarm

Central Intellectual Antecedents in Social Criticism and in Nature Writing

** Berman, Morris. The Reenchantment of the World. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 1981.

_______. Wandering God. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press, 2000.

** Catton, William. Overshoot: The Ecological Basis of Revolutionary Change. Urbana & Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1980.

Diamond, Jared. “The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race.” Discover, no. May (1987): 64–6. (Online at the Radical Anthropology Website)

Diamond, Stanley. In Search of the Primitive: A Critique of Civilization. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Transaction Books, 1974. (

The Ecologist. Whose Common Future? Reclaiming the Commons. London: 1993; reprint, Philadelphia, PA: New Society, 1994.** Ehrenfeld, David. The Arrogance of Humanism. Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press, 1978.

Jeffers, Robinson, ed. The Collected Poetry of Robinson Jeffers (4 Vols). Edited by Tim Hunt. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2001.

** Kropotkin, Peter. “Anarchism.” Encyclopedia Britanica, 11^th ed., pp. 914–19, 1910–1911. (Biographical entry)

_______. Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution. Boston: n.d.; reprint, Montreal: Black Rose, 1914. (Online)

** Leopold, Aldo. The Sand County Almanac with Essays from Round River. Oxford: 1949; reprint, New York: Sierra Club and Balentine Books, 1971.

Marsh, George Perkins. The Earth As Modified by Human Action. New York: 1874; reprint, New York City: Arno, 1970.

* Merchant, Carolyn. The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology and the Scientific Revolution. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1980.

** Muir, John. The Wilderness World of John Muir. Edited by Edwin ay Teal. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1954.

Mumford, Lewis. The Myth of the Machine. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1966.

_______. Techniques and Human Development. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1966.

• Shepard, Paul. 1998, Coming Home to the Pleistocene. San Francisco: Island Press.

• Sahlins, Marshal. Stone Age Economics. Chicago: Aldine, 1968. Online chapter: “The Original Affluent Society”

** Thoreau, Henry David. The Annotated Walden. Edited by Philip Van Doren Stern. New York: Barnes and Noble, 1970.

Movement Books, Anthologies, and Seminal Articles

Abbey, Edward. Good News. New York City: Penguin, 1980.

* _______. Hayduke Lives! Boston: Little, Brown, 1990.

** ______. The Monkeywrench Gang. New York City: Avon, 1975.

* Bari, Judi. Timber Wars. Monroe, Maine: Common Courage, 1994.

_______. “Revolutionary Ecology.” Capitalism, Nature, Socialism: a journal of socialist ecology 8, no. 2 (1997): 145–49.

** Bender, Frederic L. The Culture of Extinction: Toward a Philosophy of Deep Ecology. Amherst, New York: Humanity Books, 2003.

Bookchin, Murray and Dave Foreman. Defending the Earth: A Dialogue Between Murray Bookchin and Dave Foreman. Boston: South End, 1991.

Burks, David Clarke, ed. Place of the Wild: A Wildlands Anthology. Washington D.C.: Island Press, 1994.

Butler, Tom. Wild Earth: Wild Ideas for a World Out of Balance. Minneapolis, MN: Milkweed, 2002.

Carter, Alan. 1999. A Radical Green Political Theory. London: Routledge.

• Davis, John, ed. The Earth First! Reader: Ten Years of Radical Environmentalism. Salt Lake City, Gibbs Smith, 1991.

• Devall, Bill and George Sessions. Deep Ecology: Living As If Nature Mattered. Salt Lake City, UT: Peregrine Smith, 1985.

** Devall, Bill, ed. Clearcut: The Tragedy of Industrial Forestry. San Francisco: Sierra Club Books, 1994.

• Drengson, Alan and Yuichi Inoue, eds. The Deep Ecology Movement: An Introductory Anthology. Berkeley, California: North Atlantic, 1995.

• Foreman, Dave. Confessions of an Eco-Warrior. New York: Harmony Books, 1991.

________. 2004. Rewilding North America: a vision for conservation in the 21^st century. Washington, D.C.: Island Press.

_________. Take back conservation. Durango, Colo.: Raven’s Eye Press.

Foreman, Dave, and Laura Carroll. 2014. Man swarm: how overpopulation is killing the wild world. Live True Books.

Foreman, Dave and Howie Wolke. The Big Outside. Tucson: Ned Ludd, 1989.

** Foreman, Dave. Rewilding North America: A Vision for Conservation in the 21^st Century. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 2004.

* Hill, Julia “Butterfly”. The Legacy of Luna. San Francisco: Harper, 2000.

Kaczynski, Ted. Industrial Society and Its Future. (Click title; widely available on the internet.)

Kendell, Jeni and Eddie Buivids. Earth First: The Struggle to Save Australia’s Rainforest. Sidney, Australia: ABC Enterprises, 1987.

List, Peter C., ed. Radical Environmentalism: Philosophy and Tactics. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 1993.

Mander, Jerry. In the Absence of the Sacred: The Failure of Technology and the Survival of the Indian Nations. San Francisco: Sierra Club, 1991.

** Manes, Christopher. Green Rage: Radical Environmentalism and the Unmaking of Civilization. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1990.

• McBay, Aric, Lierre Keith, and Derrick Jensen. 2011. Deep green resistance: strategy to save the planet. New York: Seven Stories Press.

• McLaughlin, Andrew. Regarding Nature: Industrialism & Deep Ecology. New York: State University of New York Press, 1993.

Nocella, Anthony J., Richard J. White, and Erika Cudworth. 2015. Anarchism and animal liberation: essays on complementary elements of total liberation. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers.

Nocella, Anthony J. 2014. Defining critical animal studies: an intersectional social justice approach for liberation, Counterpoints: studies in the postmodern theory of education. New York: Peter Lang.

Pickering, Leslie James. 2003. The Earth Liberation Front, 1997–2002. South Wales, NY: Arissa.

Roselle, Mike, and Josh Mahan. 2009. Tree spiker: from Earth First! to lowbagging: my struggles in radical environmental action. New York: St. Martin’s Press.

** Sessions, George, ed. Deep Ecology for the 21^st Century. Boston: Shambhala Publications, 1995.

Snyder, Gary. Earth House Hold: Technical Notes and Queries to Fellow Dharma Revolutionaries. New York: New Directions, 1957.

** Snyder, Gary. Turtle Island. New York: New Directions, 1969. (See especially the essay “Four Changes,” which is a remarkable early expression of radical environmentalism. This book wins the Pulitzer prize, which magnifies its influence.

Tobias, Michael,ed. Deep Ecology. San Diego: Avant, 1985.

Watson, Paul. Seal Wars: Twenty-Five Years on the Front Lines with the Harp Seals. Buffalo, New York: Firefly Books, 2002.

_______. Ocean Warrior: My Battle to End the Illegal Slaughter on the High Seas. Toronto: Key Porter, 1994.

Willers, Bill, ed. Learning to Listen to the Land. Washington, DC: Island Press, 1991.

* Wolke, Howie. Wilderness on the Rocks. Tucson, Arizona: Ned Ludd, 1991.

Wuerthner, George, Eileen Crist, and Tom Butler, eds. 2014. Keeping the wild: against the domestication of earth. Washington, DC: Island Press.

Wuerthner, George, Eileen Crist, and Tom Butler, eds. 2015. Protecting the wild: parks and wilderness, the foundation for conservation. Washington, Covelo, London: Island Press.

Movement-relevant books focused on capitalism, globalization, corporate power, and the decline of democracy

Gonzalez, George. Corporate Power and the Environment: The Political Economy of U.S. Environmental Policy.

Lanham, MD: Rowman & Rowman & Littlefield, 2001.

Nader, Ralph, William Greider, Margaret Atwood, Vandana Shiva, Mark Ritchie, Wendell Berry, Jerry Brown, Herman Daly, Lori Wallach, Thea Lee, Martin Khor, David Phillips, Jorge Casteñeda, Carlos Heridia, David Morris and Jerry Mander. The Case Against Free Trade: GATT, NAFTA, and the Globalization of Corporate Power. San Francisco& Berkeley: Earth Island Press and North Atlantic Books, 1993.

* Tokar, Brian. Earth for Sale: Reclaiming Ecology in the Age of Corporate Greenwash. Boston: South End Press, 1997.

Movement books and journals – esp. grounded in anarchism and devoted to overturning the capitalist/technological system

* Best, Steven and Anthony Nocella, eds., Igniting a Revolution: Voices in Defense of the Earth. (Oakland, CA: AK Press, 2006).* Bey, Hakim. T.A.Z. The Temporary Autonomous Zone, Ontological Anarchy, Poetic Terrorism. Autonomedia, 1991.

_______. Millennium. Brooklyn & Dublin: Autonomedia & Garden of Delight, 1996.

Boggs, Carl. 2012. Ecology and revolution: global crisis and the political challenge, Environmental politics and theory. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Bradford, George. 1989. How Deep Is Deep Ecology? A Challenge to Radical Environmentalism. Ojai, California: Times Change Press.

** Kaczynski, Theodore. “Industrial Society and its Future.” Washington Post, 19 September 1995, begins p. A1. Internet Link

Heider, Ulrike. Anarchism: Left, Right and Green. San Francisco: City Lights, 1994. (Concise and typological.

Marshall, Peter. Demanding the Impossible: A History of Anarchism. London: Harper Collins, 1992. (Long and detailed.)

* Zerzan, John. Future Primitive. Columbia, Missouri: C.A.L. Press, 1994.

_______. Elements of Refusal. Seattle Washington: Left Bank Books, 1988.

________.Against Civilization: Readings and Reflections. Eugene, Oregon: Uncivilized Books, 1999.

Movement books — esp. focused on religion (esp. Buddhist), perception (esp. Animist), resistance and ritual (esp. Paganism and Wicca), etc.

Abram, David. Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-Than-Human World. New York: Pantheon, 1996.

Adler, Margo. Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshipers, and Other Pagans in America Today. Revised ed. Boston: 1979; reprint, Boston: Beacon, 1986.

Barnhill, David Landis. At Home on Earth: Becoming Native to Our Place. Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 1999.

_______. Deep Ecology and World Religions: New Essays on Sacred Ground. State University of New York Press, Albany, New York, 2000.

Harris, Adrian and Sean Scullion. Introduction to Pagan Activism (Handout Prepared for European Social Forum, October2004). , 2004.

Hardin, Jesse Wolf. Kindred Spirits: Sacred Earth Wisdom. Columbus, North Carolina: Swan-Raven & Co., 2001.

Henning, Daniel H. Buddhism and Deep Ecology. Bloomington, IN: 1^st Books, 2002.

Jensen, Derrick. A Language Older Than Words. New York: Context, 2000.

Harvey, Graham. “Animism.” Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature, B. Taylor, ed. NY & London: Continuum 2005. Kaza, Stephanie. The Attentive Heart: Conversations with Trees. New York: Fawcett Columbine, 1993.

• LaChapelle, Dolores. Sacred Land, Sacred Sex: Rapture of the Deep. Silverton, Colorado: Finn Hill Arts, 1988.

• ______. Earth Wisdom. Silverton, Colorado: Finn Hill Arts, 1978.

• Macy, Joanna. World as Lover, World As Self. Berkeley, CA: Parallax Press, 1991.

• ______. Coming Back to Life: Practices to Reconnect Our Lives, Our World. Blain, Washington: New Society, 1998.

McClennan, John. “Nondual Ecology: In Praise of Wildness and in Search of Harmony with Everything That Moves” [Also available: WWW@:Http://Csf.Colorado.EDU/Sol/Nondual-Ecology/Nondual-Ecology.Html ]. Tricycle: A Buddhist review, 1993, 58–65.

Nocella, Anthony J., Richard J. White, and Erika Cudworth. 2015. Anarchism and animal liberation: essays on complementary elements of total liberation. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers.

Nocella, Anthony J. 2014. Defining critical animal studies: an intersectional social justice approach for liberation, Counterpoints: studies in the postmodern theory of education. New York: Peter Lang.

Noss, Reed. “A Taoist Reply (on Violence).” Earth First! 3, no. 7 (21 September 1983): 13.

Peacock, Douglas. Grizzly Years: In Search of the American Wilderness. New York: Henry Holt, 1990.

** Seed, John, Joanna Macy, Pat Fleming and Arne Naess. Thinking Like a Mountain: Towards a Council of All Beings. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: New Society, 1988.

** Snyder, Gary. Turtle Island. New York: New Directions, 1969.

* _____. The Practice of the Wild. San Francisco: North Point Press, 1990.

_______. Mountains and Rivers Without End. Washington: Counterpoint, 1996.

_______. A Place in Space: Ethics, Aesthetics, and Watersheds. Washington D.C.: Counterpoint, 1995.Starhawk (Miriam Simos). The Spiral Dance: A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of the Great Goddess. 10^th anniversary ed. San Francisco: 1979; reprint, San Francisco: Harper, 1979.

Starhawk (Miriam Simos). Dreaming the Dark. New edition ed. 1982; reprint, Boston: Beacon, 1988.

_______. The Spiral Dance: A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of the Great Goddess. 10^th anniversary ed. San Francisco: 1979; reprint, San Francisco: Harper, 1979.

Starhawk (Miriam Simos). Webs of Power: Notes From the Global Uprising. Gabriola Island, British Columbia: New Society, 2002.

_______. Truth or Dare: Encounters with Power, Authority, and Mystery. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1987. _______. The Spiral Dance: A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of the Great Goddess. 10^th anniversary ed. San Francisco: 1979; reprint, San Francisco: Harper, 1979.

** Turner, Jack. The Abstract Wild. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1996.

* York, Michael. Pagan Theology. Washington Square, New York: New York University Press, 2004.

Novels on radical environmental, animal liberationist, ecotopian, & green anarchist themes

• Abbey, Edward. Good News. New York City: Penguin, 1980. (After the collapse of industrial civilization heroic forces of freedom fight the re-establishment of authoritarian order and for a wild ecological future.)

• _______. Hayduke Lives! Boston: Little, Brown, 1990. (Completed just before his death, humorously captures some of the spirit and absurdity of the Earth First! movement during the 1980s)

**_______. The Monkeywrench Gang. New York City: Avon, 1975. (The original inspiration for Earth First!)

Boyle, T.Coraghessan. A Friend of the Earth. New York City: Viking, 2000. (Ecological resistance modeled on Earth First! after climate change has produced an ecological calamity.)

Bradford, George. 1989. How Deep Is Deep Ecology? A Challenge to Radical Environmentalism. Ojai, California: Times Change Press.

Bishop, James. 1994. Epitaph for a desert anarchist: the life and legacy of Edward Abbey. New York & Toronto: Atheneum.

Cahalan, James M. 2001. Edward Abbey: a life. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.

Case, John. The First Horseman. New York City: Ballentine, 1998. (A mainstream novelist considers a religious cult deploying biological weapons to cull a destructive human species.) Callenbach, Ernest. Ecotopia Emerging. Berkeley: Banyan Tree, 1981.

* ______. Ecotopia. New York: Bantam, 1975.

Crichton, Michael. State of Fear. New York: Harper Collins, 2004. (A novel focused on climate change that criticizes fear-mongering scientists, and radical and other environmentalists.)

Ford, Richard. Quest for the Faradawn. New York: Dell, 1983.( Tara the Sea ELF, writing in support of the Earth Liberation Front, called this book inspirational, for it conveys the perspective of non-human nature and “it basically sums up what we are fighting for.”)

Foreman, Dave. The Lobo Outback Funeral Home. Boulder, Colorado: Johnson Books, 2000. (The first novel from the most charismatic of Earth First!’s founders, with a forward by Grizzley Years author Doug Peacock.)

Heinlein, Robert A. Stranger in a Strange Land. New York: G. P. Putnam, 1961. (Science fiction in which a human raised on mars returns and develops a water-focused nature religion, that later spins off into the real life, radical environmental “Church of All Worlds” in the Redwood biome)

Hiaasen, Carl. Sick Puppy. New York: Knopf, 2000. (Ecological saboteurs take on Florida developers.)

Jensen, Derrick. 2006. Endgame. Seven Stories Press 1^st ed. 2 vols (New York: Seven Stories Press).

LeGuin, Ursula. The Dispossessed. New York: Avon, 1975. (Science fiction comparing issues of governance and sustainability between a communitarian anarchist utopia on a desolate moon and capitalism on a natural fertile planet.)

• Quinn, Daniel. Ishmael. New York: Bantam, 1992.

• ______. The Story of B. New York: Bantam, 1996. (Two novels providing a terrific example of the animistic, radical environmental worldview.)

• Starhawk. The Fifth Sacred Thing. New York: Doubleday, 1993. (Seemingly inspired by Callenbach, but more explicitly feminist, pagan and anarchistic.)

Stephenson, Neal. Zodiac. New York: Bantam, 1995. (An environmentalist in a zodiac sabotages industrial polluters.)

Tobias, Michael, Rage and Reason. AK Press, 1998. (Animal liberationism turned explicitly violent/terroristic, with rationales sympathetically recounted. Ironically, this novel was penned by a scholar of the radically nonviolent religion Jainism and who assembled one of the early deep ecology anthologies.)

Debates/Critiques of Radical Environmentalism and/or Deep Ecology

General Critiques of Radical Environmentalism or Deep Ecology

Arnold, Ron. 1997. Ecoterror: The Violent Agenda to Save Nature--the World of the Unabomber. Bellvue, Washington: Free Enterprise.

Bradford, George. 1989. How Deep Is Deep Ecology? A Challenge to Radical Environmentalism. Ojai, California: Times Change Press.Katz, Eric, Andrew Light and David Rothenberg. Beneath the Surface: Critical Essays on Deep Ecology. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press, 2000.

Chase, Alston. 1995. In a Dark Wood: The Fight over Forests and the Rising Tyranny of Ecology (New York: Houghton Mifflin Co.).

Lewis, Martin W. Green Delusions: An Environmentalist Critique of Radical Environmentalism. Durham: Duke University Press, 1992.

_______. “Radical Environmental Philosophy and the Assault on Reason.” In The Flight from Science and Reason, eds. P.R. Gross, N. Levitt and M.W. Lewis, 209–30. Baltimore, Maryland: John Hopkins University Press, 1996.

Radical Environmentalism & the Social Construction of Nature

Burks, David Clarke, ed. Place of the Wild: A Wildlands Anthology. Washington D.C.: Island Press, 1994.

Butler, Tom. Wild Earth: Wild Ideas for a World Out of Balance. Minneapolis, MN: Milkweed, 2002.

Crist, Eileen. 2008. “Against the social construction of wilderness.” In The wilderness debate rages on: continuing the great new wilderness debate, edited by Michael P. Nelson and J. Baird Callicott, 500–525. Athens, Georgia: University of Georgia Press.

Cronon, William. “The Trouble with Wilderness; Or, Getting Back to the Wrong Nature.” In Uncommon Ground:

Toward Reinventing Nature, ed. William Cronon, 69–90. New York: Norton, 1995.

_______. “The Trouble with Wilderness: A Response.” Environmental History 1, no. 1 (1996): 47–57.

Denevan, William M. “The Pristine Myth: The Landscape of the Americas in 1492.” Annals of the Association of American Geographers 82, no. 3 (1992): 369–85.

Evernden, Neil. The Social Creation of Nature. Baltimore, Maryland: John Hopkins University Press, 1992.

Noss, Reed F. “Wilderness--Now More Than Ever: A Response to Callicott.” Wild Earth 4, no. 4 (1994): 60–3.

Soulé, Michael and Gary Lease, eds. Reinventing Nature?: Responses to Postmodern Deconstruction. Washington D.C.: Island Press, 1995.

Guha’s Critique of Environmentalism (including Radical Environmentalism) and a Response

Gadgil, Madheva and Ramachandra Guha. “Ecological Conflicts and the Environmental Movement in India.” In Development and Environment: Sustaining People and Nature, ed. Gahi Dharam. Oxford & Cambridge: Blackwell, 1994.

Guha, Ramachandra. “The Malign Encounter: The Chipko Movement and Competing Visions of Nature.” In Who Will Save the Forests?: Knowledge, Power, and Environmental Destruction, eds. Tariq Banuri and Frédérique Apffel Marglin, 80–113. London and New Jersey: Zed, 1993.

_______. “Radical American Environmentalism and Wilderness Preservation: A Third World Critique.” Environmental Ethics 11 (1989): 71–83.

_______. “The Authoritarian Biologist and the Arrogance of Anti-Humanism: Wildlife Conservation in the Third World.”The Ecologist 27, no. 1 (January/February 1997): 14–20.

_______. The Unquiet Woods: Ecological Change and Peasant Resistance in the Himalayas. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989.

Johns, David. “The Relevance of Deep Ecology to the Third World.” Environmental Ethics 12, no. 3 (1990): 233–52. Guha, Ramachandra and Martinez-Alier. Varieties of Environmentalism: Essays North and South. London: Earthscan, 1998.

Critiques and Analysis of Green Anarchism and Bioregional Social Philosophy

* Dobson, Andrew. Green Political Thought: An Introduction. London: Unwin Hyman, 1990.

** Deudney, Daniel. “Global Village Sovereignty: Intergenerational Sovereign Publics, Federal-Republican Earth

Constitutions, and Planetary Identities.” In The Greening of Sovereignty in World Politics, ed. Karen Litfin, 299–323. Boston: MIT Press, 1998.

• Deudney, Daniel. “Ground Identity: Nature, Place, and Space in Nationalism.” In The Return of Culture and Identity inIR Theory, eds. Yosef Lapid and Friedrich Kratochwil, 129–45. Boulder & London: Lynne Rienner, 1996.

Deudney, Daniel. “Global Environmental Rescue and the Emergence of World Domestic Politics.” In The State and Social Power in Global Environmental Politics, eds. Ronnie D Lipschutz and Ken Conca, 280–305. New York: Columbia University Press, 1993.

• Eckersley, Robyn. The Green State: Rethinking Democracy and Sovereignty. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2004.

• Eckersley, Robyn. Environmentalism and Political Theory: Toward an Ecocentric Approach. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press, 1992.

• Heider, Ulrike. Anarchism: Left, Right and Green. San Francisco: City Lights, 1994.

• Schmookler, Andrew Bard. The Parable of the Tribes: The Problem of Power in Social Evolution. Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 1984.

Lipschutz, Ronnie D. and Ken Conca. Eds. The State and Social Power in Global Environmental Politics. Edited by New York: Columbia University Press, 1993.

Litfin, Karen, ed. The Greening of Sovereignty in World Politics. Boston: MIT Press, 1998.

** Taylor, Bron. “Deep Ecology and Its Social Philosophy: A Critique.” In Beneath the Surface: Critical Essays on Deep Ecology, eds. Eric Katz, Andrew Light and David Rothenberg, 269–99. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press, 2000.

Radical Environmentalism and Violence/Terrorism

Ackerman, Gary. “Beyond Arson?: A Threat Assessment of the Earth Liberation Front.” Terrorism and political violence15, no. 4 (2004): tba.

Amster, Randall. 2006. ‘Perspectives on Ecoterrorism: Catalysts, Conflations, and Casualties’, Contemporary Justice Review 9.3: 287–301.

Arnold, Ron. Ecoterror: The Violent Agenda to Save Nature--the World of the Unabomber. Bellvue, Washington: Free Enterprise, 1997.

Beck, Colin. 2007. ‘On the Radical Cusp: Ecoterrorism in the United States, 1998–2005’, Mobilization: An International Quarterly 12.2: 161–76.

Buell, Lawrence. 2009. ‘What Is Called Ecoterrorism’, Journal of Theory and Criticism 16: 153–66.

Chase, Alston. Harvard and the Unabomber: The Education of an American Terrorist. New York: Norton, 2003.

Bandow, Doug. Ecoterrorism: The Dangerous Fringe of the Environmental Movement, Backgrounder #764. Washington, D.C.: Heritage Foundation, 1990.

Best, Steven, and Anthony J. Nocella, eds. 2004. Terrorists or freedom fighters: reflections on the liberation of animals. New York: Lantern.

Best, Steven, and Anthony J. Nocella, eds. 2006. Igniting a revolution: voices in defense of the Earth. Oakland & Edinburgh: AK Press.

Clausen, Barry and DanaRae Pomeroy. Walking on the Edge: How I Infiltrated Earth First! Olympia, Washington: Washington Contract Loggers Association, 1994.

Clausen, Barry. Report on Terrorism: Radical Environmental and Animal Rights Organizations, Such As Earth First! and the Animal Liberation Front, Have Committed More Than 500 Reported Acts of Terrorism Since 1986. This Report Documents 200 of Those Cases. Port Ludlow, Washington: North American Research, 1996.

Diehm, Christian. 2011. “Ecotage, ecodefense, and deep ecology.” The Trumpeter: Journal of Ecosophy 27 (2).

Denson, Bryan and James Long. “Ideologues Drive the Violence.” Oregonian, 27 September 1999, A1, online.

Eagan, Sean P. 1996. ‘From Spikes to Bombs: The Rise of Eco-Terrorism’, Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 19.1.

Fritsvold, Erik D. 2009. ‘Under the Law: Legal Consciousness and Radical Environmental Activism’, Law and Social Inquiry: Journal of the American Bar Foundation 34.4: 799–824.

Hays, Scott, Michael Esler, and Carol Hays. 2013. ‘Radical Environmentalism and Crime’, in Sally Mitchell Edwards, Terry D. Edwards and Charles B. Fields (eds.), Environmental Crime and Criminality: Theoretical and Practical Issues (Routledge).

Helvarg, David. The War Against the Greens: The “Wise-Use” Movement, the New Right, and Anti-Environmental Violence. San Francisco: Sierra Club Books, 1992.

Hills, Bruce. “‘Ecoterrorists’ May Take Aim At Livestock.” Deseret News (8 October 1990): 1.

Joosse, Paul. 2007. ‘Leaderless Resistance and Ideological Inclusion: The Case of the Earth Liberation Front’, Terrorism and Political Violence 19.3: 351–68.

_______. 2012. ‘Elves, Environmentalism, and ‘Eco-Terror’: Leaderless Resistance and Media Coverage of the Earth Liberation Front’, Sage 8.1.

Lee, Martha F. Earth First!: Environmental Apocalypse. Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press, 1995.

_______. “Violence and the Environment: The Case of ‘Earth First!’.” Terrorism and Political Violence 7, no. 3 (1995): 109–27.

_______. “Environmental Apocalypse: The Millennial Ideology of ‘Earth First!’.” In Millennium, Messiahs, and Mayhem, eds. Thomas Robbins and Susan Palmer, 119–37. New York & London: Routledge, 1997.

_______. “Environmental Apocalypse.” In Millennium, Messiahs, and Mayhem, eds. Thomas Robbins and Susan J. Palmer,119–37. New York and London: Routledge, 1997.

LeVasseur, Todd. 2017. ‘Decisive Ecological Warfare: Triggering Industrial Collapse Via Deep Green Resistance’, Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture 11.1: 109–30.

Likar, Lawrence E. 2011. Eco-Warriors, Nihilistic Terrorists, and the Environment, Praeger Security International (Santa Barbara, Calif: Praeger).

Mancuso-Smith, Chrystal. 2005. From Monkeywrenching to Mass Destruction: Eco-Sabotage and the American West. Journal of Land Resources and Environmental Law 26

Michael, George. 2012. Lone Wolf Terror and the Rise of Leaderless Resistance (Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press).

Nagtzaam, Gerry. 2017. From Environmental Action to Ecoterrorism?: Towards a Process Theory of Environmental and Animal Rights Oriented Political Violence (Cheltenham, UK ; Northampton, MA: Edward Elgar Pub.).

Posłuszna, Elżbieta. 2015. Environmental and Animal Rights Extremism, Terrorism, and National Security (Amsterdam: Elsevier/Butterworth-Heinemann).

Sciubba, Jennifer Dabbs. 2011. The Future Faces of War: Population and National Security, The Changing Face of War (Santa Barbara, Calif.: Praeger).

Taylor, Bron. “Diggers, Wolfs, Ents, Elves and Expanding Universes: Bricolage, Religion, and Violence From Earth First! and the Earth Liberation Front to the Antiglobalization Resistance.” In The Cultic Milieu: Oppositional Subcultures in an Age of Globalization, eds. Jeffrey Kaplan and Heléne Lööw, 26–74. Lanham, Maryland: Altamira/Rowman and Littlefield, 2002.

_______. “Religion, Violence, and Radical Environmentalism: From Earth First! to the Unabomber to the Earth Liberation Front.” Terrorism and Political Violence 10, no. 4 (1998): 10–42.

“Threat Assessments and Radical Environmentalism.” Terrorism and Political Violence 15, no. 4 (Winter 2004): 183–172.

________.‘Revisiting Ecoterrorism’, in Vasilios N. Makrides and Jörg Rüpke (eds.), Religionen Im Konflikt (Münster, Germany: Aschendorff): 237–48.

Smith, Brent L. Terrorism in America. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1994.

Vanderheiden, Steve. 2008. ‘Radical Environmentalism in an Age of Antiterrorism’, Environmental Politics 17.2: 299–318.

_______. 2005. ‘Eco-Terrorism or Justified Resistance? Radical Environmentalism and the “War on Terror”’, Politics & Society 33: 425–47.

Wagner, Travis. 2008. ‘Reframing Ecotage as Ecoterrorism: News and the Discourse of Fear’, Environmental Communication 2.1: 25–39.

Wood, Bill. “Terrorizing the Desert.” American Motorcyclist, no. April (1989): 44–6.

Zubrin, Robert. 2011. Merchants of despair: radical environmentalists, criminal pseudo-scientists, and the fatal cult of antihumanism. New York: New Atlantis/Encounter.

Bioregionalism-promoting books and articles

• Aberley, Doug, ed. Boundaries of Home: Mapping for Local Empowerment. Philadelphia: New Society, 1993.

Alexander, Donald. “Bioregionalism: Science or Sensibility?” Environmental Ethics 12, no. summer (1990): 161–73.

Andruss, Van, Christopher Plant, Judith Plant and Eleanor Wright. Home!: A Bioregional Reader. Philadelphia: New Society, 1990.

Barnhill, David Landis. At Home on Earth: Becoming Native to Our Place. Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 1999.

Coleman, Daniel A. Ecopolitics: Buliding a Green Society. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1994.

• Dasmann, Raymond. “Bioregion.” In Conservation and Environmentalism: An Encyclopedia, ed. Robert Paelke, 83–5. New York & London: Garland, 1995.

Dasmann, Raymond. The Biotic Provinces of the World (IUCN Occasional Paper No 9). , 1973.

Dasmann, Raymond. “Toward a Dynamic Balance of Man and Nature.” The Ecologist 6 (1976): uk.

** Dasmann, Raymond and Peter Berg. “Reinhabiting California.” In Reinhabiting a Separate Country, ed. Peter Berg, 217–20. San Francisco: Planet Drum, 1978.

Dasmann, Raymond. “Biogeographical Provinces.” Co-Evolution Quarterly, no. Fall (1978): 32–7.

Dasmann, Raymond. “I Am Looking At a Picture of Home.” In Reinhabiting a Separate Country, ed. Peter Berg, 29–33. San Francisco: Planet Drum, 1978.

** Dodge, Jim. “Living by Life: Some Bioregional Theory and Practice.” In Home! A Bioregional Reader, ed. Van Andruss, 5–12. Philadelphia: New Society, 1990.

Dodge, Jim. “Living by Life: Some Bioregional Theory and Practice.” CoEvolution Quarterly 32, no. winter (1981): 6–12.

Durning, Alan Thein. This Place on Earth: Home and the Practice of Permanence. Seattle, Washington: Sasquatch, 1996.

Dobson, Andrew. Green Political Thought: An Introduction. London: Unwin Hyman, 1990.

Foreman, Dave. “Becoming the Forest in Defense of Itself.” In Turtle Talk, eds. Christopher Plant and Judith Plant, 58–65. Santa Cruz, California: New Society, 1990.

Foreman, Dave. “Reinhabitation, Biocentrism, and Self Defense.” Earth First! 7, no. 7 (1 August 1987): 22.

Foster, Charles. Experiments in Bioregionalism: The New England River. Hanover: New Hampshire University Press, 1984.

Grumbine, Ed. “Boundary Marking.” Earth First! 8, no. 1 (1 November 1987): 27.

** Gorsline, Jeremiah and L. Freeman House. “Future Primitive.” In Home!: A Bioregional Reader (Originally in Raise theStakes #3, 1974), eds. Van Andrus, Christopher Plant, Judith Plant and Eleanor Wright, 39–41. Philadelphia: New Society, 1990.

Haenke, David. “Bioregionalism and Earth First!” Earth First! 7, no. 2 (21 December 1986): 28–9.

Hawkins, Ronnie. “North American Bioregional Congress Convening.” Earth First! 4, no. 4 (20 March 1984): 8.

* House, Freeman. “Totem Salmon.” In North Pacific Rim Alive. San Francisco: Planet Drum, Bundle No. 3, 1974.

** _______. Totem Salmon: Life Lessons From Another Species. Boston: Beacon, 1999.

House, L. Freeman. “Totem Salmon.” In Home: A Bioregional Reader, eds. Van Andruss, Christopyher Plant, Judith Plantand Eleanor Wright, 65–72. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: New Society, 1990.

Jackson, Wes. Becoming Native to This Place. Washington DC: Counterpoint, 1996.

Johnson, Huey. Green Plans: Greenprint for Sustainability. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1995.

Kemmis, Daniel. Community and the Politics of Place. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1992 (reissued)..

Klyza, Christopher, McGrory. “Bioregional Possibilities in Vermont.” In Bioregionalism, ed. Michael McGinnis, 81–98.London & New York: Routledge, 1999.

* Kroeber, A. L. Cultural and Natural Areas of Native North America. 1939; reprint, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1947.

Lipschutz, Ronnie D. “Guardians of the Forest: Renegotiating Resource Regimes in Northern California.” In Global Civil Society and Global Environmental Governance, ed. Ronnie D. Lipschutz, 81–125. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1996.

Litfin, Karen. “Ecoregimes: Playing Tug of War with the Nation-State.” In The State and Social Power in Global Environmental Movements, eds. Ronnie D. Lipschutz and Ken Conca, 94–117. New York: Columbia University Press, 1993.

Luke, Timothy. Ecocritique: Contesting the Politics of Nature, Economy, and Culture. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997.

Mander, Jerry and Edward Goldsmith. The Case Against the Global Economy, and for a Turn Toward the Local. San Francisco: Sierra Club, 1996.

Marshall, Gene. “Bioregional Spirituality: Its Unity and Diversity.” In Proceedings of the Third North American Bioregional Congress: , ed. Zuckerman, Seth, 34–7. San Francisco: Planet Drum, 1989.

** McGinnis, Michael Vincent, ed. Bioregionalism. New York and London: Routledge, 1999.

McKibben, Bill. Hope, Human and Wild: True Stories of Living Lightly on the Earth..

Mills, Stephanie. In Service of the Wild: Restoring and Reinhabiting the Wild. Boston: Beacon, 1995.

Morrison, Roy. Ecological Democracy. Boston, MA: South End, 1995.

Newkirk, Allen Van. “Bioregions: Towards Bioregional Strategy for Human Cultures.” Environmental Conservation 2 (1975): 108.

Roszak, Theodore. Person/Planet: The Creative Disintegration of Industrial Society. New York: Anchor, 1978.

** Snyder, Gary. The Practice of the Wild. San Francisco: North Point Press, 1990.

Sale, Kirkpatrick. Dwellers in the Land: The Bioregional Vision. San Francisco: 1985; reprint, Philadelphia, PA: New Society Publishers, 1991.

Snyder, Gary. “Reinhabitation.” Earth First! 7, no. 8 (23 September 1987): 28.

** Taylor, Bron. “Bioregionalism: An Ethics of Loyalty to Place.” Landscape Journal 19, no. 1&2 (2000): 50–72.

* Thayer, Robert L. LifePlace: Bioregional Thought and Practice. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2003.

Zuckerman, Seth, Editor. “Proceedings of the Third North American Bioregional Congress.” In Proceedings of the Third North American Bioregional Congress: in British Columbia, Canada 1989. San Francisco: Planet Drum, 1989.

Zwerin, Michael. Devolutionary Notes. San Francisco: 1980; reprint, Philadelphia: New Society, 1990.

Case Studies

American Forests and the Battles over them

General

* Alverson, William S., Walter Kuhlmann and Donald M. Waller. Wild Forests: Conservation Biology and Public Policy. Washington D.C.: Island Press, 1994. Superb introduction to the science of diverse forests with periodic allusions to the political difficulty to implement science-based policies, given the strong economic interests that benefit from deforestation and their political connections.

Fritz, Edward C. Sterile Forest: The Case Against Clearcutting. Austin, TX: Eakin Press, 1983.

Thomas, Jack Ward. The Journals of a Forest Service Chief. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2004. (Perspective and an insider’s history from the man in charge of the USDA Forest Service during the tumultuous 1990s; includes important information on the “Salvage Rider” and Spotted Owl cases.)

Pacific Northwest and the Redwoods

The following all are good sources on the great struggle over the Northwestern Forests. The environmental Historian Langston provides the most in-depth historical background. Durban focuses more on the grassroots. Wilkinson and Yaffee provides more on the science, and Wilkinson looks at some of the radical environmental groups that took up litigation as their central strategy. Other notes follow some of these titles.

Coleman, Kate. The Secret Wars of Judi Bari: A Car Bomb, the Fight for the Redwoods, and the End of Earth First! Encounter Books: San Francisco, 2005.

** Dietrich, William. The Final Forest: The Battle for the Last Great Trees of the Pacific Northwest. New York: Penguin, 1992.

** Durbin, Kathie. Tree Huggers: Victory, Defeat, and Renewal in the Northwest Ancient Forest Campaign. Seattle, Washington: Mountaineers, 1996.

Foster, John Bellamy. 1993. The Limits of Environmentalism without Class: Lessons From the Ancient Forest Struggle of the Pacific Northwest (New York: Monthly Review Press).

** Harris, David. The Last Stand: The War Between Wall Street and Main Street Over California’s Ancient Redwoods. New York: Times Books/Random House, 1995. Harris provides an account of the battle to save the

Redwoods from Maxam Corporation, spotlighting esp. the litigation pioneered by the Environmental Protection Information Center. Good background for understanding the struggle for the Headwaters forest and why people, like Julia Butterfly Hill, sit in trees.

• Langston, Nancy. Forest Dreams, Forest Nightmares: The Paradox of Old Growth in the Inland West. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1995.

Sher, Victor M. “Travels with Strix.” Public land law review 14 (1993): 41–79.

• Seidman, David. Showdown at Opal Creek: The Battle for America’s Last Wilderness. New York: Carol & Graf, 1993. Excellent account of struggle and eventual victory to save Opal Creek watershed, in Oregon’s Cascade Mountains.

Speece, Darren. 2017. Defending giants: the redwood wars and the transformation of American environmental politics. Seattle: University of Washington Press.

• Yaffee, Steven. The Wisdom of the Spotted Owl. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1994.

• Wilkinson, Todd. Science Under Siege: The Politicians’ War on Nature and Truth. Boulder, Colorado: Johnson Publishing Company, 1998.

Updates on the Owl Case:

Associated Press. “Decline in Spotted Owls.” New York Times, 17 April 2003, A, 18.

Mappes, Lynda V. “Despite Protections, Spotted Owl on the Decline.” Seattle Times (Online), 17 April 2003, A, 18.

Northern Rockies

• Manning, Richard. Last Stand: Journalism, Logging and the Search for Humility. Salt Lake City, UT: Gibbs Smith. The story of deforestation by two corporate giants in the Norther Rockies. Compare with Pezeshki.

• Pezeshki, Charles. Wild to the Last: Environmental Conflict in Clearwater Country. Pullman, Washington: Washington State University Press, 1998. An insider’s description of the radical environmental campaigns in the

Northern Rockies, esp. Cove Mallard Idaho. Compare with Manning, and Taylor’s “Earth First! Fights Back”

Taylor, Bron. “Earth First! Fights Back.” Terra Nova 2, no. 2 [Spring] (1997): 29–43. An analysis of Earth First!’ resistance and the rationale for it, with the anti-logging resistance at Cove/Mallard, Idaho as its central case study.

• Yaffee, Steven. The Wisdom of the Spotted Owl. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1994.

** Zakin, Susan. Coyotes and Town Dogs: Earth First! and the Environmental Movement. New York: Viking, 1993.

Radical and Popular Environmental Movements beyond the United States

Bahro, Rudolf. From Red to Green. London: Verso, 1984.

Broad, Robin and John Cavanagh. Plundering Paradise: The Struggle for the Environment in the Philippines. Berkeley,CA: University of California Press, 1993.

** Colchester, Marcus and Larry Lohmann. The Struggle for Land and the Fate of the Forests. Edited by Marcus Colchesterand Larry Lohman. Penang, Malaysia: World Rainforest Movement, 1993.

** Friedmann, John and Haripriya Rangan, eds. In Defense of Livelihood: Comparative Studies in Environmental Action. West Hartford, Connecticut: Kumarian Press, 1993.

Gedicks, Al. The New Resource Wars: Native and Environmental Struggles Against Multinational Corporations. Boston,MA: South End Press, 1993.

Guha, Ramachandra. The Unquiet Woods: Ecological Change and Peasant Resistance in the Himalayas. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989.

Hecht, Susanna B. and Alexander Cockburn. Fate of the Forest: Developers, Destroyers and Defenders of the Amazon. London: Verso, 1989.

Hurst, Philip. Rainforest Politics: Ecological Destruction in South-East Asia. London & New Jersey: Zed, 1990.

McIntosh, Alistair. Soil and Soul: People Versus Corporate Power. London: Aurum Press, 2001.

Roots, Christopher. Environmental Movements: Local, National, Global. London & Portland: Frank Cass, 1999.

Sachs, Wolfgang, ed. Global Ecology: A New Arena of Political Conflict. Halifax, Nova Scotia: Fernwood Bookd Ltd., 1993.

Pearce, Fred. Green Warriors. London: The Bodley Head, 1991.

Peluso, Nancy Lee. Rich Forests, Poor People: Resource Control and Resistance in Java. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992.

_______. “Coercing Conservation: The Politics of State Resource Control.” In The State and Social Power in Global Environmental Politics, eds. Ronnie D. Lipschutz and Ken Conca, 46–70. New York: Columbia University Press, 1993.

** Taylor, Bron, ed. Ecological Resistance Movements: The Global Emergence of Radical and Popular Environmentalism. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press, 1995.

Shiva, Vandana. Staying Alive: Women, Ecology, and Development. London: Zed, 1988.

Weaver, Jace, ed. Defending Mother Earth: Native American Perspectives on Environmental Justice. Maryknoll, New York: Orbis, 1996.

Globalization — Critique of and Resistance to

Cavanagh, John and and others. Alternatives to Economic Globalization. Berrett-Koehler, 2002.

Cockburn, Alexander and Jeffrey St. Clair. 5 Days That Shook the World: Seattle and Beyond. London: Verso, 2000.

Greider, William. “GLOBAL AGENDA: After the WTO Protest in Seattle, It’s Time to Go on the Offensive. Here’s How.” The Nation (31 January 2000): thenation.com.

Hawken, Paul. “On the Streets of Seattle.” Amicus Journal, Spring 2000.

International Forum on Globalization. “The Siena Declaration.” New York Times, 24 November 1998, A, 7.

Kaplan, Jeffrey and Heléne Lööw, eds. The Cultic Milieu: Oppositional Subcultures in an Age of Globalization. Lanham, Maryland: Altamira, 2002.

Khor, Kok Peng and Martin Khor. Rethinking globalization: critical issues and policy choices. London: Zed, 2001.

Khor, Martin, ed. WTO and the Global Trading System. London: Zed, 2005.

• Korten, David C. When Corporations Rule the World. West Hartford, Connecticut and San Francisco, California: Kumarian and Barrett-Kohler, 1995.

• Mander, Jerry and Edward Goldsmith. The Case Against the Global Economy, and for a Turn Toward the Local. San Francisco: Sierra Club, 1996.

Mertes, Tom, Editor. A Movement of Movements: Is Another World Really Possible? London & New York: Verso, 2004.

Mol, Arthur P. J. Globalization and Environmental Reform. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2003.

• Nader, Ralph, William Greider, Margaret Atwood, Vandana Shiva, Mark Ritchie, Wendell Berry, Jerry Brown, Herman Daly, Lori Wallach, Thea Lee, Martin Khor, David Phillips, Jorge Casteñeda, Carlos Heridia, David Morris and Jerry Mander. The Case Against Free Trade: GATT, NAFTA, and the Globalization of Corporate Power. San Francisco& Berkeley: Earth Island Press and North Atlantic Books, 1993.

Starhawk. Webs of Power: Notes From the Global Uprising. Gabrioloa Island, British Columbia: New Society Publishers, 2002.

Stewart-Harawira. The New Imperial Order: Indigenous Responses to Globalization. London: Zed, 2005.

• Thomas, Janet. The Battle in Seattle: The Story Behind and Beyond the WTO Demonstrations. New York: Fulcrum, 2000.

50 Years Is Enough Network. Empty Promises: The IMF, the World Bank, and the Planned Failures of Global Capitalism. Washington, D.C.: 50 years Is Enough Network, 2003.

(See also next section)

Technology and Biotechnology — Critique of and Resistance to

Ellul, Jacques. The Technological Society. New York: Vintage, 1964.

Kaczynski, Theodore. “Industrial Society and Its Future.” Washington Post, 19 September 1995, A, 1.

• Shiva, Vandana. Biopiracy the Plunder of Nature and Knowledge. Boston: South End Press, 1997.

• Tokar, Brian. Gene Traders: Biotechnology, World Trade, and the Globalization of Hunger. Burlington, Vermont: Toward Freedom, 2004.

Winner, Langon. Autonomous Technology: Techniques-Out-of-Control As a Theme in Political Thought. Cambridge, MA: MITPress, 1977.

Winner, Langon. The Whale and the Reactor: A Search for Limits in an Age of High Technology. Chicago, Illinois: University of Chicago Press, 1986.

Ecopsychology and Radical Ecology

Cohen, Michael J. Reconnecting with Nature: Finding Wellness through Restoring Your Bond with the Earth. Corvallis, OR: Ecopress, 2004.

Devall, Bill. “Earth Bonding.” Earth First! 3, no. 2 (21 December 1982): 13.

• Fisher, Andy. Radical Ecopsychology: Psychology in the Service of Life. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press, 2002.

• Foster, Steven and Meridith Little. The Vision Quest. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1980.

Foster, Stephen. Book of Vision Quest. Fireside, 1989.

Fox, Warwick. Toward a Transpersonal Ecology. Boston: Shambhala, 1991.

• Fox, Warwick, ed. Toward a Transpersonal Psychology. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press, 1996.

Grof, Stanislav. The Holotropic Mind. San Francisco: Harper, 1992.

Grof, Stanislav. The Adventure of Self-Discovery: Dimensions of Consciousness and New Perspectives in Psychotherapy and Inner Exploration. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press, 1988.

Glendinning, Chellis. My Name Is Chellis and I’m in Recovery From Western Civilization. Boston & London: Shambhala, 1994.

Gibson, Peter M. “Therapeutic Aspects of Wilderness Programs: A Comprehensive Literature Review.” Therapeutic Recreation Journal, no. 2^nd quarter (1979): pages na.

• Hillman, James and Michael Ventura. We’ve Had a Hundred Years of Psychotherapy and the World’s Getting Worse. San Francisco: HarperCollins, 1993.

** Keepin, William. “Toward an Ecological Psychology.” Revision: a Journal of Consciousness and Transformation 14, no. 2 (1991): 90–100.

Kidner, David W. Nature and Psyche: Radical Environmentalism and the Politics of Subjectivity. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press.

** Macy, Joanna. World as Lover, World as Self. Berkeley, CA: Parallax Press, 1991.

• Metzner, Ralph. Green Psychology: Cultivating a Spiritual Connection with the Natural World. Rochester, Vermont: Inner Traditions International Ldt., 1999.

• Metzner, Ralph, ed. Ayahuasca: Human Consciousness and the Spirits of Nature. Berkeley and New York: Thunder’s MouthPress, 1999.

Quinn, Daniel. Providence: The Story of a Fifty-Year Vision Quest. New York: Bantam, 1994.

** Roszak, Theodore. The Voice of the Earth: An Exploration of Ecopsychology. New York: Touchstone, 1992.

* Roszak, Theodore, Mary E. Gomes and Allen D. Kanner, eds. Ecopsychology: Restoring the Earth, Healing the Mind. San Francisco: Sierra Club, 1995.

** Seed, John, Joanna Macy, Pat Fleming and Arne Naess. Thinking Like a Mountain: Towards a Council of All Beings. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: New Society, 1988.

** Shepard, Paul. Nature and Madness. San Francisco: Sierra Club Books, 1982.

Seagal, Fran. “Full Circle: Creativity and the Ecopsychology Movement.” unpublished.

Segal, Fran. “Ecopsychology: Toward an Integration of Nature and Culture.” Creation Spirituality 9, no. 2 (1993): uk.

Walsh, Roger. Staying Alive: The Psychology of Human Survival. Boston & London: New Science/Shambhala, 1985.

Winter, Deborah DuNann. Ecological Psychology: Healing the Split Between Planet and Self. Harper Collins.

Audio Media Resources

Audio-Visual Media Resources (Video & Film)

Beyond Borders: Wildlands of the Northern Rockies. Green Fire Productions (Corvallis) and Alliance for the Wild

Rockies (Missoula). Good 28 min film on destruction wrought by logging & salvage rider Bison. Arts and Entertainment.channel investigative report on the conflicts over Bison management, 2000.

Breaking the Spell. PickAxe productions. $72 minutes.

DamNation (2014). Documentary about Earth First! anti-dam campaigns.

The Last Buffalo War. National Wildlife Foundation, 1998. appx 20 minutes, discusses science of Brucillosis, urges viewers to support management of Bison as wildlife not agriculture, and discusses alliance with NWF and Intertribal Bison Cooperative to protect wild Bison.

The Death of David Chain. Anonymously shot video illustrating the conflict with the logger shortly before he felled the tree that killed forest activist David Chain. 9 September 1998.

Dixie Roughcut (Cove Mallard). Videotape (not professionally edited) of near-violent confrontations in rural Idaho during Cove-Mallard campaign.

“Earth First!” 60 Minutes. (CBS News), 1989.

End Logging on Public Lands. Many Rivers Chapter-Sierra Club, 1996.

Dave Foreman “GreenFire” Presentation. Doug Freshner: Oshkosh Wisconsin, 1990.

Dixie Roughcut / Cove Mallard (Summer 1993)

Eco-Paganism on Television in the United Kingdom (Compiled by Adrian Harris)

Fern Gully. 1992. 20^th Century Fox. Animated commercial wherein indigenous people and fairies/forest spirits resist rainforest destruction.)

Goddess of the Earth. PBS. Video on Gaia theory.

The Great Forest. Missoula: High Plains Films (Doug Hawes-Davis). Three logging-related documentary-genre films in one DVD, produced by movement activists, including “Southbound,” and “Green Rolling Hills” focusing on shift of pulp and paper industry to the southeastern United States.

Green Rolling Hills, 1995/2003, 28 minutes. West Virginia chip mills.

The Hundredth Monkey. Westport, CT: Hartley Film Foundation, 1982, 28 minutes. Good illustration of how ‘metaphysics of interconnection’ give some activists hope, and a reason to pursue, dramatic consciousness change as a strategy to overcome social and environmental dysfunctions. With Ken Keyes himself.

If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front (2011). Documentary

Instinct. Commercial film loosely adapted from the Ishmael novel; starring Anthony Hopkins

Judi Bari Presentations including on “Revolutionary Ecology,” Oshkosh Wisconsin, 1992.

Lacandona: The Zapastistas and the Rainforest of Chiapas, Mexico. Native Forest Network, Eastern North America

Resource Center. Burlington, Vermont, 1998. Excellent video from a movement perspective

Lessons from the Ancient Forest: Earth Wisdom and Political Activism. Cave Junction, Oregon: Siskiyou Regional Education Project. Video of Lou Gould’s presentation sponsored, by John Denver, about the Kalmiopsis wilderness and radical environmental efforts to defend it.

Luna: The Stafford Giant Tree Sit. Headwaters Action Video Collective, 1998.

Mama Bilong Olgeta (Mother of Us All). Seed, John and Rainforest Information Centre. Lismore, Australia, 1995.

No Room for Compromise. Leona. Klippstein & the Spirit of Sage Council, 1994.

Pickaxe. Activist/anarchist video on NW forest resistance, featuring Tim Ream.

The East (2013). Theatrical film about an eco-anarchist group.

The Pie’s the Limit. Whispered Media. 1999. Video from the Biotic Baking brigade re. attacks on corporate capitalism.

Rage Over Trees. PBS/Audubon Society. Excellent video on the NW forests and battles over them.

Redwood Summer: This Is Where the 90s Begin..

Road Use Restricted. Good video on Cove-Mallard campaign..

Showdown in Seattle. Independent Media Center, 1999, 150 minutes

Southbound. High Plains Films, 2003, 47 minutes. Southern Chip Mills documentary, with Ned Mudd and others.

Thinking Like a Watershed. Produced by Johan Carlisle. Ben Lomond, CA 95005: The Video Project. About Matole river watershed back-to-the-land movement activists fighting to restore salmon habitat and build a sustainable bioregional community..

Timber Wars. CBS: 60 Minutes, 5 May 1996.

Tree Sit: The Art of Resistance.

Troubled Waters. Green Fire Productions (Corvallis) v. salvage rider, stressing fisheries. 12 minutes.

To Wake Up One Day Different: An Interview with John Seed by Ram Dass. Dass, Ram and John Seed.

Turn of the Wrench Roadshow. Andy Caffrey’s video of roadshow with Dana Lyons and Lone Wolf Circles..

Twelve Monkeys. Commercial film with radical environmental themes.

Varmits. Missoula: High Plains Films (Doug Hawes-Davis). Re. hunting subcultures and killing of prairie dogs on the plains.

Wrenched (2014). Documentary about Edward Abbey and Radical Environmentalism.

Yellowstone to Yukon: the Wildlands Project. Excellent Discovery Channel video narrated by David Suzuki, about the Wildlands Project in the northern Rockies.

OTHER, RELATED VIDEO

Angels of Mercy. United Kingdom: Animal Liberation Front, 1990 (circa).

Animal Liberation Front Anti-Fur Campaign. 60 Minutes., 12 December 1991.

Battle for Wilderness: Muir and Pinchot: PBS: The American Experience, 1990.

Bison. Public Broadcasting (US), 1999.

Gaia: Goddess of the Earth. PBS.

The Global Brain. With Russell, Peter. England: I.C. Twickenham.

In the Light of Reverence. McLeod, Christopher and Malinda Maynor, co-producers, Washington, D.C.: Independent Television Service & Native American Public Telecommunications, 14 August 2001.

Radical Environmentalism on the World Wide Web

Radical Environmental Roots and Offshoots

Earth First! and Offshoots

Center for Biological Diversity: See description under “Law-based resistance,” below. Founded by Phoenix Arizona emergency room physician Robin Silver, and two early EF!ers, Kieran Suckling and Peter Galvin. Now arguably the most effective law-based biodiversity protection group in North America.)

Circle of Life Foundation. The organization Julia “Butterfly” Hill formed to continue her work after her famous tree sit.

Earth First! – the Radical Environmental Journal Earth Liberation Front press office.

Fund for Wild Nature. Site for Earth First!’s own fund; used largely to support direct action campaigns.

Judi Bari Home Page and the Redwood Summer Justice Project. Listen to the radio program

(MP3) “Revolutionary Ecology”: http://www.judibari.org/audio/Bari-RevolutionaryEcologyAR-20kB.mp3

Conservation Northwest; was Northwest Ecosystem Alliance. Founded by early EF!er Mitch Friedman, who became critical of the countercultural style of the movement and tried to reach out

The Ruckus Society: Founded by Earth First! co-founder Mike Roselle, and directed by former Greenpeace Direct Action expert John Sellers, this society trains activists in non-violent direct action, supporting forest defense, anti-globalization protests, etc.

The Rewilding Institute: Dave Forman’s latest venture with Michael Soule, founded in 1983, is a “conservation think tank dedicated to the development and promotion of ideas and strategies to advance continental-scale conservation in North America.”

Deep Ecology

Deep Ecology entry in the ERN

Foundation for Deep Ecology. Funded & Founded by the former CEO of North Face and Esprit corporation, who converted to DE by reading Arne Naess.

Institute for Deep Ecology.

Ecopsychology and Transpersonal Psychology

John Davis’s Ecopsychology Site

Wilderness Guides Council. See the history link for background information on some of the key figures involved in “wilderness vision quests,” which have been important to some radical environmentalists.

Rites of Passage/Wilderness Vision Quest. Founded by Steven and Meredith Foster in 1977, run by Michael Bodkin since 1987.

Law-based Resistance (including Earth First! groups)

Center for Biological Diversity: Founded by Phoenix Arizona emergency room physician Robin Silver, and two early EF!ers, Kieran Suckling and Peter Galvin. Now arguably the most effective law-based biodiversity protection group in North America.)

Earth Justice. Was the Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund, until they refused to take their marching orders from it.

Environmental Protection Information Center: Responsible for some of the most important and precedent setting environmental litigation in the Northwestern U.S., located in the Redwood Biome, Garberville, northern California. Predated similar strategies by Earth First Groups.

Earth Law Center. Has many radical environmentalists involved and promotes intrinsic value of nature.

Globalization Resistance

(“Alternative Globalization”, Anti-Corporate/Capitalist/ NeoLiberal, Movements/Sites)

See anti-globalization entry from Wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia.

International Forum on Globalization, built with significant donations by Doug Tompkins (North Face then Esprit Corporations) one of the deep pockets of the radical environment/deep ecology movement. Tompkins is a mountaineer who came to his activism via the writings of Arne Naess.

World Social Forum ... “an open meeting place where groups and movements of civil society opposed to neo-liberalism and a world dominated by capital or by any form of imperialism, but engaged in building a planetary society centred on the human person, come together to pursue their thinking, to debate ideas democratically, for formulate proposals, share their experiences freely and network for effective action (see the Charter of Principles). The WSF proposed to debate alternative means to building a globalization in solidarity, which respects universal human rights and those of all men and women of all nations and the environment, and is grounded in democratic international systems and institutions at the service of social justice, equality and the sovereignty of peoples.

Anarchist Resistance

Green Anarchist: A good introduction from www.TheFreeDictionary.com to the original magazine by this title, the infusion of “primitivist” views such as those of John Zerzan, and eventual controversy over terrorist tactics.

Primitivism

Coalition Against Civilization: Collectivity website and location for the writings of Kevin Tucker, who John Zerzan says is working on the spiritual dimensions of radical environmentalism.

This is also the site for the anarcho-primitivist, insurrectionary Species Traitor journal.

Green Anarchy Magazine Archive 2001-2008: according to “TheFreeDictionary, this group broke off in 2000 from Green Anarchist and began publishing from Eugene Oregon by a collective including John Zerzan. Compare with the website/writings of Zerzan, Moore, and Kevin Tucker, introduced at Insurgent Desire: The Online Green Anarchy Archive.

International Workers of the World

Industrial Workers of the World (IWW): an anarchistic, radical labor group that many radical environmentalists have had affinity with and that some, most notably Judi Bari, sought to build connections to.

Infoshop. A good clearing house for information on anarchism. It includes helpful FAQ pages that address “What is anarchism?” and other frequently asked questions. This is “mainstream anarchism,” if such terminology is not an oxymoron, and includes a critique of Green Anarchy, John Zerzan, John Moore and other anarcho-primitivists.

Regional Issues and Issue-Focused Campaigns

Animal Liberation, Rights, and Hunt Sabotage Bioregional and Watershed Protection Organizations

Mendocino Environmental Center

Missoula Ecology Center

Genetic Engineering Resistance Road Resistance

Reclaim the Streets/Critical Mass “A direct action network for global and local social-ecological revolution(s) to transcend hierarchical and authoritarian society”

Reclaim the Streets (United Kingdom)

Paganism (including Wicca) Campaign Sites (& Case Studies)

Starhawk and Reclaiming (links to ERN entries: Starhawk and Reclaiming)

Black Mesa (historical ERN entry)

GO Road (historical ERN Entry)

The National Forest Protection and Restoration Act Conceived of and promoted by many radical environmentalists, here described at the ecostewards website.

SPRING 2018: Environmental Ethics (Rel 2104)

Source:

<http://brontaylor.com/test_site/102-2/courses/spring-2018-environmental-ethics/>

SECTIONSClearcut Oregon

Lectures Tuesday, Periods 2 & 3 (8:30–10:25), in Florida Gym Room 220

Section 006G: Thursday Discussion Period 2 (8:30–9:20), Anderson Hall, Room 101

Section 1A65: Thursday Discussion Period 3 (9:35–10:25), Anderson Hall, Room 013

INSTRUCTOR

Professor Bron Taylor (Ph.D.)
Email: bron@religion.ufl.edu
Office: Anderson 121
Office hours: Tuesday 10:45–12:15 and by appointment

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Aya Cockram (Teaching Assistant)
Email: ayac2889@ufl.edu
Office: Anderson 119
Office hours: Monday: 12:00–1:00; Wednesday: 4:00 — 5:00 and by appointment

DESCRIPTION

Brief Course Description (in UF Catalogue)

Exploration of competing secular and religious views regarding human impacts on and moral responsibilities toward nature and of the key thinkers and social movements in contention over them.

Role in Curriculum

This course serves as an elective for Religion majors and minors, and provides credit for the department’s ethics emphasis. It also meets the ethics requirement in UF’s Sustainability minor and for SNRE students, and provides Humanities General Education, and Writing Rule credit (E2/2000 words or more).

Overview

As concern over the well-being of the planet spreads, people frequently find themselves in conflict over how to balance conservation with the use of natural resources, about visions for our common future, and the wisdom of development. Such conflict stems in important ways from varying understandings of values and responsibilities, of what is good and right. In this course we will examine a wide range of intellectual efforts to address the problem of our obligations to Earth and its living systems. Although we will focus on contemporary philosophical environmental ethics we will also introduce religious environmental ethics, examine ideas about nature prevalent in American culture and history, and examine how individuals involved in contemporary environmental movements express and endeavor to implement their environmental values.

Teaching Objectives

1. To understand the historical emergence and development of environmental philosophy and environmental ethics in Western societies, as well as the ways such ethics become entwined with and influenced by developments in religion, literature, and the arts, as illuminated by the Humanities.

2. To understand the range of perspectives on human responsibility to the environment and enable critical thinking and writing about them, including by arbitrating among competing views of environmental facts.

3. To understand the epistemological bases (philosophical, scientific, religious, aesthetic) for different ethical orientations as well as the various methodological approaches to making individual and public environment-related decisions.

4. To introduce the contribution of diverse humanities disciplines, especially art history, literary criticism, philosophy, and religious studies, to illuminating environmental ethics and practice.

5. To communicate effectively and logically one’s own moral perspective and views of environmental facts and trends orally and in writing.

READINGS & ELECTRONIC DEVICES

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Many of the course readings are directly downloadable under the assignments found in the course’s shedule section. Required readings for the course not available via this website are available from the University of Florida bookstore and elsewhere, and students are expected to purchase or otherwise gain access to these readings:

Daniel Quinn, Ishmael (Bantam, 1992) (or The Story of B, for students who have already read Ishmael.)

The rest of these will have chapters available in a course reader; details will be sent by email.

DesJardines, Environmental Ethics (5^th edition)

Gardiner and Thompson, Oxford Handbook of Environmental Ethics (below OHEE)

Over recent years I have gained the impression that laptops and tablets impede careful listening and thus learning. Increasingly, research is demonstrating that this is indeed the case; see Susan Dynarski, Laptops Are Great. But Not During a Lecture or a Meeting. For this reason, unless instructors make explicit exceptions, do not use these devices during class. Listening and deciding what to take down in notes is a proven and effective learning method.

REQUIREMENTS

The Writing Requirement (formerly called the Gordon Rule) promotes student fluency in writing and is reflected in the following course assignments (see 1, 3, and 4, below). It includes written work in which the instructor will evaluate and provide feedback on the student’s itten assignments with respect to grammar, punctuation, clarity, coherence, and organization. Feedback and evaluation of written work will be returned to students before the end of the semester, and normally no more than one week after they are due. For due dates see the course schedule.

1. Reading Analysis. Students are expected to read assigned readings before the week for which they are assigned. Each week you are strongly encouraged to write 300–500 words in response to the major reading or readings (you decide which to focus on). These are to be brought, typed and printed, with your names on them, to your Thursday discussion sessions. Course instructors will respond to these and note which students are conscientiously preparing for class. Students who show consistent effort will be rewarded by extra points at the end of the course but preparing these responses is not mandatory.

These are the questions to address in these weekly reading responses: What are the author(s) central argument(s)? How do they build their argument(s)? What evidence do they cite? What do the authors think is at stake? With whom are the authors in contention and why?These are the sorts of questions you will need to be able to answer about all of the perspectives presented in the course if you are to participate effectively in classroom discussions as well as to perform well on exams and in your critical analysis papers. Additionally, think about the key presuppositions, strengths or weaknesses of the articles.

2. Examinations. There will be three exams. The final will be cumulative. These exams will typically have multiple-choice questions and fill-in sections, as well as short essay and/or take-home essay question(s). Study your study guides and classroom notes carefully in preparation for these exams. Everything that has occurred in class or that is assigned may appear on these exams.

3. Makeup Examinations. Makeup exams will only be permitted in cases of documented medical conditions or extreme hardship. Unless the circumstance is an emergency, to be eligible for a makeup exam, a student must email the instructors at least 24 hours before the scheduled exam to request permission to take a makeup exam. Documention of the reason must subsequently be provided. All makeup exams will be administered by arrangement during the officially designated final exam week at the end of the semester. The format and questions on the makeup exam will differ from the missed exam.

4. Essay Review. You will write a 500–1000 word essay review of Ishmael or, if you have already read it, The Story of B. (Count the words using your word processor’s word counting feature). Analyze the book, describing its overall moral perspective and the kind of evidence provided related to this perspective. Make an argument about what you take to be the strengths and/or weaknesses in the book’s assertions.

5. Critical Essay. Students will write a 1,500–2,000 word critical ethical analysis of an environment-related issue. For details, see the links under the course schedule, week 6.

6. Attendance and participation. Students are expected to attend and participate in class — this is part of the learning process. Students who miss the equivalent of three weeks of class will suffer a one-grade reduction; those missing more than this will fail the course. Students who distinguish themselves by contributing significantly to classroom discussions may receive extra points for doing so. Course instructors will be looking for the following: Do you demonstrate that you have read and understood the course readings and can you engage in discussions in an informed and civil manner? Do you regularly commit “fallacies of moral reasoning” as discussed early in the course? How well do you integrate what you are learning in this course with information gathered elsewhere?

7. Extra credit. There will normally be extra credit oportunities announced in class or via the class email list serve. These usually involve attending an event on campus or in Gainesville that engages environmental ethics. Students then will write 300–500 word essay analyzing the following: What are the central argument(s) that were being advanced? How did the individuals or groups build their argument(s)? What evidence did they cite? What do they think is at stake? With whom are those involved in contention, and why? These extra credit write ups must be turned in to the teaching assistant no later than the final exam. The points used often help students raise their grade a notch or two, e.g., from a C+ to a B- or even a B.

We will arrange forums and debates and hold them in class. Although we will not award points based on the quantity of participation, regular participation will insure that we have enough experience of you to evaluate. Do not miss class.

Monitoring email and participation in email discussions. Routine course logistics will be updated through email, via a list serve established for this purpose. These email messages will be sent to your official university email address, which you are responsible to monitor every day or two. Course instructors will also send you short supplementary materials to read and about which you may be questioned on exams. A list serve has been established for the class and students may communicate with each other and the course instructors through it. Students may ask questions via email and instructors will respond either privately or to the class, as appropriate. It is critical to check your email because, as the course progresses, the list of assignments and the readings are subject to modification. Always consult the latest version of the readings online.

EVALUATION

Points Possible for Required Assignments

This chart shows the points it is possible to earn for each assignment:

Undergraduate Section

ASSIGNMENT	POINTS PER ASSIGNMENT	TOTAL POSSIBLE POINTS
Exams (first two)	100 points each	200
Final Exam	150 points	150
Essay/Review of Ishmael	50 points	50
Critical Analysis	100 points	100
	Total Possible Points:	500

Calculating Grades

For both the midterm and final exams, the total number of points earned by each student will be divided by the total number earned by the highest-scoring student. The resulting percentage will be used to calculate each student’s grade for the course. Put in a formula, it looks like this:

the score of each individual student (your score)
(divided by) the highest score earned by a student

The percentage arrived at by means of this formula will be evaluated according to the following scale:

93% 90% 87% 83% 80% 77% 67% 60% 59%

A A- B+ B B-C+ C D F

This kind of scoring is fairer than many other forms of grading because: (1) It is based on what students actually achieve rather than some preconceived standard held by the professor; (2) Each student can receive a high grade; (3) Hard-working students will not be penalized for staying in a demanding course full of industrious students. With a traditional curve, demanding courses that “weed out” less industrious students, leaving hard-working ones, can unintentionally harm good students putting them in competition with each other. This will not occur in this course. To further insure fairness, any extra credit points will be added to the individual student’s score, only after the highest score earned by a student has been established. This ensures that the extra credit earned will not increase the difficulty of the grading scale.

Course instructor reserves the right to lower or raise course grades based on classroom contributions or upon absences. Instructor also reserves the right to change course requirements.

Late or Missing Assignments

Students who do not turn in study guides or reading analyses on the days they are collected will not receive points. The total number of points possible for the review essay will be reduced by 20% for each day it is late.

Returned Assignments

Assignments will usually be returned to students no later than one week after they were due. At the end of the semester, unreturned course work will be available for pickup in the Religion Department office in Anderson 107 for 30 days after the official date that grades are posted by the registrar. After this time, they will be shredded to ensure privacy, and then recycled.

Academic Dishonesty

Students engaged in any form of academic dishonesty, as defined under the “Academic Misconduct” section of the Student Discipline Code, may fail the course and will be subject to other disciplinary measures.

SCHEDULE

WEEKS

January — 01 — 02 — 03 — 04
February — 05 — 06- 07 — 08
March

• 09 — 10- 11
  April — 12 — 13 — 14 — 15

Note: All readings are to be completed before the class date/week under which they are listed. This schedule is subject to change so rather than printing it, I recommend bookmarking this online syllabus and consulting it regularly.

(Week 1) 9 & 11 January

Presentations:

We will begin the course with an introduction to environmental philosophy and ethics, and John Rawls’ notion of the necessity of ‘basic facts’ in ethical reasoning.

In subsequent weeks will take up our State of the Planet Report (beginning with the Limits to Growth and Planetary Boundaries analyses).

Readings: Introducing Environmental Ethics and the notion of Carrying Capacity.

Readings (required)

— DesJardines, Chapter 1, ‘Science, Politics and Ethics’.
- U.S. Global Change Research Program: Climate Science Special Report
->> Required reading: ‘Executive Summary pdf
->> Recommmended reading: ‘Full Report pdf

Powerpoint Lectures (delivered in class first three weeks; available here with audio narration)

— Introduction to Environmental Ethics (slideshow; download and review using powerpoint or keynote).
- Introduction to Environmental Ethics (movie; download and view with VLC, Quicktime, or other media players).
- Limits to Growth (slideshow; download and review using powerpoint or keynote).
- Limits to Growth (movie; download and view with VLC, Quicktime, or other media players).
- Limits to Growth-evaluation (slideshow; download and review using powerpoint or keynote).
- Limits to Growth-evaluation (movie; download and view with VLC, Quicktime, or other media players).

Readings & Website (recommended)

— Club of Rome history

— Club of Rome‘s website

— Last Call: the untold reasons of the global crisis (2012) [About the Club of Rome’s reports]

(Week 2) 16 & 18 January

Presentation: The State of the World Report ~ On limits to Growth & Planetary Boundaries.

Readings on the types of environmental ethics, with a focus on rights and utilitarian theories.

Readings (required)

— DesJardines, Chapter 2, ‘Ethical Theories and the Environment’ and Chapter 5, ‘Responsibilities to the Natural World: From Anthropocentric to Nonanthropocentric ethics’.

Websites to Review

— Ecological Footprint Network (Peruse the site and familiarize yourself with it. Then go to the “personal footprint” link and do the analysis there – be ready to provide (confidentially) your footprint (‘how many planets needed’) in class on Thursday.

Readings & Websites (recommended)

— Peter Singer, The Animal Liberation Movement

— Tom Regan, The Case for Animal Rights

Documentary

— Merchants of Doubt (2014)

(Week 3) 23 & 25 January

Presentation: The State of the World Report (Part Two: focus on biodiversity)

Readings on Biocentric and Wilderness ethics.

Readings (required)

— DesJardines, Chapter 6, ‘Biocentric ethics’ and Chapter 7 ‘Wilderness, Ecology and Ethics’.

Powerpoint Lecture (with audio narration) for review; these will not perfectly parallel classroom presentations which are more regularly updated.

— Planetary Boundaries Research (slideshow; download and review using powerpoint or keynote).
- Planetary Boundaries Research (movie; download and view with VLC, Quicktime, or other media players).

Reports to peruse (required)

— See report assigned week one, if you have not read it yet.

Reports to peruse (recommended)

— United Nations Environmentlal Program, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. This initiative of the United Nations was the co-recipient with former U.S. President Al Gore of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. Take some time to peruse the website. Find and read the especially useful Summaries for Policymakers.

Next, search ‘global warming hoax’ or ‘skeptics’ and such words to get an idea of the contempt directed at the IPPC by its detractors.

-Living Planet Report 2016 (World Wide Fun For Nature) presents annual living planet reports; the latest can be perused and downloaded and provide excellent, synthetic reports on the status of the world’s diverse species.

— IUCN (International Union for the Conservation of Nature) Red List of Threatened Species.

Readings (recommended)

— Garrett Hardin, Cultural Carrying Capacity (1986)

Documentary

— Chasing Ice (2012) or Chasing Coral (2012).

(Week 4) 30 January & 1 February

Presentation: State of the World Report, Part 3 toxics, climate change, and deforestation (concludes week 5).

Readings on the Land Ethic, holism, and aesthetics in environmental ethics.

Discussion: Individualism v. holism: Who is morally considerable? Does individualism provide a basis for “hard cases” in environmental ethics? What are the weaknesses and strengths of holistic environmental ethics?

Readings (required)

— DesJardines, Chapter 8, “The Land Ethic, ” 176–199.

— Leopold, Aldo, (biography)

— Aldo Leopold, from A Sand County Almanac Foreword, Arizona and New Mexico (especially sub-section, “Thinking like a Mountain”), “The Round River,” “Goose Music,” and The Land Ethic. (Note: The Oxford University Press edition (1949/1968) does not have “Part III”, which includes the Thinking like a Mountain, Round River, and Goose Music essays. For these, see the Ballentine Books (1970) paperback edition. Also strongly recommended from the Ballentine paperback edition, read widely, esp. “A Sand County Almanac” and “Wilderness” and “Conservation Aesthetic.

— J. Baird Callicott How ecological collectivities are morally considerable, OHEE.

Documentaries/Lectures

— Greenfire (2011)

(Week 5) 6 & 8 February

Exam One– In Class – Thursday 8 February Short answer, matching, & multiple choice exam. Closed book, no computer.

Note: Exam subject matter will be drawn exclusively from information conveyed in required readings and classroom presentations through week five.

Presentation: State of the World Report (Part III, concluded).

Readings: Pioneer-elders in environmental ethics (continued)

Readings (required)

— Thoreau, Henry David (biography)

— Thoreau readings, from Appendix of Dark Green Religion(2010).

— Muir, John (biography)

— John Muir. Read Cedar Keys, and Wild Wool. from Nature Writings. Edited by William Cronon. New York: Library of America, 1997.

— Carson, Rachel (biography)

— Rachel Carson, Nature Religion Selections and selections and commentary on Silent Spring. Also strongly recommended, peruse Under the Sea Wind, about which she ruminated in the hyperlinked selections, or read Preface and The Marginal World (pp. 1–7), and The Enduring Sea (pp. 249–50), in The Edge of the Sea (1955), or read widely from The Sea Around Us or Silent Spring (in this, her most famous book, see especially the introductory Fable for Tomorrow (pp. 1–3), and the concluding section, The Other Road, pp. 177–97, esp. its concluding two pages).

Documentary

— Battle for Wilderness (1989)

(Week 6)13 & 15 February

By 15 February, discuss the subject of your critical essay with one of your instructors. Here are resources for them:
Critical Essay Guidelines, and Critical Essay Topics; and Fallacies of Moral Reasoning.

Ethics presentations over the next several weeks include: ‘The Discipline of Ethics’, ‘Principles of Ethics: Rights, Justice, and Beneficence’, ‘Key Conundrums in Environmental Ethics’ (with powerpoint presentations) and ‘Fallacies of Moral Reasoning’ (with hyperlinked summary)

Readings in Anti-Hierarchal Environmental Ethics: Environmental Justice, Anarchism, Social Ecology, and Ecofeminism

Readings (required)

— Derek Bell, Justice on One Planet (from OHEE, ch 23)

— Anarchism and Social Ecology by John Clark in the ERN; another good summary is Carolyn Merchant, Social Ecology

— Ecofeminism by Caroline Merchant; another good summary is Ecofeminism by Laura Hobgood-Oster in the ERN

— ERN: Environmental Justice and Environmental Racism by Robert Figueroa in the ERN.

Additional Resources

— Ethics Analysis Chart

Powerpoint Lectures

— Discipline Of Ethics (pts 1 & 2) (powerpoint lecture, to be presented this and next week, available for review).

— Discipline Of Ethics (pt 3) (powerpoint lecture, to be presented during the next few weeks, available for review).

Readings (recommended)

— What is Social Ecology (originally 1993) and Social versus Deep Ecology (orig. 1987) by Murray Bookchin

Documentary

— Wild By Law (1991)

(Week 7) 20 & 22 February

Ethics presentations over the next several weeks include: ‘The Discipline of Ethics’, ‘Principles of Ethics: Rights, Justice, and Beneficence’, ‘Key Conundrums in Environmental Ethics’ (with powerpoint presentations) and ‘Fallacies of Moral Reasoning’ (with hyperlinked summary)

Readings (required)

— Arne Naess, The Shallow and the Deep, Long-Range Ecology Movement, Inquiry 16: 95–100.

— Bron Taylor & Michael Zimmerman, Deep Ecology from the Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature

— Kyle Powls Whyte and Chris Cuomo, Ethics of caring in environmental ethics, HOEE.

— Bron Taylor, Religion and Environmental Ethics from the Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature

— Arne Naess, The Deep Ecology Movement, in Deep Ecology for the 21^st Century.

Documentary

— Earth First! (60 Minutes)

1 March is the last date to provide the title, abstract, and sources for your Critical Essays to Aya Cockram (see critical essay guidelines under week 6)

(Week 8) 27 February & 1 March (3–10 March is Spring Break)

Readings and discussions on Radical Environmentalism.

Readings (required)

— ERN: Radical Environmentalism; Earth First! and the Earth Liberation Front.

— Dave Foreman with Edward Abbey and T.O. Hellenbach, Why Monkeywrench? Selections from Ecodefense, 7–23.

— Bron Taylor, Resistance: Do the Means Justify the Ends?, in Linda Stark, ed., State of the World 2013, (Worldwatch Institute: Washington, D.C. 2013).

Documentary

— Dave Foreman Lecture at UW Oshkosh (1990)

(Week 9) 13 & 15 March

Presentations and debates on radical and grassroots environmentalism.

Readings (required)

— Daniel Quinn, Ishmael, or if you have already read this novel, then read his The Story of B.

— Paul Watson, A Call for Biocentric Religion. Watson is Captain of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society and star of the Animal Planet show Whale Wars.

Documentary (required viewing)

— Blackfish (2013), which is about Killer Whales in captivity), if not in class viewing will be arranged by the instructors.
Take a look at Sea World Cares, where the corporation features its “caring and passion for wildlife”, and the New York Times article, Smart, Social and Erratic in Captivity.
Ben Minteer and Leah Gerber, Buying Whales to Save Them, Issues in science and technology, Spring 2013 (online). Be prepared to discuss the film and the ethical debates surrounging it anytime this week.

Note: you are to present a summary of your sources to Aya Cockram by 15 March, and by this time, you should be regularly working on your critical essay.

(Week 10) 20 & 22 March

Exam Two– In Class – 22 March. Short answer, matching, & multiple choice exam. Closed book, no computers.

Readings and discussions on Pragmatism and Public Lands Management.

Readings (required)

— DesJardines, Chapter 3, “Ethics and Economics: Managing Public Lands,” 45–66, and Chapter 12, “Pluralism, Pragmatism, and Sustainability,” 258–269.

— Phil Cafaro Valuing Wild Nature (2017), OHEE.

Documentary

— Yellowstone to Yukon (1997)

(Week 11) 27 & 29 March

Carrying Capacity and the ethics of procreation and consumption

Readings (required)

— Garrett Hardin, Lifeboat ethics, Psychology Today (1974) and Carrying Capacity as an Ethical Concept (2001)

— Robert Fletcher & Others, Barbarian hordes: the overpopulation scapegoat in international development discourse

— Eileen Crist & others, Population and Biodiversity (2017), in Science.

— Recommended: Sandy Irvine, The Cornucopia Scam: Contradictions of Sustainable Development, in Wild Earth 4 (4):72–82, Winter 94/95.

— Peruse the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement website and consider their prescription: ‘live long and die out!’

Sources to peruse (required)

— Ecofuture reports on Overpopulation and Sustainability, this includes UC professor Al Bartlett’s article,
Is there a population problem? originally in Wild Earth

Documentary

— Mother: Caring for Seven Billion (2013) (Mother Website)

30 March: Essay on Ishmael or Story of B due, send by email to Aya Cockram by midnight. Essays returned no later than 12 April but probably sooner.

(Week 12) 3 & 5 April

Bioregionalism & Degrowth movements versus Ecological Modernism

Readings (required)

— Bron Taylor, Bioregionalism: An Ethics of Loyalty to Place, Landscape Journal 19(1&2): 50–72, 2000.

— Breakthrough Institute, The ecomodernist manifesto (2015).

— Eileen Crist, Against the ecomodernist manifesto (2015) and A Degrowth Response to an Ecomodernist Manifesto via Resilience, which also provides a summary.

Documentary

— Thinking Like a Watershed (1998)

Readings (recommended)

-Wendell Berry, Two Economies

5 April: Last chance to present to your instructors a summary of the arguments and sources for critical essays. MANDATORY

(Week 13) 10 & 12 April

Global Issues: Triage Ethics and the Tragedy and Battle for the Commons; and Grassroots Ecological Resistance Movements

Readings (required)

[This week be prepared to debate Hardin’s views from this week’s reading in contrast to those expressed by Feeney et. al., and a third and fourth from Gedick’s and Akula’s articles]

— Garrett Hardin, Tragedy of the Commons from Science (1968). Also available in html at http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/162/3859/1243. Feeney et al., The Tragedy of the Commons: Twenty-Two Years Later in Green Planet Blues, 53–62

— Garrett Hardin responds, The Global Pillage: Consequences of Unmanaged Commons, ch 21 from Living Within Limits.

— Al Gedicks, on Indigenous Environmentalism and Vikram Akula on Environmentalism in India, from Ecological Resistance Movements

Readings (recommended)

— The Ecologist, Whose Common Future?: Reclaiming the Commons (Philadelphia: New Society, 1994), ch 1–2 & 6 Many other articles by Hardin or related to his views are at the Garrett Hardin Society website.

Podcast and websites on Climate Change (recommended)

— Canadian Broadcasting System “Climate Wars” (mp3s),Part1, Part2, Part3. Series based on Gwynne Dyer’s Climate Wars (2008).

— The Rock Ethics Institute has a valuable website focusing on Climate Ethics.

Documentary

— Lacandona: The Zapatistas and the rainforest of Chiapas, Mexico (26m/bt)

(Week 14) 17 & 19 April

Critical Essay due 17 April, in class, paper copies. See the critical essay guidelines in the schedule, above, week 6. Do not forget to include the title, abstract, and sources assignments, which were due earlier and returned to you.

The Great Debate: Which Environmental Philosophy Makes the most Sense?

Readings (required)

— Theodore Kaczynski, Industrial Society and Its Future.

— Bron Taylor, Deep Ecology and its Social Philosophy: A Critique, in Beneath the Surface: Critical Essays on Deep Ecology. Eds. E. Katz. A. Light, D. Rothenberg (Boston: MIT Press, 2000), 269–299.

— Ben Minteer, Environmental Ethics, Sustainability, and the Recovery of Pragmatism, OHEE.

Readings (recommended)

— Bryan Norton & Ben Minteer, From environmental ethics to environmental public philosophy: ethicists and economists, 1973-future, in T. Tietenberg adn H. Folmer (eds.) The International Yearbook of Environmental and Resource Economics 2002/2003 (Edward Elgan, 2002).

— Robert Paehlke’s Environmentalism and the Future of Progressive Politics (Yale U.P, 1989), 273–283 (on reserve)

— Martin Lewis, Green Delusions (Duke U.P., 1992), p. 150–90 & 242–51.

Documentary

— Pickax (1999)

(Week 15) 24 April (Last Day of Class)

Critical Essays Returned 24 April, in class

Social Philosophy and Environmental Futures: How should we structure livelihoods, communities, nations, and international relations? Is religion the solution or one of the key problems?

Readings (required)

[This week be prepared to discuss these ‘parting shots’, constrasting them with other perspectives in the class]

— Bron Taylor, Evolution & Kinship Ethics.Humans and Nature Website.

— Haydn Washington, Bron Taylor, Helen Kopnina, Paul Cryer & John Piccolo, Why ecocentrism is the key pathway to sustainability, in Ecological Citizen. See also and consider signing the Ecocentrism Statement.

— Bron Taylor, Salmon Speak ~ Why not Earth?, Humans and Nature Website.

— Bron Taylor, Earth Religion and Radical Religious Reformation, Moral Ground: Eighty Visionaries on Why its Wrong to Wreck the World (Trinity University Press, 2010)

— Arne Naess, Deep Ecology for the 22^nd Century, in Deep Ecology for the 21^st Century.

Lecture (required)

— Listen to Sam Harris’s Ted Talk, Science Can Answer Moral Values, in which he argues, contrary to those who argue one cannot get a value from a fact, that objective moral truth can be deduced from facts, including those derived from science. His ethical benchmark is that of concern for the well being of conscious living beings, and he contends that we can know from the facts what the well being for conscious beings entails, and when we are closer or further from the conditions in which conscious beings can and will flourish. Listen to his talk and consider its implications for environmental ethics, and possible social and environmental futures.

The time and place for the
final, cumulative exam will be
announced in class and here

RESOURCES

Writing Well

— Bron Taylor’s Writing Well Guide

Outline Articles

— Environmental Ethics (by Andrew Brennan and Yeuk-Sze Lo) in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

Documentaries

THE ENVIRONMENTAL SITUATION(S):

Last Call: the untold reasons of the global crisis (2012) [About the Club of Rome‘s Limits to Growth and subsequent]

Growthbusters (2011)

Greedy Lying Bastards (2012)

Gassland Part II (2013)

Gassland (2010)

An Inconvenient Truth (2006)

The Story of Stuff (2008); see also The Story of Stuff website

Food Inc (2008)

The 11^th Hour (2007), with Leonard DiCaprio, Thom Hartmann

Red Gold (2008), 55 minutes, about Bristol Bay

Southbound (1996) [Deforestation in SE USA]

Cowspiracy (2014)

Merchants of Doubt (2014)

Chasing Ice (2012)

Chasing Coral (2017)

The Cove (2009)

Blackfish (2013)

RADICAL ENVIRONMENTALISM:

The East (2013)

If a Tree Falls: A story of the Earth Liberation Front (2011)

Edward Abbey: A Voice in the Wilderness (1993)

Dave Foreman, Radical Environmentalism talk, the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh (1990)

Earth First!, on 60 Minutes (1990)

DamNation (2014)

Wrenched (2014)

ENVIRONMENTAL THOUGHT/THINKERS/MOVEMENTS/ETHICS:

Holmes Rolston Lecture on Leopold, Greenfire, and Earth Ethics (2013)

Greenfire (2011) [Aldo Leopold]

American Values / American Wilderness (2006)

Lessons from the Rainforest (ca. 1993) [Lou Gold]

The Faithkeeper [Oren Lyons with Bill Moyers]

Gaia-Goddess of the Earth (1986) PBS|Nova

ENVIRONMENTAL SOLUTIONS:

Mother: Caring for Seven Billion (2013)

I am (2011)

Truck Farm (2011)

Thinking like a Watershed (1998)

Yellowstone to Yukon (1997) [The Wildlands Project]

Green Plans (1995)

Ecopsychology-Restoring the Earth | Healing the Self (1995)

Websites

ACADEMIC ORGANIZATIONS AND INITIATIVES INVOLVED IN ENVIRONMENTAL ETHICS:

The International Society for Environmental Ethics (ISEE)

International Society for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture

International Association for Environmental Philosophy (IAEP)

Center for Environmental Philosophy

Centre for Applied Ethics

Environmental Ethics(Journal)

Environmental Values (Journal)

Forum on Religion and Ecology at Yale University

Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture

Additional resources, such as links to podcasts, music, slideshows, video, music, and websites, will be made available here during the course. Students are encouraged to send their own ideas for resources to the course instructors.

SPRING 2021, Religion and Nature in North America (undergraduate & graduate sections)

Source:

<http://brontaylor.com/courses/pdf/RNNA.Syllabus(Spring.2021).pdf>

“Without a fascination with the grandeur of the North American continent, the energy needed for its preservation will never be developed”

~ Thomas Berry

SECTIONS & TIMES:

REL 3103 & 5199 | Monday 1:55–2:45 & Wednesday 1:55–3:50

INSTRUCTOR:

Professor Bron Taylor (Ph.D.)

Email: bron@ufl.edu

Office: Anderson 121

Office hours: by zoom appointment

DESCRIPTION (UF Catalogue):

Investigation of the ways that “religion” and “nature” have evolved and influenced one another during the cultural, political, and environmental history of North America since European Contact.

DESCRIPTION (detailed):

This course critically examines the roles played by “religion” and “nature” during the evolution of the cultural, political, and environmental history of North America.

Specifically, it considers questions such as:

• What are the various and contested ways terms such as “religion” and “nature” are understood, and do such understandings enhance or constrain our ability to apprehend their reciprocal influence in American cultural, political, and environmental history?

• Have the habitats of North America shaped human consciousness, including “religious” or “spiritual” perceptions, ritualizing, and ethical practices, and if so, how? This question will be in mind throughout the course, from an examination of the cultures of the continent’s “first peoples,” to religionists, environmentalists and scientists in the 20^th century.

• How and to what extent have religions of various sorts influenced human behavior in ways that contributed to the transformation of North American ecosystems?

• What roles have religiously-shaped concepts of nature played in American political history? For example, how have notions such as “natural theology” “natural law” and understandings of “sacred nature” influenced social life and natural systems during the history of the United States?

• How have religion-related nature discourses, attitudes, and practices been shaped by, and shaped European cultures, and later, by such developments in international spheres?

The course will draw on diverse sources, including ethnographies and other studies pertinent to America’s aboriginal peoples, environmental histories that attend to the role of religion in landscape transformations, primary texts written by the figures most responsible for watersheds in the ferment over religion and nature in America, scholarly examinations of these figures and their influence, as well as studies of social movements promoting a “greening of religion,” or conversely, resisting religioninspired environmentalism. A variety of theoretical issues and background articles, including biographies of many of the central figures to be examined, will be provided from The Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature (2005). Students will complete the course with a broad knowledge of nature-related American religious history while becoming acquainted with pivotal figures, movements, and critical questions.

COURSE OUTLINE

1. Approaching Nature, Religion, & Nature Religion

1. Definitions of religion

2. ‘Lived religions’, family resemblances, and spirituality 3. Nature Religion

2. Religion & Nature with Early European Contacts (1000–1600)

1. The arrival, first by the Norse, then the Spanish and other European peoples, set in motion dramatic and sometimes devastating changes to the land, its first inhabitants, and the new immigrants. Religion had much to do with the character of these encounters and changes.

3. The Colonial Period (1600–1775)

1. Fear, Ambivalence, and the Stirrings of Reverence toward Nature in the Colonial Period to the Founding of the Republic (ca. 1600–1776). b. Religion & the Ideology of Manifest Destiny as the violent collision of European and Native American religious cultures escalate.

4. Early Republic to the End of the Frontier (ca. 1780 to 1890)

1. The subjugation of wild peoples and places (continued). b. The European tributary of aesthetic, religious, and romantic attachments toward nature.

1. Transcendentalism and romantic theologies of correspondence. ii. Wildness and wilderness emerge as nature religion. iii. Nature, spirituality, and tourism.

4. The End of the Frontier to Earth Day (1880–1970)

1. Forest Reserves, National Parks, Conservation & the emergence of environmental activism. b. Scouting and Indian Guides. c. Nature writing, Back to the Land Movements, and early “postsupernaturalistic spiritualities of connection.” d. The Land Ethic (1948), Sea Mysticism, & Silent Spring (1962). e. “The Historic Roots of our Ecologic Crisis” (1967) and the turn toward the indigenous cultures of Turtle Island (1969) and those originating in Asia.

5. Religion and Nature from Earth Day & the Age of Environmentalism (1970 to present)

1. Asian, Pagan, and Native American Spiritualities as Nature Religions. b. Religionists seeking to awaken environmental concern and action within the world’s predominant religions in America and beyond. c. The growth of Scientific Nature Religion, including Systems Ecology and the Odumites; Conservation Biology and Restoration Ecology;

“Intelligent Design” and its variants;

a. The consecration of scientific narratives about the origin and evolution of the cosmos and biosphere (such as the Epic of Evolution & the Universe Story) and their critics.

4. Environmentalism and Religion

5. Religious & ideological criticisms & reactions to the growth of naturebased spiritualities in America & beyond.

6. International Dimensions and Future Trends

7. Kinship, spirituality, and planetary futures

Every course involves difficult decisions about what to include and exclude. In this course, the focus is on the foundational religious (and spiritual) perceptions that have animated the most influential figures and movements in American environmental thought and conservation practices up until Earth Day and the beginning of the modern environmental period, which is often traced to the Rachel Carson and her book Silent Spring. The rationale for this focus is that scholars cannot really understand more recent phenomena if they do not understand the cultural soil, and the histories, from which they emerged.

Another way I have prioritized selections is to focus on those who have been the most influential on conservation and environmental movements; in other words, that whatever else they are known for, they promoted environmental conservation. Consequently, unlike a typical course taught by scholars of literature, I have not focused on novelists and poets, although many more could have been included in required and recommended readings. Such individuals are as deserving of scholarly attention as many of those included in this course, and they may well be fitting subjects for research papers for the graduate students in this course. We will discuss a number of such figures in class. For additional ideas see the separate religion and nature in North America bibliography

READINGS

Note: most of the required books can be found inexpensively from online and other used booksellers. Every effort will be made to ensure, as well, that required book readings will also be available digitally at UF’s library. Additional articles will be available online via links found in the course schedule.

Required Texts (graduate and undergraduate sections)

• Albanese, Catherine L. Nature Religion in America: From the Algonkian Indians to the New Age. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1990.

• Deloria, Vine (Jr.). God Is Red: A Native View of Religion. Updated ed. Golden, Colorado: 1972; reprint, Golden, Colorado: Fulcrum, 1994.

• Nash, Roderick Frazier. Wilderness and the American Mind. 4^th ed. 1967; reprint, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1967.

• Pike, Sarah. New Age and Neopagan Religions in America. New York: Columbia University Press, 2004.

Additional Required Readings for Graduate Section

• Stoll, Mark. Inherit the Holy Mountain: Religion and the Rise of American

Environmentalism. Oxford University Press, 2015. Note, this book replaces John Gatta’s Making Nature Sacred: Literature, Religion, and Environment in America from the Puritans to the Present. Oxford University Press, 2004, which is recommended.

• Gould, Rebecca. At Home in Nature: Modern Homesteading and Spiritual Practice in America. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2005.

• Sears, John. Sacred Places: American Tourist Attractions in the Nineteenth Century. New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989.

Highly recommended for purchase (required readings for graduate section)

• Emerson, Ralph Waldo. Nature. Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1986 (reprint); also in

Emerson, Ralph Waldo. The Essential Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Edited by Brooks Atkinson. New York: The Modern Library, 2000. Or Essays and Lectures (includes Nature) Library of America, 1983.

• Muir, John. Nature Writings. Edited by W. Cronon. New York: Library of America, 1997. This is the best single volume of Muir’s writings and it belongs in religion and nature scholars’ libraries.

• Thoreau, Henry David. There are many editions; two from the Library of America are nicely produced, 1985 & 2004

Supplementary Primary Texts (recommended for any ‘religion & nature’ library)

• Burroughs, John. Accepting the Universe. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1920. Commemorative Edition, George W. Lugg, ed., reprint of 1920 publication; Moore Haven, Florida: Rainbow Books, 1987, or 2001 edition from Fredonia Books; and Time and Change (the Complete Writings of John Burroughs). Amsterdam: Fredonia Books, 2001

• Carson, Rachel. Silent Spring. New York City: Houghton Mifflin, 1962; The Sea

Around Us. New York: Oxford University Press, 1950; Under the Sea Wind. New

York: Dutton, 1991; The Edge of the Sea. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1955. Carson, Rachel. Lost Woods: The Discovered Writing of Rachael Carson. Edited by Linda Lear. Boston: Beacon Press, 1998.

• Emerson, Ralph Waldo. Nature. Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1986 (reprint); also in Emerson, Ralph Waldo. The Essential Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Edited by Brooks Atkinson. New York: The Modern Library, 2000.

• Eiseley, Loren. The Immense Journey: An Imaginative Naturalist Explores the Mysteries of Man and Nature. New York: Vintage, 1959; The Firmament of

Time. New York: Atheneum, 1960; The Invisible Pyramid. New York: Scribners,

1970; The Unexpected Universe. New York: Harcourt, 1972; The Star

Thrower (anthology). New York: Harcourt/Harvest, 1979; All the Strange Hours. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2000.

• Jefferson, Thomas, Notes on the State of Virginia, Penguin Classics, 1998.

• Leopold, Aldo. The Sand County Almanac with Essays from Round River. Oxford: 1949; reprint, New York: Sierra Club and Balentine Books, 1971.

• Muir, John. Nature Writings: The Story of by Boyhood and Youth; My First Summer in the Sierra; The Mountains of California; Stickeen; Essays. Edited by William Cronon.

New York: Library of America, 1997.

• Kimmerer, Robin Wall. (2013). Braiding sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants. Minneapolis, Minnesota, Milkweed.

An extended scholarly bibliography will be provided as a separate document.

Students may propose other figures to study, including (but not limited to):

Willa Cather, Susan Fenimore Cooper, Cotton Mather, Jonathan Edwards, Gifford

Pinchot, Ernest Thompson Seton, Sarah Orne Jewett, Theodore Roosevelt, Ansel Adams, David Brower, Mable Osgood Wright. Moreover, although the first priority in this class is to help students understand the period leading up to 1970, Earth Day, and the Age of Ecology, I will consider proposals to focus on more recent figures including: Edward Abbey, Thomas Berry, Wendell Berry, Annie Dillard, Denise Levertov, Joy Harjo, Mary Oliver, Robinson Jeffers, Barry Lopez, Peter Matthiessen, Gary Snyder, Starhawk, Terry Tempest Williams, Alice Walker, E.O. Wilson. Feel free to make your own proposals.

REQUIREMENTS

Undergraduate Section

• This is a reading-intensive class so a high priority will be placed on the quality of preparation, participation, and thus also attendance (30%). To ensure careful preparation, there will be regular, unannounced, quizzes held in class based on the readings, or, students will be asked to submit, normally no later than midnight Sunday (otherwise by announcement), a 500–750 word summary of the major arguments being articulated in the major reading, and identify major fault lines and competing perspectives. The weeks in which these short essays will be required will be announced in class, on canvas, and placed in the reading schedule; so pay attention!

• Multiple choice in class & take-home essay mid-term exam (30%); see class schedule for details.

• Multiple choice and short answer final exam (40%); see class schedule for details.

Important notes for all students

This course is a hybrid, including both upper-level undergraduate and graduate student sections. This has both disadvantages and advantages, but the course has been designed to amplify the advantages. It may be necessary to make adjustments to course readings and requirements along the way. The online version of this syllabus is the operative and binding version, so it is imperative that you use the online version, rather than versions printed out earlier in the class.

The quality of this course depends on the preparation and insights of every participant. Only in exigent circumstances may students be absent, and the instructor should be informed of any absence before the class that is missed, unless health and safety prevents such notice. Students are expected to be punctual, for this expresses courtesy and respect for your colleagues and prevents repetition of material presented in class.

Course readings and requirements may be modified. The online version of this syllabus is the operative and binding version, so it is imperative that you use the online version for assignments and due dates, rather than this syllabus.

Graduate Section

This course is a luxury in that the premium in it is the reading of primary and secondary sources that you will likely not have the opportunity to do in a similar way unless your research takes you in these directions. Consequently, it is what I call a ‘readings’ course. This means I do not require a research paper. Rather, I prioritize careful reading and class preparation, in-class presentations, and exams, which provide an opportunity to demonstrate careful reading and analytical insights. Here are the specific assignments:

• Consistent attendance, quality of preparation, & participation (15%). Normally, by no later than Sunday evening (otherwise by announcement), students are to email a 750–1,000 word summary of the major arguments being articulated in the major readings, with some reflection on the relationship among these arguments and other currents in the class, first in other readings from that

week, and then, with regard to other theoretical streams they are encountering. In other words, after articulating the arguments being advanced and what is at stake with regard to them, you are to identify the fault lines and competing perspectives that are emerging and make connections among the various understandings. If the key readings are not argumentative, then you should describe the perspective(s) presented and note connections among this week’s and prior readings. Remember that the course has to do with religion and nature in America, so you should be especially alert to and engaged in analysis of the religious dimensions of the arguments, figures, movements, and so on, that appear in your readings. You will also be regularly called upon to explain and interpret readings that the undergraduates have not had in their assignments.

• Biographical, Movement Research, or Controversy Analysis (& related classroom presentation). (15%) Each student will either (1) read the major writings of and about seminal figures or (2) read about movements critical to the America’s religion and nature ferment, and then, provide written, and if time allows, oral reports to the classroom, as negotiated with and scheduled through agreement with the instructor. In your presentations you should endeavor to situate the subject within the broader cultural ferment of the time. Presentations focused on individuals will include the reading of biographies (see course bibliography for some examples). A third option will be to read into a critical controversy, such as related to Frederick Jackson Turner’s “Frontier Thesis” and its “New Western History” detractors, analyzing the controversy’s relevance to this course’s critical questions. Whatever else they do, all presentations will bring the same sorts of critical questioning to these analyses as identified under #1, above.

• Midterm exam taken via Canvas with diverse formats and questions, combined with take-home essays (30%)

• Final exam: similar format as with the Midterm exam (40%).

* Alternative: With instructor approval, students wishing to write a standard research paper may do so, replacing this for assignment #2, above. In this case, the goal would be to prepare a paper for eventual publication in a scholarly journal. In such a case both exams, and the research paper, would each be worth 30% of the course grade.

Important additional notes for graduate students

• You will be asked to regularly share with the undergraduates what you are learning from your more extensive readings. You will also be expected to lead some discussion sessions with several of them from time to time.

• This course is an important one for Religion and Nature graduate students seeking competence in Occidental traditions in general and North America in particular. It is also an elective in the Religions in the Americas concentration. Given that other courses are offered that focus on Asian and Abrahamic religions and do so making a priority of examining developments since 1970, the priority in this course is historical. The central objective is to illuminate broad cultural trends and naturerelated practices and transformations, rather than attempting to survey the world’s major religious traditions, and their natural dimensions, in America.

EVALUATION

Points Possible for Required Assignments

This charts that follow show the points it is possible to earn for each assignment. If the total points on an assignment do not match the figures below a mathematical adjustment will be made so they do.

Assignment		Points per Assignment		Total Possible Points
Quizzes & Summari	es	10 or 20 points each	150 (30%)
Midterm Exam		150 points	150 (30%)
Final Exam		200 points	200 (40%)
		Total Possible Points:	500 (100%)

Assignment		Points per			Total Possible
	Assignment		Points
Weekly Summaries	10–20 points each		75 (15%)
Research Presentation	75 points		75 (15%)
Midterm Exam	150 points		150 (30%)
Final Exam	200 points		200 (40%)
	Total Possible Poin	ts:	500 (100%)

Calculating Grades

For both the midterm and final exams, the total number of points earned by each student will be divided by the total number earned by the highest-scoring student. The resulting percentage will be used to calculate each student’s grade for the course. Put in a formula, it looks like this:

the score of each individual student (your score)

(divided by) the highest score earned by a student

The percentage arrived at by means of this formula will be evaluated according to the following scale:

93%	A
90%	A-
87%	B+
83%	B
80%	B-
77%	C+
67%	C
60%	D
59%	F

This kind of scoring is fairer than many other forms of grading because: (1) It is based on what students actually achieve rather than some preconceived standard held by the professor; (2) Each student can receive a high grade; (3) Hard-working students will not be penalized for staying in a demanding course full of industrious students. With a traditional curve, demanding courses that “weed out” less industrious students, leaving hard-working ones, can unintentionally harm good students putting them in competition with each other. This will not occur in this course. To further ensure fairness, any extra credit points will be added to the individual student’s score, only after the highest score earned by a student has been established. This ensures that the extra credit earned will not increase the difficulty of the grading scale.

Course instructor reserves the right to lower or raise course grades based on classroom contributions or upon absences. Instructor also reserves the right to change course requirements.

Late or Missing Assignments

Students who do not turn reading analyses on time will not receive points for these assignments. The total number of points possible for the review essay will be reduced by 20% for each day it is late.

Returned Assignments

Assignments will usually be returned to students no later than one week after they were due. At the end of the semester, unreturned course work will be available for pickup in the Religion Department office in Anderson 107 for 30 days after the official date that grades are posted by the registrar. After this time, they will be recycled.

Academic Dishonesty

Students engaged in any form of academic dishonesty, as defined under the “Academic Misconduct” section of the Student Honor Code, will be subject to other disciplinary measures. Students are expected to know what constitutes plagiarism and to understand and avoid inadvertent forms of it that can occur by cutting and pasting quotations from various texts on the world wide web and elsewhere.

SCHEDULE

All readings and the related written assignments are to be completed before class date/week under which they are listed by 11:59p.m. Sunday evenings, unless otherwise stated below. To flourish in this class you must read widely and carefully.

Module 1: A ‘family resemblances’ approach to ‘religion,’ ‘spirituality,’ ‘nature religion,’ & with a case study in ‘aquatic nature religion’ (Week of 11 January)

Key questions:

• What is religion, spirituality, and nature religion?

• What is ‘lived religion’?

• What is ‘family resemblances’ approach to religion-resembling social phenomena?

• How does surfing, fly fishing, whitewater kayaking, and rock climbing, open the analytic horizon for considering the religion and nature nexus?

Readings (all)

• From the Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature (henceforth the ERN): S. Kretch American Indians as ‘First Ecologists’; F. Berkes, Traditional Ecological Knowledge; G. Johnson, Rock Climbing

• Albanese, Nature Religion in America, “Introduction” & “Native Ground: Nature & Culture in Early America,” pp. 1–46 (Intro & ch. 1)

• Aquatic Nature Religion,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 75(4): 863–874, 2007. (Surfing into Spirituality…) is also recommended for undergraduate students; it is linked in the following section (it will reinforce the lecture).

Readings (grads)

• B. Taylor,Exploring Religion, Nature, and Culture: Introducing the Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture_, Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture 1(1): 5–14, 2007.

• B. Taylor, Surfing into Spirituality and a New, Aquatic Nature Religion, Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 75(4): 923–951, 2007.

• Stoll, Inherit the Holy Mountain, Introduction and Ch. 1

• From the ERN: K. von Stuckrad, Mountaineering

Recommended readings

• Gatta, Making Nature Sacred, Introduction and “Landfall,” pp. 3–33; “Meditating on creatures in early American life and letters,” pp. 34–54; re. “Intimations of an environmental ethic in the writings of Jonathan Edwards,” 55–70 (chs. 1–3)

• From the ERN: Anishnabeg Culture; Harmony in Native North

America; Lakota; Sacred Geography in Native North America; Shoshone (Western North America); Shamanism-Traditional; Traditional Ecological Knowledge among Aboriginal Peoples in Canada; Yoeme (Yaqui) Ritual

• Snyder, S. S. (2007). “New streams of religion: fly fishing as a lived, religion of nature.” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 75(4): 896–922. PDF

• Sanford, W. (2007). “Pinned on karma rock: whitewater kayaking as religious experience.” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 75(4): 875–895. PDF

Module 2: Native American and European cultures from contact to the birth of the American republic. (Week of 18 January — no class 18 January due to Martin Luther King holiday)

Key questions:

• What generalizations can be made about the religious dimensions of the ways indigenous Americans and European arrivals tended to view nature?

• How did such perceptions play out with regard to perceptions about the American republic?

• What were early American attitudes toward ‘wilderness’ including among Christians and those who developed a romantic appreciation for it?

• What are some of the ways that indigenous critics view Christianity and the early republic?

Your first reading summaries are due by 11:59 p.m. Tuesday 19 January. Since these will cover two weeks, undergraduates may take up to 1,000 and graduates up 1,500 words, and possible points will double. Focus especially on Albanese & Nash (and Grad Students also on Stoll).

Readings (all)

• From the ERN: Haudenosaunee Confederacy; Deism; Book of Nature; Christianity (7h)-Natural Theology

• Albanese, Nature Religion ..., “Republican Nature_” pp. 47–79 (ch. 2)

• Nash, Wilderness and the American Mind, xii-43 (chapters 1 & 2)

Readings (grads)

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “The Romantic Wilderness” and “An American Wilderness,” pp. 44–83 (ch. 3 & ch. 4)

• Stoll, Inherit the Holy Mountain, Ch. 2 & 3

• Recommended: Gatta, Making Nature Sacred, “Revelation to US: Green shoots of romantic religion in Antebellum America,” pp. 71–99 (ch. 4)

• From the ERN: Unitarianism; Manifest Destiny

Recommended readings

• Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia,Aborigines pp. 98–113; The Administration of Justice pp. 137–155, and Religion pp. 163–167.

Module 3: Aesthetic and spiritual appreciation of nature during the first century of the republic, including Henry David Thoreau, & up to the end of the frontier.

(Week of 25 January)

Key questions:

• Roderick Nash provided the classic treatment of wilderness in the American mind; how does he characterize it in this week’s readings?

• Who is the most prominent proponent of transcendentalism, what are its main tenets?

• What are the main ideas and practices promoted by Henry David Thoreau? Did he transcend transcendentalism?

• What is romanticism and what are the forms and means of its transmission in North America?

Your reading summaries are due by 11:59 p.m. Sunday 24 January.

Readings (undergrads ~ grads read these previous week)

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “The Romantic Wilderness” and “An American Wilderness,” pp. 44- 83 (ch. 3 & ch. 4)

Readings (all)

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “Henry David Thoreau;” pps. 84–95, (ch. 5)

• From the ERN: Transcendentalism; Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Readings (grads)

• John Sears, Sacred Places, re. nature appreciation and pilgrimage, first 1⁄2 19^th century, pp. 1–71

• Stoll, Inherit the Holy Mountain, Ch. 4

• Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nature and other selections.

• Henry David Thoreau, Selections from Bron Taylor‘s Thoreau Appendix in Dark Green Religion. PDF

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “Preserve the Wilderness” and “Wilderness Preserved,” pp. 96–121 (chs. 6 & 7 (read quickly)

• From the ERN (European tributaries): Romanticism-in European

History; Romanticism in European Literature; Rousseau, Jean-Jacques; (American manifestations): Romanticism-American; (See also a contemporary reading by a LDS scholar of the natural aspects of the teaching of Joseph Smith and others in the entry): Church of Jesus Christ, Latter Day Saints.

• Excerpts from The National Parks: America’s Greatest Idea (2009); some will be viewed in class, additional segments will be made available.

Recommended readings

• From the ERN: Thoreau, Henry David

• Albanese, Nature Religion ..., re. “Wilderness and the Passing Show” (on Transcendental Religion), pp. 80–116 (ch. 3)

• Gatta, Making Nature Sacred, “Variations on Nature: from the Old Manse to the White Whale,” pp. 102–125 (ch. 5), which is about early 19^th century poets and writers; and “Rare and delectable places: Thoreau‘s imagination of sacred space at Walden,” pp. 127–142 (ch. 6)

Websites

• Cedar Grove, the National Park Service sponsored site devoted to Thomas Cole, and the Hudson River School of Art, which he founded.

• The Catskill Archive, a site devoted to the history of the Catskill Mountains, has many images from Thomas Cole’s paintings.

* Note the differences between the various periods of his work, and the environmental and religious values in the paintings, as well as the view of environmental history implicit in them, especially in the “empire” series.

Module 4: John Muir, spiritual conservation, & the complicated roots of the National Parks. (Week of 1 February)

Key questions:

• What are the central spiritual and ethical perceptions and views held by John Muir and Gifford Pinchot?

• Muir has been characterized as racist by some while others view such charges as based on out-of-context cherry picking that, moreover, ignores a wide variety of other information that would illuminate his views and how they evolved. How strong are the arguments and evidence on the various sides of this debate, and what ought to be made of it more than a century since Muir’s death; including, did the director of the Sierra Club make too hasty a judgment?

Your reading summaries are due by 11:59 p.m. Sunday, 31 January.

Readings (all)

• From the ERN: National Parks and Monuments; Pinchot, Gifford; Muir, John; Sierra Club

• John Muir. From Nature Writings. Edited by William Cronon. New York: Library of America, 1997. Read, Cedar Keys, pp. 818–827; Wild Wool, pp. 598–606

• Nash. Wilderness and the American Mind, “John Muir,” pp. 122–140, “The Wilderness Cult,” pp. 141–160, and “Hetch Hetchy,” pp. 161–181 (chs. 8–10)

• Tompkins, L. (2020). Sierra Club Says It Must Confront the Racism of John Muir, New York Times, 22 July 2020.

• Nobel, J. (2016). The Miseducation of John Muir. Atlas Obscura, 26 July.

• Worster, D. (2019). John Muir Biographer: He was no white supremacist. California

Sun, 30 July. (See also the interview linked at the end of Worster’s essay.)

Readings (grads)

• Purdy, J. (2015). Environmentalism’s racist history. The New Yorker, 13 August.

• Stoll, Inherit the Holy Mountain, Ch. 5 — 7

• Mark David Spence. Introduction & Looking Backward and Westward, pp. 1–23, The Heart of the Sierras, Yosemite Indians and the National Parks Ideal, and Conclusion, pp. 101–139. (Dispossessing the Wilderness: Indian Removal and the Making of the National Parks. Oxford University Press, 1999.)

• John Sears, Sacred Places, re. The Sacred & National Parks nature appreciation and pilgrimage, second 1⁄2 19^th century pp. 122–216 (chs 6–8).

Viewing (all)

• Battle for Wilderness (The American Experience, PBS/1989).

Recommended readings

• John Muir. Nature Writings. Edited by William Cronon. New York: Library of America, 1997. In addition to the required readings, strongly recommended are Stickeen, pp.553–571; and then skim widely, looking especially for his emerging biocentrism and ambivalent attitudes toward Native Americans, in “My First Summer in the Sierra*," pp. 147–309. [Note: this is the volume you should all get for your libraries]

• Lynn Ross-Bryant. Pilgrimage to the National Parks: Religion and Nature in the United States, London: Routledge 2012

• Kerry Mitchell, “Managing Spirituality: Public Religion in National Parks,” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture 1/4 (2007): 431–49. For a more indepth work see his Spirituality and the State: Managing Nature and Experience in America’s National Parks, NYU Press 2016.

• ERN: B. Ortiz, Miwok People

• Dispossessing the Wilderness (the remaining chapters) pp. 24-100,* and Robert Keller and Michael Turek, Everglades National Park and the Seminole Problem, pp. 216–231, from American Indians and National Parks. Tucson: Arizona University Press, 1998.

• Carolyn Finney (2014). Black faces, white spaces: reimagining the relationship of African Americans to the great outdoors. Chapel Hill, The University of North Carolina Press.

Recommended viewing or listening

• Conversation between Dr. Carolyn Finney and Robert Hanna (25 July 2020). Finney is the author of Black Faces, White Spaces (cited below); Hannah, who is the host of the conversation, is the great-great-grandson of John Muir. (Also interesting is this news about Hanna’s contribution to efforts to recognize Chiura Obata, a Japanese American whose California-drenched nature spirituality permeated his landscape artist).

Module 5: Dark Green, Animistic, and Gaian Spirituality (Week of 8 February).

Key questions:

• What is the difference, according to Taylor, between ‘green religion’ and ‘dark green religion’?

• What are the main types of dark green religion and how are these related to wilderness spiritualities and biodiversity conservation?

• In what ways has nature related though in Europe and the Americas (including indigenous perspectives) been engaged and mutually influential?

Your reading summaries are due by 11:59 p.m. Sunday, 7 February.

Readings (all)

• Taylor, Bron, Dark Green Religion, Preface & Ch. 1, Exploring Critical Terms (Ch. 1 begins at the bottom of the preface); Ch. 2, Dark Green Religion, and Wilderness, Spirituality and Biodiversity in North America: tracing an environmental history from Occidental roots to Earth Day, in Wilderness in Mythology and Religion, ed. Laura Feldt, (De Gruyter, 2012), 293–324; Recommended: Ch. 3, Dark Green Religion in North America.

Viewing (all)

• The National Parks: America’s Greatest Idea (2009); excerpts, this and next week.

Recommended website

• The Dark Green Religion website has a variety of supplementary materials that students may enjoy perusing, including video, music, and images.

Module 6 ~ Insights and corrections to the most prevalent narratives about religion and nature in North America from the emerging discipline of environmental history (Week of 15 February)

Key questions:

• What has the discipline of environmental history contributed to the study of religion and nature in North America?

• Have the insights at times also led to lacunae that need to be remedied?

• What are the major arguments advanced by Mark Stoll in his landmark book?

No weekly analysis is due this week but students should be ready to address the readings during the in-class mid-term exam, part of which will be multiple choice and administered via Canvas on 17 February, the rest will involve take-home essays which must be emailed to Professor Taylor no later than 12:00 p.m (high noon) 22 February.

Readings (all)

• ERN: Scouting

• Paul Sutter, The World with Us: The State of American Environmental History, Journal of American History, 2013.

• Bron Taylor, Its not all about us, Journal of American History, 2013.

Readings (grads)

• Stoll, Inherit the Holy Mountain, Ch. 8 & Conclusion

• Kimberly Smith, “What Is Africa to Me? Wilderness in Black Thought,

1860–1930,” Environmental Ethics 27/3, 279–97

Viewing (all)

• American Values / American Wilderness (High Plains Films/2005) [available in Canvas]

• Buffalo should be everywhere (High Plains Films/2019) [three minute video]

Recommended Readings

• Rebecca Gould, At Home in Nature, especially “Ambivalent Legacies II: Gender, Class, Nature, and Religion,” 201–235.

• Carolyn Finney, Black Faces, White Spaces: reimagining the relationship of African Americans to the Great Outdoors. Univ of North Carolina Press, 2014.

• Amanda Baugh, God and the Green Divide: Religious Environmentalism in Black and White. University of California Press, 2017.

• ERN (recommended): Indian Guides; Nature Fakers Controversy;

• Ernest Thompson Seton Institute & Seton biography (Brief)

• Eileen Smith-Cavros, “Modern Black Churchgoers in Miami-Dade County, Florida: Place, Nature, and Memory,” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture 1/3: 351–70, 2007.

• Ian Finseth (2009). Shades of green: visions of nature in the literature of American slavery, 1770–1860. University of Georgia Press, 2009

• Diane Glave and Mark Stoll, eds. (2006). To love the wind and the rain: African Americans and environmental history. Pittsburgh, University of Pittsburgh Press.

Module 7: John Burroughs & Loren Eiseley: Science & nature religion in the early & mid-20^th century (Week of 22 February)

Key questions:

• How did figures including Burroughs, Eiseley, and movements such as the back to the land movement, integrate science into nature spiritualities?

• What resistance to Darwinian nature religion emerged after the publication of On the Origin of Species in 1859?

Due to the mid-term exam, no reading summaries are due this week.

Readings (all)

• ERN: Back to the Land Movement; Creationism and Creation Science

• John Burroughs. Preface and The Long Road pp. 1–38, and The Gospel of Nature pp. 243–73, in Time & Change (vol. xv) in The Complete Writings of John

Burroughs) Amsterdam: Fredonia Books, 2001. Commemorative Edition, George W. Lugg, ed., reprint of 1920 publication; Moore Haven, Florida: Rainbow Books, 1987, or 2001.

• ERN: Eiseley, Loren

• Loren Eiseley, The Flow of the River pp. 15–27, The Judgment of the Birds pp. 163–78, The Bird and the Machine pp. 179–93, and The Secret of Life pp. 195–210, from The Immense Journey, and The Star Thrower pp. 67–92, from The Unexpected Universe (or reprinted in The Star Thrower). A Small Death pp. 139–49, and The Coming of the Giant Wasps” (pp. 236–47), and The Other Player (258–66) from All the Strange Hours.

Readings (grads)

• Rebecca Gould, At Home in Nature, pp. 1–138 (ch. 1–4).

Viewing (all)

• Thinking Like a Watershed (1998); to be shown in class.

Recommended reading

• ERN: Darwin, Charles

• Todd Levasseur, Religious agrarianism and the return of place (Albany: SUNY Press, 2017).

Module 8 ~ Aldo Leopold & David Bower: the Wilderness Society and the Sierra Club a breakthrough toward bio/ecocentric environmental ethics and nocompromise environmentalism (Week of 1 March)

Key questions:

• How would you characterize the worldview & ethics of Aldo Leopold?

• What was Leopold’s influence on environmental thought, spirituality, and activism?

• What were the turning points in David Brower’s life-pilgrimage, and why do some consider him to be the 20^th Century’s greatest environmentalist?

• What were the religious-dimensions of Brower’s conservationist strategies?

• What would the American landscape look like today if either of them had never lived?

Your reading summaries are due by 11:59 p.m. Sunday, 28 February. Since these will cover two weeks, undergraduates may take up to 1,000 and graduates up 1,500 words. Possible points will double.

Readings (all)

• ERN: Environmental Ethics

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “Aldo Leopold: Prophet,” pp. 182–99, “Decisions for Permanence,” pp. 200–237, (chs. 11–12)

• Aldo Leopold, from A Sand County Almanac: Foreword, Arizona and New Mexico (especially sub-section, Thinking like a Mountain) and The Land Ethic. (Note: The Oxford University Press edition (1949/1968) does not have Part III, which includes the Round River and Goose Music essays. For these, see the Ballentine Books (1970) paperback edition.

• Also strongly recommended from A Sand County Almanac are the essays “Wilderness” and “Conservation Esthetic,” which appear along with “The Land Ethic” in The Upshot (Part III).

• Curt Meine, In a time of social and environmental crisis, Aldo Leopold’s call for a ‘land ethic’ is still relevant, The Conversation, 5 January 2021.

Readings (grads)

• Whyte, Kyle, How Similar Are Indigenous North American and Leopoldian Environmental Ethics? (2015, draft)

• ERN: Leopold, Aldo; Ouspensky, Pyotr Demianovich

Viewing (all)

• Green Fire / Aldo Leopold (Curt Meine/2011); to be viewed during class.

• Monumental / David Brower (2004); to be viewed in class

Viewing (required of graduate students, recommended for undergraduates)

• Wild By Law (The American Experience/PBS, 1992)

Recommended readings (grads)

• Meine, Curt, Aldo Leopold, Race, and Social Justice (2020, draft) PDF

Module 9 ~ Developments since 1960: From Rachel Carson to the environmental justice movement, including the increasing influence of nature writers, including by women thinkers & activists (week of 8 March).

Key questions:

• What is Rachel Carson best known for and what can you say about her spirituality?

• How would you characterize her values and cultural influence?

• Was Rachel Carson a feminist? An ‘ecofeminist?’ If so, of what sort?

• Who is Sylvia Earle and is she channeling a Carson-like marine spirituality?

Your reading summaries are due by 11:59 p.m. Sunday, 7 March.

Readings (all)

• ERN: Carson, Rachel; Environmental Justice & Environmental Racism; Williams, Terry Tempest

• Rachel Carson, Nature Religion Selections, with notes from Professor Taylor; see also selections and commentary on Silent Spring. Recommended, peruse Under the Sea Wind, or read Preface and The Marginal World (pp. 1–7), and The Enduring

Sea (pp. 249–50), in The Edge of the Sea (1955), or read widely from The Sea Around Us or Silent Spring (in this, her most famous book, see especially the introductory Fable for Tomorrow (pp. 1–3), and the concluding section, The Other Road pp. 177–97, esp. its concluding two pages).

Readings (grads)

• Kathleen Dean Moore, The Truth of the Barnacles: Rachel Carson and the Moral Significance of Wonder.In Rachel Carson: Legacy and Challenge.

Viewing (all)

• Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring (The American Experience, 1993); available through Canvas.

• Lecture by Amanda Nichols on Sylvia Earle and other innovative and influential post-Earth Day women thinker/activists.

Recommended readings (grads)

• ERN: Dillard, Annie; Berry, Wendell; Lopez, Barry

• Sarah McFarland Taylor, Land as Lover: Mormon eco-eroticism and planetary plural marriage in the work of Terry Tempest Williams Nova Religio vol. 8 no 1 (July 2004): 39–56

• Terry Tempest Williams, Epilogue: The clan of the one-breasted women, pp. (pp. 281–90), in Refuge: an Unnatural History of Family and Place. New York: Pantheon, 1991. Also, see Desert Quartet: an erotic landscape. New York: Pantheon, 1995.

• Gatta, Making Nature Sacred, “Post-Darwinian Visions of Divine Creation,” pp. 143–173, “Imagined Worlds: the lure of numinous exoticism,” 175–198, “Reclaiming the sacred commons,” 199–224, “Learning to love creation: the religious tenor of contemporary ecopoetry,” 225–243 (chs. 7–10), and “Afterword,” 245–46.

• Lisa Sideris and Kathleen Dean Moore, eds. Rachel Carson: Legacy and Challenge. State University of New York Press, 2008.

Recommended viewing

• Mission Blue, (2014) documentary about Syvia Earle’s efforts to spur “action to explore and protect the ocean.” The full 2 hour, 20 minute version is linked here, a version that ran 1 hour & 35 minutes is available on Netflix.

Module 10: Native American thinkers fusing nature and spirituality and inspiring movements for social and environmental justice among diverse peoples (Week of 15 March)

Key questions:

• Who was Vine Deloria, what were his central arguments, and how extensive was his influence?

• More generally, what has been the influence of native American traditions on environmental thought and activism?

• What were Jace Weaver’s contentions in his contributions to Defending Mother Earth? (graduate readings).

• Who are these figures: Oren Lyons & Winona LaDuke.

Your reading summaries are due by 11:59 p.m. Sunday, 14 March.

Readings (required)

• ERN: Deloria, Vine Jr.

• Vine Deloria (Jr.) God is Red (peruse/skim the entire book, reading carefully 1–113 (ch 1- 6), pp. 185–202 (ch 11); pp. 236–282 (ch. 14–16).

Readings (grads)

• ERN: Bison Restoration and Native American Traditions; Black Elk; Cowboy Spirituality; Law, Religion and Native American Lands; Mother Earth; Native

American Languages; Peyote; Romanticism and Indigenous

Peoples; Savages; Seattle (Sealth), Chief (ca. 1790–1866)

• Weaver, Jace, ed., especially Introduction (pp. 1–26) and Afterward (pp. 177–191), in Defending Mother Earth: Native American Perspectives on Environmental Justice. Maryknoll, New York: Orbis, 1996.

Viewing & listening (all)

• Indigenous Reflections on Christianity; interviews including with Winona LaDuke (Sacred Land Film Project, 2015), 13 minutes.

• The Faithkeeper (Oren Lyons interview with Bill Moyers/PBS/1991)

Recommended reading

• Cornell, George L. “The Influence of Native Americans on Modern Conservationists.” Environmental Review9, no. 2 (1985): 104–17.

• ERN: _Black Mesa; Cowboy Spirituality; Peyote; Plastic Medicine Men_

Module 11 ~ Paganism, the New Age | & changes over time in political ideologies and nature spiritualities as exemplified by Disney’s world (Week of 22 March)

Key questions:

• What are the central characteristics of Paganism (of various sorts) and New Age thought and practice, and in what ways to they have affinity and diverge?

• What are the tensions that sometimes occur between those who identify with or otherwise have affinity with New Age, Pagan, and Indigenous traditions?

Your reading summaries are due by 11:59 p.m. Sunday, 21 March.

Readings (all)

• ERN: Paganism-Contemporary; Odinism; Celestine Prophecy; New Age; Harmonic Convergence; Harmonic Convergence and the Spiritualization of the Biosphere; Wicca.

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “Toward a Philosophy of Wilderness,” pp. 238–271

Readings (grads)

• Pike, Sarah. New Age and Neopagan Religions in America (pp. 3–172)

• Taylor, B. (2019). Rebels against the Anthropocene? Ideology, spirituality, popular culture, and human domination of the world within the Disney empire. Journal for Study of Religion, Nature and Culture 13(4): 414–454.

Viewing (all)

• Ideology & Nature Spirituality in the Disney Empire (recorded lecture by Prof. Taylor).

Recommended readings (grads)

• Taylor, Bron. Earthen Spirituality or Cultural Genocide?: Radical

Environmentalism’s Appropriation of Native American Spirituality, Religion 27(2): 183–215, April 1997.

• Bron Taylor & Joel Geffen, _Battling Religions in Parks & Forest Reserves_ (2004) [about Mt. Graham+Mato Tipila/Devils Tower].

• ERN: Plastic Medicine Men

Recommended viewing

• Sweating Indian Style: Conflicts Over Native American Ritual (Society for Visual Anthropology/1994)

Module 12 ~ Defending the Sacred: Ecological Resistance & Environmental Justice movements (Week of 29 March) Key questions:

• What are the religious dimensions of environmental movements since Earth Day?

• In what ways are environmental individuals and groups engaged common cause, what sorts of tensions and alliances have emerged, and what does religion have to do with it?

Your reading summaries are due by 11:59 p.m. Sunday, 28 March.

Readings (undergraduates and graduates (except replace Kraft & Johnson article with the one in the graduate reading section)

• ERN: Radical Environmentalism; Earth First! and the Earth Liberation Front; Indigenous Environmental Activism and the Indigenous Environmental Network; Law, Religion, and Native American Lands

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “The Irony of Victory” pp. 316–341 (ch. 15)

• Kraft, S. E. and G. Johnson (2018). Protective occupation, emergent rituals of solidarity: Comparing Alta (Sápmi), Mauna Kea (Hawai‘i), and Standing Rock (North

Dakota). The Bloomsbury Handbook of Religion and Nature. Eds. L. Hobgood and

W. Bauman. London & New York, Bloomsbury: 185–196; 287–289. PDF

Readings (grads)

• Johnson, G. and S. E. Kraft (2018). “Standing Rock religion(s): ceremonies, social media, and music videos.” Numen 65: 1–32. PDF

• Taylor, Bron. Resacralizing Earth: Pagan Environmentalism and the Restoration of Turtle Island. In American Sacred Space, eds. David Chidester and Edward T. Linenthal, 97- 151. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1995.

• Brown, M. A. (2016). “Mauna Kea: Ho‘omana Hawai‘i and Protecting the Sacred.” Journal for Study of Religion, Nature and Culture 10(2): 150–169 PDF

Viewings (all)

• Rise: Sacred Water, Standing Rock, Part I (2017); 50 minutes. This documentary is the first part of an 8 part series about indigenous movements that includes a segment on Mauna Kea. It is available on Amazon Prime for $1.99; viewing will be via Canvas.

• Kapu Aloha 101 (2015), 12 minutes (Greg’s recommendation).

• The Fight for Oak Flat (Craig Johnson/2020) 11 minutes

• Wrenched: How Edward Abbey lit the flame of environmental activism and gave the movement its soul (2014).

• Lessons from the Rainforest (1991) [Lou Gold]

Recommended viewings (about native American campaigns for cultural and environmental justice)

Documentaries from the Sacred Land Film Project (Christopher McLeod):

• In the Light of Reverence (2001)

• Standing on Sacred Ground (2013); four part series available on Amazon Prime.

Documentaries (misc)

• Awake: A Dream from Standing Rock (2017); 90 minutes; see especially the final 30 minutes.

• Standing Above the Clouds (re. Manua Kea) (Jalena Keane-Lee/2020), 50 minutes, not yet widely available; film website

• The Condor and the Eagle (2019); esp. focused on South America.

• Biidaaban (The Dawn Comes) (2018); 18 minute animated short film.

• American Buffalo: Spirit of a Nation (PBS/Nature, 1998)

Module 13 ~ Science, Religion & Nature | & The Greening of Religions? (Week of April 5)

Key questions:

• What are the competing perceptions about religion and environmental behavior, including whether the world’s predominant religion are, or might, be in the process of becoming more environmentally friendly?

• What are the competing perspectives about whether the sciences can become a mythic resource for a compelling worldview and pro environmental behavior, or if in some way such efforts are misguided or pernicious?

Your reading summaries are due by 11:59 p.m. Sunday, 4 April.

Readings (undergraduates)

• ERN: Conservation Biology; Epic of Evolution

• Bron Taylor, Gretel Van Wieren, and Bernard Zaleha, Lynn White Jr. and the greening-of-religion hypothesis, Conservation Biology 30(5): 1000–1009, 2016.

Readings (graduate students)

• Bron Taylor, The Greening of Religion Hypothesis (Part One): From Lynn White, Jr. and claims that religions can promote environmentally destructive attitudes and behaviors to assertions they are becoming environmentally friendly, Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, 10 (3) 2016

• Bron Taylor, Gretel Van Wieren & Bernard Zaleha, The Greening of Religion Hypothesis (Part Two): Assessing the Data from Lynn White, Jr. to Pope Francis, Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, 10 (3) 2016.

• Amanda Baugh, “Explicit and Embedded Environmentalism: Challenging Normativities in the Greening of Religion.” Worldviews 23 (2019): 93–112.

These articles from a forum debating, in part, the consecration of scientific narratives, as exemplified in Journey of the Universe. The PDFs of these articles are all downloadable via a ZIPFILE.

• Taylor, B. (2015). Editor’s introduction: contesting consecrated scientific narratives in religion and environmental ethics. Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature, and Culture 9(2): 133–135.

• Sideris, L. (2015). “Science as sacred myth? Ecospirituality in the Anthropocene.” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature, and Culture 9(2): 136–153.

• Callicott, J. B. (2015). “Science as myth (whether sacred or not), science as prism.” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature, and Culture 9(2): 154–168.

• Goodenough, U. (2015). “Honoring nature all the way down.” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature, and Culture 9(2): 176–180.

• Zaleha, B. D. (2015). “Just say no to knowledge: religious postmodernism’s attack on the natural sciences.” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature, and Culture 9(2): 213–220.

• Rolston, H. (2015). “Placing, displacing, replacing the sacred: science, religion, and spirituality.” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature, and Culture 9(2): 199–205.

These additional contributions to the forum are recommended:

• Deane-Drummond, C. (2015). “The uses and abuses of science in religious environmentalism.” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature, and Culture 9(2): 221–239.

• Ivakhiv, A. (2015). “New wine into old bottles? or time to jettison the bottle?” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature, and Culture 9(2): 136–153.

• Tucker, M. E. (2015). “Journey of the Universe,” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature, and Culture 9(2): 206–212.

• Sideris, L. (2015). “Forum response: the confines of consecration: a reply to critics.” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature, and Culture 9(2): 221–239.

These contributions are less important for the present purpose:

• Northcott, M. S. (2015). “Myth, ritual, and the New Universe Story in the Inner Hebrides.” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature, and Culture 9(2): 192–198.

• Larson, B. M. H. (2015). “The role of scientism in myth-making for the Anthropocene.” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature, and Culture 9(2): 185–191.

Viewings (all)

• Journey of The Universe (2011).

• We Believe in Dinosaurs, a documentary about Kentucky’s ‘Creation Museum (PBS/2019), 1hr, 38 minutes, available on Amazon Prime. We will view excerpts; full viewing by arrangement via Canvas. Check out, also the online site of The Creation Museum

Recommended readings (all)

• Bron Taylor, Ecology and Nature Religions Encyclopedia of Religion, v. 4, 2^nd ed., Lindsay Jones, ed., MacMillan Reference, New York: 2005, pp. 2661–2668

• ERN: Natural History as Natural Religion; Restoration Ecology and Ritual; Process Philosophy (and Theology cross-reference); Sagan, Carl; Space Exploration.

• Thomas Berry, The Human Presence pp. 13–23 (ch. 3), The New Story pp. 194–215

(ch. 15), in Dream of the Earth. (Alternatively, read the selections from The Great Work, immediately below.)

• Thomas Berry, pp. 1–71 and 166–201, * from The Great Work. New York: Bell Tower, 1999.

• ERN: Berry, Thomas (and adjacent to this entry): Thomas Berry on Religion and Nature

Recommended readings (grads)

• Oberlin, K. C. (2020). Creating the Creation Museum: how fundamentalist beliefs come to life. New York, New York University Press.

• ERN: “World religions” sections (especially Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism and Daoism, then following as many cross-references as possible). For recent religious resistance to these developments, see Paganism: a Jewish Perspective, and Wise Use Movement.

• Albanese, Nature Religion ..., re. “Recapitulating Pieties,” pp. 153–198 (ch. 5), and “Epilogue,” pp. 199–201..

• Leslie Sponsel (2012). Spiritual Ecology: A Quiet Revolution. Santa Barbara, Praeger.

Recommended viewings (fun)

• Symphony of Science Music Videos (especially fun); search for “We’re All Connected” and “The Unbroken Thread”, check out some others.

• Either or both of the PBS Cosmos television series: the first was narrated by Carl Sagan, the second by Neil DeGrassie Tyson

Recommended websites (a scholarly site illustrating religious environmentalism)

• Forum on Religion & Ecology (a scholarly site exemplifying religious environmentalism)

• The Creation Museum (the website of the Evangelical Christian museum featured in the ‘We Believe in Dinosaurs’ documentary.)

Module 14 & 15: International Influences & the growth of spiritualities emphasizing interconnection (Gaian & Mother Earth spiritualities) and the kinship and sacredness of life (weeks of 12 & 19 April

Key questions:

• What are the influences between North American nature spiritualities and those abroad, including within moments for social and environmental justice around the world?

No more reading reviews will be due, but do keep up with the readings, for they will need to be well in hand to do well on your final exam. This is not a bluff : )

Podcasts (listenings)

• Kinship With The More-Than-Human World, a special series, from the PBS/PRI radio/podcast, ‘To the Best of our Knowledge,’ that was developed with the Center for Humans and Nature. See especially the Eye-To-Eye Animal Encounters segment

• Robin Wall Kimmerer, _The Intelligence of Plants_, On Being (podcast with transcription); also recommended is her 2020 Emergence Magazine essay, Corn tastes better on the honor system.

Readings (all)

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “The International Perspective,” pp. 342–378 (ch. 16) and “Epilogue,” pp. 379–390.

• ERN: United Nation’s ‘Earth Summits’; Earth Charter; Biosphere Reserves and World Heritage Sites

• Bron Taylor, Civil Earth Religion versus Religious Nationalism, The Immanent

Frame, or better, Dark Green Religion, chapters 7–9, especially chapter 8, “Terrapolitan Earth Religion.”

Viewing (all)

• Bron Taylor, Kinship Through the Senses, Science, and Arts (2021)

• Ceremony, United Nations World Summit on Sustainable Development (Johannesburg 2002). Part One. Part Two.

• Welcome Ceremony, United Nations World Summit on Sustainable Development (Johannesburg 2002). Part One. Part Two.

• Call of Life (Species Alliance/2010)

RESOURCES

Writing Well

• Bron Taylor’s Writing Well Guide

Documentaries & other films (about and by Native Americans\)

• The Faithkeeper (Oren Lyons interview with Bill Moyers/PBS/1991)

• In the Light of Reverence (Sacred Land Film Project/Christopher McLeod/ 2001); for background see the _interview with Christopher McLeod_ and his website.

• American Buffalo: Spirit of a Nation (PBS/Nature, 1998)

• Sweating Indian Style: Conflicts Over Native American Ritual (Society for Visual Anthropology/1994

• Awake: A Dream from Standing Rock (2017) (Myron Dewey, Josh Fox).

• The Condor and the Eagle (2019); esp. focused on South America.

• Biidaaban (The Dawn Comes) (2018); 18 minute animated short film.

Documentaries (misc)

• Battle for Wilderness (1989)

• Disneynature

• Greenfire (2011) [Aldo Leopold]

• Holmes Rolston Lecture on Leopold, Greenfire, and Earth Ethics (2013)

- Gaia-Goddess of the Earth (1986) <verbatim>PBS

Nova</verbatim> (1995)

- Ecopsychology-Restoring the <verbatim>Earth

Healing</verbatim> the Self (1995)

• Thinking like a Watershed

• The National Parks / Americas Best Idea (Ken Burns/PBS/2009)

• Renewal: America’s Emerging Religious Environmental Movement (2007)

• Spirit & Nature’ (PBS/Moyers, 1991) (viewable, here, online)

Documentaries (about or by radical environmentalists)

• American Values / American Wilderness (High Plains Films/2005)

• Call of Life (Species Alliance/2010)

• Edward Abbey: A Voice in the Wilderness (1993)

• Lessons from the Rainforest (1991) [Lou Gold]

• Rage over Trees (Audubon, 1994)

• Pickaxe (Independent, 2000)

• Road Use Restricted (Independent, 1987).

• Dave Foreman, Radical Environmentalism talk, the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh (1990)

• Earth First!, on 60 Minutes (1990)

• If a Tree Falls: A story of the Earth Liberation Front (2011)

• Buffalo should be everywhere (High Plains Films/2019)

Motion Pictures (theatrical)

• Dances With Wolves (1990)

• The Color Purple (1985)

• Contact (1991)

• Pocahontas (Disney/1995)

• Avatar (2009)

• The East (2013)

Television

• Game of Thrones

• Many productions on Discovery, Animal Planet, PBS, Disney channels.

Websites (academic journals & organizations)

• Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture (scholarly journal affiliated with the International Society for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture).

• The International Society for Environmental Ethics (ISEE)

• Environmental Ethics_ (Journal)

• Environmental Values (Journal)

• Forum on Religion and Ecology at Yale University (site promoting the ‘greening of religion’ led by religion scholars and diverse religionists)

• IUCN World commission on Protected Areas, Cultural and Spiritual Values Specialist Group.

Websites (popular & often focused on nature and spirituality)

• Emergence Magazine

• On Being (NPR/PRI podcast)

• To the Best of Our Knowledge (NPR/PRI podcast)

• Orion Magazine (Journal)

• Sacred Lands Film Project

Additional resources, such as links to podcasts, music, slideshows, video, music, and websites, will be made available here during the course. Students are encouraged to send their own ideas for resources to the course instructor.

A longer bibliography will be provided separately

FALL 2021, Nature, Spirituality and popular Culture (undergraduate)

Source:

<http://brontaylor.com/courses/pdf/NSPC.Syllabus(Fall.2021).pdf>

Nature, Spirituality & Popular Culture

The University of Florida

COURSE NUMBER, TIME & PLACE

Interdisciplinary Studies: IDS 2935 (This course will be entirely online.)

INSTRUCTORS

Professor Bron Taylor (Ph.D.) Chris Lomelin (M.A.)

Email: bron@ufl.edu Email: lomelince@ufl.edu

Office: Anderson 121 Office: Anderson 017

Office hours: by appointment via zoom. Office hours: by appointment via zoom.

COURSE DESCRIPTION

Beginning with the period since Walt Disney began making animal-focused documentaries and animated films in the 1930s, continuing up through the blockbuster motion picture Avatar (2009) and the Animal Kingdom theme park further expressing its themes, this course takes a global tour examining the religious, spiritual, ethical, and political dimensions of artistic productions, scientific representations in museums, and other cultural inventions, in which nature takes center stage. We will explore the international cultural tributaries, influences, and controversies such productions engender, for they constitute important ways that environmental ethics, and quests for environmentally sustainable livelihoods and lifeways, are expressed and promoted. The course will enhance students’ abilities to interpret these cultural productions and their evocative power, explore their own reactions to these social phenomena, whilst learning to think more deeply about their own places in, and obligations to, the natural world.

The course will also help students to recognize how different worldviews — the philosophical, religious, and scientific understandings of the universe and biosphere — are expressed and promoted in popular culture. This will also enhance students’ international sophistication as they learn from where and when the world’s predominant religions emerged — for example Buddhism, Daoism, Confucianism and Hinduism in Asia, Judaism, Christianity and Islam from the Near East — while also learning about the worldviews and ethical orientations typical of indigenous traditions, among contemporary Pagans, New Age devotees, and science-inspired nature spiritualities. Analytic tools from the Humanities and humanistic social sciences will also be provided in order to enhance student understanding of important trends at the intersection of nature, spirituality, and popular culture.

GENERAL EDUCATION | HUMANITIES/INTERNATIONAL | WRITING REQUIREMENT | QUEST “NATURE & CULTURE” FOCUS

This course has been approved for UF’s General Education credit in the Humanities and

International Studies areas. It has been approved under Humanities (H), International (N) and Quest 1 “Nature and Culture” theme. It also meets the University Writing Requirement (2000 words).

Pages 2–5 explain the purpose and student learning outcomes for these credits. Specific information about the course, such as readings, assignments and grading, begins on page 6.

GENERAL EDUCATION | HUMANITIES & INTERNATIONAL FOCI

Humanities (H)

Humanities courses provide instruction in the history, key themes, principles, terminology, and theory or methodologies used within a humanities discipline or the humanities in general. Students will learn to identify and to analyze the key elements, biases and influences that shape thought. These courses emphasize clear and effective analysis and approach issues and problems from multiple perspectives.

International (N)

This designation is always in conjunction with another program area.

International courses promote the development of students’ global and intercultural awareness. Students examine the cultural, economic, geographic, historical, political, and/or social experiences and processes that characterize the contemporary world, and thereby comprehend the trends, challenges, and opportunities that affect communities around the world. Students analyze and reflect on the ways in which cultural, economic, political, and/or social systems and beliefs mediate their own and other people’s understanding of an increasingly connected world.

General Education Subject Areas will be met through:

Regular lectures and near-weekly writing assignments, in-class discussions, and feedback on their assigned research paper, will help students to analyze the geographically diverse and international social contexts, and worldviews, leading to and undergirding the various religious, spiritual, scientific, and ethical understandings that are being expressed in popular culture, which they have encountered through readings and diverse media in the course. Every student will also be expected – and pushed – during the discussion to articulate their understandings and emerging views orally during discussion sections. The weekly topics identified course schedule provides more detail on specific phenomena we will be analyzing and the General Education – relevant issues students will be engaging.

GENERAL EDUCATION STUDENT LEARNING OUTCOMES

The general education student learning outcomes (SLOs) describe the knowledge, skills and attitudes that students are expected to acquire while completing a general education course at the University of Florida. They fall in three main areas:

1. Content: Students demonstrate competence in the terminology, concepts, methodologies and theories used within the subject area.

2. Critical Thinking: Students carefully and logically analyze information from multiple perspectives and develop reasoned solutions to problems within the subject area.

3. Communication: Students clearly and effectively communicate knowledge, ideas, and reasoning in written or oral forms appropriate to the subject area.

General Education / Humanities specific SLOs.

Through exams, written work, and class discussions students will demonstrate that they understand, can think critically, and communicate effectively about the role religion, spirituality, and popular culture often plays in contemporary life. Specifically:

1. Content: 1) Students will show they understand critical course terms such as religion, spirituality, nature, and popular culture, as well as theories scholars use to understand the religious dimension of human life, and specific methodological tools they deploy when analyzing beliefs, perceptions, and practices related to what people variously construe as religion or spirituality; (2) Students will show they can explain the above mentioned terms, theories, and approaches to the study of religion, nature and popular culture.

2. Critical Thinking: (1) Students will show they understand the major, often competing and incompatible knowledge systems around the world and how these are related theories of environmental ethics, and the assumptions, religious, philosophical, and scientific, upon which they are based; (2) Students will show they can discern differences between differing knowledge systems and understand their origins and the diverse ways they engage the religious/spiritual, affective, ethical, and political dimensions of life; and (3) Student will demonstrate an ability to think reflexively and critically about their own spiritual views and values, how they arrived at them, and whether and if so why any of the many perspectives they are encountering in the course they find emotionally and intellectually compelling.

3. Communication: (1) Nearly every week, students will provide a written response paper showing they understand the week’s assignments and they illuminate the ways nature-related spiritualities and values are constructed, expressed, promoted, and contested in popular culture (2) Students will demonstrate they understand the process of writing research paper by submitting a draft research paper, and after receiving feedback on it, revising it and then submitting a final, properly formatted and referenced original research paper, including a literature review that draws on refereed scholarly research. (3) On their final exam students will demonstrate an ability to write a coherent and well-reasoned essay expressing how, given what they have encountered in this course, their minds have changed or remained the same about their place in the world and responsibilities to it.

General Education / International studies specific SLOs

Through exams, written work, and class discussions students will demonstrate that they understand, can think critically, and communicate effectively about the role religion, spirituality, and popular culture often plays in contemporary life. Specifically:

1. Content: (1) Students will show that they understand the major differences between religious perceptions and practices around the world, including the ways indigenous traditions typically differ from the world’s predominant religions. 2) Students will show that they understand how in the contemporary world popular culture expresses and promotes, in a host of ways, diverse perspectives on the human place in the world and their responsibilities to it and one another, and the stakes involved given the increasingly interconnected nature of Earth’s biocultural systems.

2. Critical Thinking: (1) Students will demonstrate an ability to analyze and think critically about the strengths and weaknesses of competing and incompatible knowledge systems around the world, including those with implicit or explicit environmental ethics. (2) Students will show they can recognize the cultural and international sources of these differing perspectives in a wide variety of cultural productions that engage religious/spiritual, affective, ethical, and political dimensions of life.

3. Communication: (1) Through exams, reading responses, and oral responses during classroom discussions, students will show that they understand how nature-related spiritualities and values are constructed, expressed, promoted, and contested in popular culture, and these are increasingly globalized processes leading to new hybrid religious forms, which variously both hinder and promote proenvironmental behavior and thereby affect biocultural systems. (2) Students will be demonstrate through their exams and written work that they can identify popular culture productions, their international and cultural sources, as well as divergent scholarly perspectives on their impacts upon biocultural systems today and in the future.

WRITING REQUIREMENT

The University Writing Requirement is designed to promote student fluency in writing. Course instructors will assess student’s written assignments with respect to content, grammar, punctuation, usage of standard written English, clarity, coherence, organization, style, and mechanics. To help students improve their writing I have provided a writing well guide. Students who study this guide and avoid the problems identified in it typically improve and do well with their writing assignments. I have also prepared a writing assessment rubric to explain how course instructors will evaluate written work.

Professor Taylor’s Writing Assessment Rubric

	Satisfactory (Y)	Unsatisfactory (N)
Content	Good writing demonstrates an ability to understand and critically evaluate facts, different perspectives, and fault lines among the perspectives you are analyzing in course materials.	Unsatisfactory writing has minimal if any relevant discussion or citation of content relevant to the assignment.
Clarity & Organization	Often neglected, one’s writing must be work in a coherent manner that clearly states a thesis and musters evidence in support of it, provides transitions where needed (while avoiding tautology, in other words, needless repetition). Good organization provides readers what they need to follow the discussion.	Unsatisfactory writing is difficult if not impossible to follow because there is no coherent organization (or flow) to the writing. It typically has abrupt shifts and material that appears ‘out of the blue.’
Critical Thinking & Argument	Good writing judiciously assembles and evaluates evidence both for and against one’s argument while providing reasons for why the balance of evidence favors one’s findings, conclusions, and arguments.	Unsatisfactory writing provides no or an obtuse arguments, little if any well-sourced evidence, and/or no fairminded analysis of competing perspectives.
Expression & Style	Good style involves using word choices that reflect an accurate understanding of their meanings, terminology fitting the critical perspectives introduced in the course, and grammar at an appropriate level of sophistication for college-level analysis.	Unsatisfactory writing often if not entirely incoherent – due to failures in organization, word choice, sentence structure, and poor grammar.
Mechanics & Summary	Excellent written work will consistently reflect the above-mentioned virtues. Satisfactory work may have flaws but will, nevertheless, demonstrate that the student has mastered key concepts and has been able to make some good points relevant to the specific assignment.	Unsatisfactory writing fails to communicate. It typically reveals a lack of student effort. When written work is ill-informed or confusing due to poor writing, or both, it will be judged unsatisfactory.
Reflection	Good reflexivity makes connections and provides insights that demonstrates connections with one’s intellectual, personal, and professional growth.	Unsatisfactory writing is unreflective and does not demonstrate that the student is gaining the kind of insights that lead to personal growth
The Art of Writing	Writing is an art. It is hard work. It requires many revisions. It often requires starting over and radical reorganization. It benefits from criticism from more advanced writers. Welcome Criticism. Work the craft. It’s the only way to be become a good writer.	To avoid an unsatisfactory evaluation, work the craft, and consult my writing well guide, which will help you avoid some of the most common writing mistakes.

** Important note: To receive writing requirement credit, a student must receive a grade of C or higher in the course, and a satisfactory completion of the writing component of the course.

THE QUEST ~ “NATURE & CULTURE” FOCUS

This course has been created for Quest program’s “Nature and Culture” theme by examining nature-related global processes and the religious, spiritual, political dimensions of artistic productions and scientific representations in ‘popular culture.’ It illuminates the global and international tributaries, hybridities, reciprocal influences, and controversies that flow from these processes in the ongoing struggle of humankind to understand its place in and responsibilities toward one another and the rest of the living world.

By looking at these processes and the contentions related to them students will encounter and wrestle with a variety of religion-related perceptions and claims about non-human organisms and environmental systems, such as: Are any of them sacred and worthy of reverence, or conversely, are any of them spiritually or politically dangerous? Is there some sort of divine agency that has given rise to the world and who enjoins responsibilities to it? Do religious worldviews, which emerged in diverse regions around the world, lead to indifference or hostility to earthly organisms or environmental systems, viewing them as profane, or illusory, or of penultimate value, compared to some extra-worldly sacred place of greater, or exclusive, moral and spiritual value? In short, this course poses longstanding questions regarding the nature of the universe, the biosphere, and the ways humans construct meaning and values as they seek to understand their place in both. The course also intersects with other “essential questions” the Quest program poses: including who are we

(identities)? What meaning and values should we uphold (through an examined life)? How ought we to live with one another and the wider community of life? And, how we ought to pursue or defend good and socially just ecological and social systems?

COURSE OBJECTIVES AND QUEST-RELATED STUDENT LEARNING OUTCOMES

The quest program has its own Student Learning Objectives, which include the following text: During this class, through exams, written assignments, and participation in course discussions, students will be able to ...

• identify, describe and explain the major types and differences in the world’s religions/spiritualities and how these are typically related to environment-related perceptions and behaviors

• identify, describe and explain a wide variety of course-related terms including religion, spirituality, nature, hybridity, globalization, anthropocentrism, biocentrism, and ecocentrism, as well as the

“family resemblances” approach to the study of religion-resembling social phenomena

• explain how social contexts and processes of socialization shape nature-related worldviews, beliefs, values, and practices

• identify, describe and explain the theories and methods, grounded in the Arts and Humanities, that analysts introduced in the course use to illuminate the role that artistic productions in popular culture play expressing, promoting, and shaping nature-related perceptions, spiritualities, values, and behaviors, and how these processes are increasingly globalized, lead to cross-cultural influences, new, hybridized religious forms, and influence social and environmental systems.

• demonstrate they can be self-reflexive and evaluate the knowledge systems and ethical perspectives advanced by individuals and groups very different from their own, while connecting the personal quest to arrive at a compelling worldview with their own intellectual, professional, and even (perhaps) spiritual development.

PRIVACY

Class discussions are for enrolled students in this class and are not to be shared outside of class.

This said, students cannot expect that comments made during this class will remain private.

READINGS

The required books are either available for free from UF’s library or can be found inexpensively from online or purchased from the University of Florida bookstore. Additional articles will be available via online links.

Required Texts

Bron Taylor, Dark Green Religion: Nature Spirituality and the Planetary Future (Berkeley & Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2010). A digital copy of this book is available on reserve at UF’s library. Also available at the books website are ‘dark green’ nature-venerating video and nature-venerating music, and other supplementary materials.

Daniel Quinn, The Story of B (Bantam, 1997)

Michael Redfield, The Celestine Prophecy (NY/Warner 1993)

Ernest Callenbach, Ecotopia (Heyday/Banyan Tree 2004) (or any other edition)

REQUIREMENTS

Movies and Documentaries

Students will view motion pictures pertinent to the course foci. Students will need access to streaming services such as Netflix to view some of the video resources. Students must see required films no later than they are assigned.

Discussion & Quizzes

Nearly every week there will be discussion sessions and quizzes. Students must participate in assigned discussions between Wednesdays and Saturdays and complete assigned quizzes by Sunday at 11:59 p.m., which is when that module ends. Only the highest ten scores from the quizzes will count toward the 100 points possible for this assignment. The regularity and quality of discussion participation will be evaluated by the instructors at the end of the term.

Field Trips (fieldwork / experiential research)

Students will participate in at least one, course-relevant cultural production in Gainesville or the wider region (or virtually if this is not possible), and subsequently, write up an analysis of the course-relevant themes encountered and discuss their findings during class with student colleagues and course instructors. For due dates see the “Schedule” section and for more information see “Fieldwork & Research Paper Guidelines” (pages 19 & 20).

Exams

There will be a midterm and a final exam, with diverse questions to respond to, including essay sections. The exams will be comprehensive, with questions drawing on any classroom experience or assignment that occurred previously.

Research Paper and optional Slideshow Presentation

Students will prepare a 2,000 word research paper that adheres to the University of Florida’s

Level-Two Writing Requirement. After submitting a proposal for approval, students will submit

a draft of these papers and receive feedback on them. They will then be expected to revise them in the light of the instructor’s suggestions and criticisms (see course schedule for related due dates for the proposal, draft, and revised, final paper). In addition to this research paper, students may submit a related slideshow illuminating the social phenomena analyzed in the written paper. Slideshows will receive up to 40 bonus points (40 if judged outstanding: if excellent, 30; if good, 20; if course relevant but not particularly good, 10). With student permission, excellent and outstanding slideshows may be shared with course colleagues. Slideshows will be prepared with PowerPoint, Keynote, or other slideshow presentation programs. For more information see the section “Fieldwork & Research Paper Guidelines” (pages 19 & 20).

Discussions. There will be ample opportunities for students to express confusions and ask questions about all course materials and presentations via the discussion features provided in Canvas. Students themselves will often be able to answer questions or clarify things for one another before course instructors do, but course instructors shall seek to answer all questions within a week.

EVALUATION

Points & Percentages for Required Assignments

Assignment	Proportion of Course Grade
Regular Quizzes (10%) (10 each, 75 total)	7.5%
Participation in Discussions (75 points)	7.5%
Fieldwork Research (5%) (50 points)	5%
Research Paper (200 points; up to 240 if optional slide show also provided.)	20%
Midterm (250 points)	25%
Final (350 points)	35%

Evaluation of Contributions to Discussions

Participation in discussions is essential to student learning and enhancing the experience in the class by connecting students personally to one another as well as their instructors. Responses to each discussion question can be usually be provided succinctly, in one to three sentences. Students are also expected to provide feedback, to respond, to what their colleagues and instructors say during the discussion sections. Student contributions to discussions will be evaluated on a scale of 1–5, every week that discussions questions are posed. Excellent contributions will receive 5 points, good contributions 4 points, fair contributions 3 points, and insufficient contributions will receive 1 or 0 points.

Most weeks there will be 6–8 questions posed. Excellent performance will involve providing well written and accurate responses to two or more of these questions, and in cases where others have answered well, responding to them in agreement, and if possible, adding one’s own insights.

Excellent contributions will also, often, involve making specific references to relevant course materials, and they may also include unique insights. In short, as much as can be approximated with online discussions, excellent responses will actively engage the questions in the way a lively and collegial conversation would take place in person. This can include agreements, disagreements, adding additional perspectives and relevant facts. Good contributions will involve much of the same but some occasional misapprehensions and writing flaws. Fair contributions will involve less engagement, fewer direct references learning materials and/or inaccurate statements about them (indicating that the student is not studying courses materials in the depth, and with the effectiveness, needed). Fair contributions may also suffer from less lucid and grammatically correct writing. Insufficient contributions will be judged when engagement is low or absent and when extant, indicates that the student is not engaging the courses learning materials.

In summary: the more lively one’s participation the more one will learn during discussions and contribute to the learning of others. As importantly, the more one participates in discussions the better one will soon the quizzes that flow directly from the questions engaged in them.

Evaluation of Written Research Assignments

See the explanations on page 3 & 4 about UF’s Writing Requirement, the Evaluation Rubric, and Professor Taylor’s writing guide.

Calculating Grades

At the end of the semester, the total number of points earned by each student will be divided by the total number earned by the highest-scoring student. The resulting percentage will be used to calculate each student’s grade for the course. Put in a formula, it looks like this:

the score of each individual student (your score)

(divided by) the highest score earned by a student

The percentage arrived at by means of this formula will be evaluated by this scale:

A	≥95
A-	90
B+	87
B	83
B-	80
C+	77
C	73
C-	70
D+	67
D	63
D-	60
F	≤59.99

This kind of scoring is fairer than many other forms of grading because: (1) It is based on what students actually achieve rather than some preconceived standard held by the professor; (2) Each student can receive a high grade; (3) Hard-working students will not be penalized for staying in a demanding course full of equally industrious students. With a traditional curve, demanding courses that “weed out” less industrious students, leaving hard-working ones, can unintentionally harm good students putting them in competition with each other. This will not occur in this course.

Extra credit

Extra credit can be earned in a number of ways. Exams may include extra credit questions. If so, any extra credit points will be added to the individual student’s score but only after the highest score earned by a student has been established. This ensures that the extra credit earned will not increase the difficulty of the grading scale. Students who contribute significantly to classroom discussions— by pointing instructors to course-related phenomena (including events in Gainesville or nearby that could provide extra credit opportunities for the entire class); or who attend and submit 300–500 word reports from events approved by instructors as extra credit opportunities—will receive extra credit. Apart from extra credit points earned on exams such points will be awarded at the end of the semester after the grading scales have been finalized.

Attendance, late or Missing Assignments

Students who do not make discussion posts on time will not receive credit for them. Students who cannot take an exam on time for UF authorized excuses, must inform the course instructors before the exam of the reason for their impending absence, and provide evidence verifying the reason. No accommodation will be made after the fact apart from a contemporaneous emergency immediately prior to the exam. Any makeup exams will take place during finals week. For further information about what constitutes acceptable absences or late assignments, see UF’s Attendance Policies.

Academic Dishonesty

Students engaged in any form of academic dishonesty, as defined under the “Academic Misconduct” section of the Student Honor Code, will be subject to other disciplinary measures. Students should know what constitutes plagiarism and avoid inadvertent forms of it that can occur, as for example, by cutting and pasting quotations from various digital texts and failing to put them in quotation marks with appropriate crediting of the source.

Reviewing exams

Academic dishonesty is so pronounced that faculty need to take precautions to ensure the integrity of exam processes. For this reason, in some classes, exams or parts of them will not be returned, but students may review them during office hours. At the end of the semester, work that was available for student pickup will be available in the Religion Department office in Anderson 107 for 30 days after the official date that grades are posted by the registrar. After this time, they will be shredded & recycled.

Student Evaluations of this Course

Students and instructors all have much to learn and room for improvement. Your feedback on your courses is critical to their quality. Students will be notified when the window for providing feedback on the course opens, and will be able to do so under the GatorEvals link in the Canvas course menu or here. After the end of the semester students can also review a Summary of Student Evaluations.

Courtesy to fellow students and instructors

One of the beautiful things about higher education, at its best, is the ability to wrestle with wildly diverse perspectives on critically important issues and ideas. Exchanges among all course participants should remain collegial, even when serious and emotionally-charged perspectives are being advanced and criticized.

Communicating with instructors

Students should contact their instructors through the Canvas email link. Your instructors pride themselves on being responsive to students and will usually respond within 48 hours. This is not always possible, however, and such rapidity should not be expected. Plan ahead.

Accommodation for Disabilities

Students with disabilities who experience learning barriers who wish to learn about and possibly request special accommodations should begin by contacting the Disability Resource Center. Students should discuss such needs within the first two weeks of the semester, and share any letter requesting accommodations, with Professor Taylor.

In-Class Recording

Students are allowed to record video or audio of class lectures. However, the purposes for which these recordings may be used are strictly controlled. The only allowable purposes are (1) for personal educational use, (2) in connection with a complaint to the university, or (3) as evidence in, or in preparation for, a criminal or civil proceeding. All other purposes are prohibited. Specifically, students may not publish recorded lectures without the written consent of the instructor.

A “class lecture” is an educational presentation intended to inform or teach enrolled students about a particular subject, including any instructor-led discussions that form part of the presentation, and delivered by any instructor hired or appointed by the University, or by a guest instructor, as part of a University of Florida course. A class lecture does not include lab sessions, student presentations, clinical presentations such as patient history, academic exercises involving solely student participation, assessments (quizzes, tests, exams), field trips, private conversations between students in the class or between a student and the faculty or lecturer during a class session.

Publication without permission of the instructor is prohibited. To “publish” means to share, transmit, circulate, distribute, or provide access to a recording, regardless of format or medium, to another person (or persons), including but not limited to another student within the same class section. Additionally, a recording, or transcript of a recording, is considered published if it is posted on or uploaded to, in whole or in part, any media platform, including but not limited to social media, book, magazine, newspaper, leaflet, or third party note/tutoring services. A student who publishes a recording without written consent may be subject to a civil cause of action instituted by a person injured by the publication and/or discipline under UF Regulation 4.040 Student Honor Code and Student Conduct Code.

Health & Wellness

• U Matter, We Care: If you or someone you know is in distress, please contact umatter@ufl.edu, 352-392-1575, or visit U Matter, We Care website to refer or report a concern and a team member will reach out to the student in distress.

• Counseling and Wellness Center: Visit the Counseling and Wellness Center website or call 352-392-1575 for information on crisis services as well as non-crisis services.

• Student Health Care Center: Call 352-392-1161 for 24/7 information to help you find the care you need, or visit the Student Health Care Center website.

• University Police Department: Visit UF Police Department website or call 352-392-1111 (or 9-1-1 for emergencies).

• UF Health Shands Emergency Room / Trauma Center: For immediate medical care call 352-733-0111 or go to the emergency room at 1515 SW Archer Road, Gainesville, FL 32608; Visit the UF Health Emergency Room and Trauma Center website.

Academic Resources

• E-learning technical support: Contact the UF Computing Help Desk at 352-392-4357 or via email at helpdesk@ufl.edu.

• Library Support: Various ways to receive assistance with respect to using the libraries or finding resources.

• Teaching Center: Broward Hall, 352-392-2010 or to make an appointment 352- 392–6420. General study skills and tutoring.

• Writing Studio: 2215 Turlington Hall, 352-846-1138. Help brainstorming, formatting, and writing papers.

• Student Complaints On-Campus: Visit the Student Honor Code and Student Conduct Code webpage for more information.

• On-Line Students Complaints: View the Distance Learning Student Complaint Process.

SCHEDULE

Important notes:

• Complete all readings and review all recorded resources by 11:59 a.m. on the Wednesdays during the week of a given Module. Quizzes when assigned will be due by 11:59 p.m. on Sundays.

• Readings average about 55 pages per Module.

• This schedule is subject to change:during the class, for the weekly assignments, use the online version, which will reflect any changes. The syllabus here has additional information you will need, including about how many points are available per assignment and how exams are evaluated.

(Orientation Week; 8/16-22/2021) ~ Introducing the Course Goals and Instructor

Assignments

View the Professor Taylor’s welcome message, review the course goals, familiarize yourself with Canvas, our online course venue, and if possible, get started on the assignments Module One.

(Module 1; 8/23-29/2021) ~ The Quest for Knowledge & Introducing NSPC

In broad terms, this course is about the quest for knowledge, so we begin by examining how knowledge is acquired, expressed, promoted, and ultimately integrated into the worldviews (aka cosmovisions) that provide people with meaning and guidance for the course of their lives. We also begin introducing the terminology — such as religion, spirituality, culture, and popular culture — that we will need to analyze the social phenomena that are the focus of this course.

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Selections from Genesis 1–12 (which includes commentary from Professor Taylor).

Andrew Fiala’s and Matt Wiebe’s articles about ‘Creation Myths in the Ancient World’ and the ‘Creation Story in the Hebrew Bible.’

Daniel Quinn, Animism: Humanities Original Worldview

Popular Culture itself is defined in different ways so we begin by looking at a discussion of the term in Wikipedia, an online source that some would and others would not consider to be an expression of popular culture William French, Rousseau

Lectures:

-> Welcome to UF & ‘The Great Quest’

-> Epistemological Humility & the Libera(ng Power of the Sociology of Knowledge -> Course Framework & Key Terms

Note: Every week there will be discussions and nearly most weeks, a short quiz, to evaluate learning during that week’s module.

(Module 2; 8/30-9/5/2021) ~ Abrahamic Cosmogonies

Assignments/Readings & Viewing (before class)

Bron Taylor’s Overview of Daniel Quinn’s Ishmael. This book was the inspiration for the motion picture “Instinct”, and it precedes chronologically The Story of B

Lynn White Jr., The Historical Roots of our Ecological Crises

William French, _Francis of Assisi_

Daniel Quinn, The Story of B, Bantam, 1997 (begin reading)

Zeitgeist Documentary (excerpts to view)

Optional viewing: “The Bible’s Buried Secrets” [1:46:31]

Presentations & discussions:

-> Genesis & Abrahamic cosmogonies

-> Lynn White’s thesis about religion and environmental behavior; Saint & Pope Francis

-> Mo(on Picture: Noah (2014), directed by Darren Aronofsky

(Module 3; 9/6-12/2021) ~ Animism & Pagan Cosmogonies ~ & two approaches to understanding religion

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Motion Picture: Bambi (1942), 79 minutes (link provided via canvas)

Daniel Quinn, The Story of B, Bantam, 1997 (complete reading this novel; the “Epilogue” & “Public Teachings appendices are optional”)

Graham Harvey, Contemporary Paganism

Presentations & discussions

-> Brother Sun, Sister Moon (1972); prologue, mo(on picture, epilogue, and discussion.

-> Explana(on of fieldwork-based and course research papers & deadlines.

(Module 4; 9/13-19/2021) ~ Analyzing ‘religion’

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Dark Green Religion, Preface, Readers Guide and Introductory Chapter (ix-12), Chapter 2, Dark Green Religion (pp. 13–41) Movie: The Wicker Man (1993).

Presentations

-> Two Analy(c Approaches to Religion

-> Paganism & The Wicker Man

Introductory resources for motion picture the Mists of Avalon

-> Audio recording on ‘Camelot, the Arthurian Legends, & ‘The Mists of Avalon’

-> Companion to the Mists of Avalon (document with plot and characters described)

* Recommended: submit your research project proposal for approval this week.

(Module 5; 9/20-26/2021) ~ Types of Religion

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Dark Green Religion in North America (Ch 3., 42–70)

Jo Pearson and Sarah Pike, Wicca

Michael York, New Age

Michael Redfield, The Celestine Prophecy (NY/Warner 1993) (read the first 50 pages)

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> “I AM” — documentary & discussion

* Deadline for submitting your research proposal for approval is Sunday 26 September, at 11:59 p.m.

(Module 6; 9/27-10/3/2021) ~ Disney’s Natures & the New Age

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Bron Taylor, “Rebels against the Anthropocene? Ideology, Spirituality, Popular Culture, and

Human Domination of the World within the Disney Empire,” JSRNC 2019

Bron Taylor, Celestine Prophecy

Jose Arguelles, Harmonic Convergence

Michael Redfield, The Celestine Prophecy (NY/Warner 1993) [read first 100 pages]

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Disney’s Natures

-> Nature, Science & New Age Nature Spirituali(es (in the Celes(ne Prophecy, and beyond) -> New Age v. indigenous spirituali(es & compe(ng understandings of the sacred (featuring excerpts from “In the Light of Reverence: The Wintu & New Age on Mt. Shasta” [29:00].

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> “Hopi Four Corners / Black Mesa” [25:00]

— > “The Lion King” [1:29:00]

(Module 7; 10/4-10/2021) ~ Ecotopias & Dystopias (Midterm Week)

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

— Michael Redfield, The Celestine Prophecy, conclude reading — Ernest Callenbach’s, Ecotopia, read first ½.

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Utopias, Dystopias and Ecotopias

-> Last chance for pre-exam Q & A

Mid-term exam this week

(Module 8; 10/11-17/2021) ~ Pagan & Radical Environmentalism

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Dark Green Religion, Ch 4. Radical Environmentalism (71–102).

Bron Taylor, Animism, Tree Consciousness and the Religion of Life, the backstory to Richard Powers’ Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Overstory.

John Seed, Re-Earthing

Ernest Callenbach’s, Ecotopia, read next ½.

“Earth First!” (60 minutes, 1990) [14:35]

“Earth Liberation Front” 60 minutes, 2001) [13:39]

Recommended Movies (available various ways with streaming services; extra credit for movie reviews): The East (2013) FernGully (1992); The Last Rainforest (1992), Hoot (2006), Butterfly (2000), If a Tree Falls, and Pickaxe (1999).

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Midterm exam debriefing

-> View the final 22 minutes of ‘The East’ and discuss.

-> Radical Environmentalism and Nature Spirituality in novels and cinema.

(Module 9; 10/18-24/2021) ~ Surfing Spirituality and Outdoor Nature Spiritualities

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Ernest Callenbach, Ecotopia (conclude, if necessary)

Dark Green Religion, Ch 5. Surfing Spirituality (103–126)

Tina Grandinetti, “Indigenous Surfing Rides High: The ocean is my totem,” The Guardian.

Bron Taylor onSurfing, Nature and Spirituality [3:30]

Decolonizing Surfing with Native Like Water | Sea of Change [5:02]

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Surfing into Spirituality lecture (with excerpts from Point Break (1991), Five Summer Stories (1972), Whale Rider (2002), Step into Liquid (2003), Blue Horizon (2004), and Inten(o (2012). -> Climbing Devil’s Tower: Religious Ritual or Desecra(ng Act? Lecture with excerpts from “In the Light of Reverence”

-> Discussion of outdoor recrea(on & nature spirituali(es

* Recommended due date for Field Trip reports is by 11:59 p.m. on 31 October. (More time is possible because some such experiences may be after this date.)

(Module 10; 10/25-31/2021) ~ Pantheism, Gaian Naturalism, & Dark Green Religion Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Dark Green Religion, Ch 6. Globalization with Predators & Moving Pictures (127–154)

Jack Loeffler, Edward Abbey, “Either everything is divine, or nothing is” Bernard Zaleha, Pantheism in American Popular Culture (82–101; the rest is optional)

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Dark Green Spirituali(es (Part 1): Pain(ng, Photography, and Prose

-> Dark Green Spirituali(es (Part 2): Museums, Aquariums & Science Performances

-> Pantheism in the movies and music (including discussion of Zaleha ar(cle), including excerpts and discussion of the mo(on picture S(gmata and the role of the Dead Sea scrolls in Chris(an Pantheism today.

-> Analysis of A Walk Through Time (an online version of museum-like exhibi(on on cosmological and biological evolu(on produced by the HewleJ Packard company).

Video & Mo,on Picture

Michael Jackson, Earth Song

S(gmata (1999)

Monterey Bay Aquarium Jelly Cam (discussed in lecture)

The first draft of your research paper is due by 11:59 p.m. on 7 November.

Note: it will be returned to you, evaluated as indicated previously with suggestions, no later than 21 November.

(Module 11; 11/1-7/2021) ~ Nature spirituality from pilgrimage to the future

Assignments/Readings & Viewings

Ch 7. Globalization in Arts, Sciences, and Letters (155–179)

Get started on the Avatar readings (listed under week12):B. Taylor, Prologue: Avatar as Rorschach; and, Introduction: The Religion and Politics of Avatar

Britt Istoft, Avatar Fandom, Environmentalism, and Nature Religion

Kari Sonde (2020). “How ‘Avatar: The Last Airbender’ Became One of the Summer’s Most Popular Shows 15 Years After Its Debut, Movie: Avatar (2009) (Watch this or next week; there will be a collective viewing opportunity with popcorn after class this or next week.)

The optional slide show, which goes with the research paper, must be turned in by 11:59 p.m. on 13 November.

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Dark Green Spiritualities (Part 3): From Pilgrimage to the Future -> Introduce and begin watching Avatar excerpts.

(Module 12; 11/8-14/2021) ~ Avatar, Contact & Cultural Conflict over Religion & Nature in Motion Pictures

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Chapters from Avatar and Nature Spirituality (available gratis through Professor Taylor):

• Chris Klassen, Becoming the ‘Noble Savage’: Nature Religion and the ‘Other’ in Avatar

• Lisa H. Sideris, I See You: Interspecies Empathy and Avatar

• B. Taylor, Truth and Fiction in Avatar’s Cosmogony and Nature Religion

Video online: Amazon Watch, Defending the Rivers of the Amazon with Sigourney Weaver (2010, 10:39); Avatar: A Message from Pandora (James Cameron on protecting the Amazon; optional, 20.00); and from indigenous rights websites: Indigenous Environmental Network; Amazon Watch

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Conclude Avatar excerpts.

-> discuss & debate the compe(ng perspec(ves described in Avatar & Contact, and how they reflect compe(ng views in society at large.

Lecture: Avatar (2009) and indigenous peoples, nature, and popular culture: exploring changes from vilification to (sometimes romantic) vindication, with more popular culture exemplars, including excerpts from Dances with Wolves (1990).

(Module 13; 11/15-28/2021) — includes Thanksgiving week) ~ Civil Religion & Terrapolitan Earth Civilization

Readings:

* Dark Green Religion, Ch 8, “Terrapolitan Earth Religion (180–99); ch 9 recommended now.

Presentations & discussions:

-> Civil and Terrapolitan Earth Religion, from Abraham Lincoln to Robert Bellah and Daniel

Deudney

-> Civil Religion and “America’s Best Idea” — the PBS documentary about our Na(onal Parks — and what it reveals about nature spirituality (and Na(onalism) in America.

-> Patriotism, environmentalism, and the consecration of The National Parks: America’s Best Idea (2009), with excerpts from this PBS documentary series.

Assignments/Readings & Viewings

• Mo(on Picture to watch: Contact (1997)

• Documentary excerpts to watch: The Na(onal Parks

Important: many things are introduced during the 12 hour series on the National Parks that are not included in the assigned excerpts, so here is some important background to have in mind when viewing them, as well as a few things to think about while doing so:

1. The establishment of America’s National Parks, in most cases, depended upon the violent subjugation and displacement of the indigenous populations already living there.

2. Their establishment would not have happened, or at least to the extent and within the specific time frames, were it not for both commercial interests (railroads and tourism, for example) and nationalism, including its ideology of ‘manifest destiny.’

3. The Parks also include historical and cultural sites, and examples in many places in America including Florida.

4. Episode 2 has more historical information about John Muir’s battle against the Hetch Hetchy Dam in Yosemite National Park. Before the 1906 earthquake in California, which led to most of San Francisco being burnt to the ground, it looked as though he would win that battle, but afterward, the public switched to supporting it, being misled into believing that the water from it was needed to safeguard the city. Brokenhearted, Muir died soon afterward. But historians say for the most part his loss solidified the notion that National Parks should be off limits to commercial incursions.

5. Wallace Stegner is one of the countries greatest western writers. He is often quoted in the documentary but the excerpts shown do not introduce him.

6. Many of the cultural sites promote and reinforce patriotism and civil religion, which are in turn often linked to the exceptional natural landscapes and used to foster both we feeling and place feeling, and sometimes even superiority, over other people and places. Is a ‘civil earth religion,’ or a ‘terrapolitan earth religion’ expressed and promoted in the parks, or a narrower nationalistic civil religion, or neither?

7. Notice how different the reactions of people are to nature, that these reactions are at least some extent ‘socially constructed’, namely, a reflection of the preexisting cognitive and cultural frames people bring to the experience. This was seen in the history chapter in the Dark Green Religion book; What examples of it to you see in this film? E.g., some people were and are horrified by wild, sometimes geothermal nature, others find the sublime in the continent’s wild places, others find evidence for the grandeur and goodness of God.

8. In a section not excerpted, the National Park Ranger Sheldon Jacobs discussed how he had no connections with wild places growing up in Detroit, but was immediately moved and enraptured by bison during his first visit to Yellowstone National Park. At the time of the filming, he was an interpretive ranger in Yosemite National Park. A good question when considering his mystical experiences with the bison in Yellowstone is whether for him, that was a socially constructed experience, or a more personal one grounded in an experience, and a felt relationship, with the beings and place where bison still are allowed to live.

9. Are there examples of animistic or Gaian spiritualities depicted in, and even expressed by the filmmakers, in this documentary? If so, where/when?

10. What role did photographers and landscape painters play in expressing and promoting nature spirituality and the establishment and protection of National Parks?

11. What role did the nature writer Terry Tempest Williams play; and what if anything did it have to do with nature religion and environmental ethics?

(Module 14; 11/29-12/8) ~ Popular Culture & the Future of Religion & Nature

Assignments/Readings & Viewings

• Mo(on Picture to watch: The Fountain (2006)

Readings

* Dark Green Religion, Ch 9. Conclusion: Dark Green Religion and the Planetary Future (200–222).

Presentations

Lecture: Darwinian Nature Spirituality, Evolutionary Ethics, and The future of Religion and Nature, including “Symphony of Science” music videos & Cosmos video excerpts; includes discussion and excerpts from The Fountain (2006, dir. Darren Aronofsky), 96 minutes

Any previously un-submitted Field Trip reports are due by 11:59 p.m. on 5 December

The revised Research Paper is due no later than 11:59 p.m. on 1 December — it will be returned by 8 December.

The only exceptions will be in the case of a documented medical or family emergency.

Any approved extra credit assignments are due by 11:59 p.m. on 8 December.

FINAL EXAM: 16 DECEMBER, 10 A.M. TO NOON

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

The rest of this syllabus provides resources and guidelines for the fieldwork assignment and the research paper; followed by a more extensive bibliography of scholarly books and novels, and lists of documentaries, feature films, websites, and other exemplars of the entanglement of religion, nature and popular culture; followed by additional, recommended readings and other resources paralleling the weekly course schedule. These materials can be especially helpful to students when considering research topics. Links to yet more resources, such podcasts, music, slideshows, video, music, and websites, will be made available during the course. Students are encouraged to send to course instructors their own ideas for additional resources.

Research Papers will often if not usually also draw on scholarly scholarly articles or books that you find in the library that illuminate your subject matter. This is not absolutely necessary because there may not be scholarly resources for some things you may wish to focus with the kind of focus we are taking in this class. You may, therefore, be plunging into a completely novel area, using lenses learned in or beyond this class as heuristic (interpretive) devices.

Consider what the artists themselves are trying to convince you about, or evoke some emotion in you, or call you to some action. Alternatively, you may elect to focus on the audiences who experience these productions. Consider also whether the social phenomena in question are advancing not only a spiritual approach to nature but also a political ideology, namely, ideas, aims and assertions that constitute a socio-economic-political program. Doing so will also bring into focus the perspectives with which your subject matter is in contention. Good questions to ask include: What do the producers of what you are examining think is at stake? With whom are they in contention? Can their means of artistic expression be considered ‘technologies of the sacred’ and if so, how? If there is a view of where humanity went wrong spiritually and with regard to nature, what is it? And if they are explicitly or implicitly envisioning or advocating a certain kind of future (e.g., a utopian or ‘ecotopian hope), what would it be?

To decide on a research project it would be a good idea to carefully review the entire class schedule to see what is coming up, as well as the “Additional Resources” section at the end of this syllabus.

Hints: In some cases, the theoretical approach and arguments found in Dark Green Religion will be helpful as you work up your own paper. Do you find these arguments and the evidence mustered for them compelling? Does your own focus evidence such arguments? Or, does your research cast into question those findings? Alternatively or additionally, Avatar and Nature Spirituality might be helpful to you analytically because it exemplifies the sorts of analyses I am looking for in your own papers. You may, therefore, find it helpful to read ahead to find the range of issues it explores that may also be ripe for analysis in your own research.

You are by no means restricted to the many possibilities to be found in the syllabus but being familiar with it may trigger ideas about things you know about that would be fitting. I especially like learning about things I had no idea even existed!

Finally, do not assume that you must focus on social phenomena in popular culture that promotes environmental concern and action. Much of popular culture is indifferent to and a distraction from any environmentalist agenda, and some is in direct opposition to such an agenda, including due to religious, political, and moral beliefs that view environmentalist worldviews as religiously, politically, and ethically misguided or even dangerous.

The more innovative and creative your research paper is, the better argued and evidenced, the better your grade for it will be; the same applies to your slide show presentation if you elect to do one to complement your research paper. If your paper is exceptional, I may encourage you to develop it further in order to submit to a scholarly journal, including the Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, which I edit.

Field Trips (fieldwork) analysis assignment. Students will participate in at least one, courserelevant cultural production in Gainesville or the wider region during the semester, and write up an analysis of the course-relevant themes encountered at it or during it. UF’s Harn Art Museum has regular exhibitions that are often fitting (see http://harn.ufl.edu/exhibitions/current) and our Florida Museum of Natural History (see https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/) provide many opportunities for such experiences as does the Planetarium at Santa Fe College (see https:// www.sfcollege.edu/planetarium/index).

Many of the world’s great museums, aquariums and planetariums provide virtual experiences. Due to the corona virus pandemic, some of these have enhanced what they offer or are providing such experiences for the first time. If local experiences are not available, or with the approval of instructors, for this field studies requirement students may analyze the virtual exhibitions at venues such as the American Visionary Art Museum (Baltimore), Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History (Washington DC), Shedd Aquarium, Chicago, United States (Chicago), Galleria Internazionale d’Arte Moderna (Italy), and the National Museum of Anthropology, Mexico City. At Google Arts and Culture there are many possibilities (see https://

<verbatim>artsandculture.google.com/partner?hl=en&tab=pop). Students can also submit for approval other exhibitions they may wish to explore, and additional ideas will be shared during the course via canvas.

When writing up your analyses, in 1,000 to 1,500 words, do the following:

• provide detailed description of the venue or event. Consider saying something about the visitors and whether there is something about them that is worth analyzing.

• analyze what course-relevant beliefs and values the curators, and those whose work is being featured, are trying to convey. Reflect as well on whether you find the approach evocative and/or compelling.

• use the theoretical lenses presented in the class to make an argument about the social phenomenon under investigation, or draw on other analytic perspectives you have learned elsewhere, or develop your own analytic approach as you make an argument.

In short, do not just describe but analyze and make connections with the course material. Fieldwork papers require no research other than the fieldwork experience itself; simply draw on the analytic tools provided during the course itself.

SCHOLARLY BOOKS AND ARTICLES

* most course relevant

• David Ingram, Green Screen: Environmentalism and Hollywood Cinema (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2000).

• Adrian Ivakhiv, Ecologies of the Moving Image: Cinema, Affect, Nature (WLU Press 2013) (N)

• John C. Lyden, Film as Religion: Myths, Morals, and Rituals (New York University Press, 2003) (N)

• Jeffrey Kripal, Mutants and Mystics: Science Fiction, Superhero Comics, and the Paranormal (University of Chicago Press, 2011).

Verlyn Flieger, “Taking the Part of Trees: Eco-Conflict in Middle-Earth,” in J. R. R. Tolkien and His Literary Resonances: Views of Middle-Earth, (Westport, CT & London: Greenwood Press, 2000. 147–58).

Lee Gilmore, Theatre in a crowded fire: ritual and spirituality at Burning Man (University of California Press, 2010)

Robert K. Johnston, Reel Spirituality: Theology and Film in Dialogue (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2000)

John May, ed, New Image of Religious Film (Kansas City: Sheed & Ward, 1997).

Eric Mazur, ed., Encyclopedia of Religion and Film (ABC-CLIO, 2011)

Margaret Miles, Seeing and believing: religion and values in the movies (Beacon: 1996).

Joel Martin & Conrad Ostwalt, eds, Screening the Sacred: Religion, Myth, and Ideology in Popular American Film (Boulder: Westview Press, 1995).

Jolyon Mitchell and S. Brent Plate, eds., The Religion and Film Reader (Routledge, 2007). S. Brent Plate, Religion and Film: Cinema and the Re-Creation of the World (2009).

Graham St. John, Global Tribe: Technology, Spirituality and Psytrance (Equinox Press, 2012).

(engages trance and psychedelic, nature-related shamanism)

Graeme Turner, Film as Social Practice (London and New York: Routledge, 1999).

Gregory J. Watkins, Teaching Religion and Film (Oxford University Press, 2008)

NOVELS

Margaret Atwood, The Year of the Flood: A Novel (Bloomsbury, 2009. London: Virago Press, 2010).

Dan Brown, Origin (New York: Doubleday 2017).

Robert A. Heinlein, Stranger in a Strange Land (New York: Putnam, 1961).

Barbara Kingsolver, Flight Behavior (New York: Harper, 2012).

Michael Murphy, Golf in the Kingdom (New York: Viking, 1972).

Starhawk, The Fifth Sacred Thing (New York: Doubleday, 1993).

Richard Powers, The Overstory (New York: Norton, 2018)

Kim Stanley Robinson, Ministry of the Future (Orbit, 2020)

Alice Walker, The Color Purple: A Novel (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1982).

DOCUMENTARIES

Nature-venerating (and/or conservationist)

• American Buffalo: Spirit of a Nation (1999)

• I Am (III) (2010), Tom Shadyac

• Greenfire: Aldo Leopold (2011)

• In the Light of Reverence (2001)

• Journey of The Universe (2001)

- RamDass <verbatim>

</verbatim> Fierce Grace (2001)

• The National Parks: America’s Best Idea (2009f)

• The Sacred Balance (2002); based on David Suzuki’s book by this title, narrated by him. Excerpts are sometimes available for free on youtube; if these links do not work, search for them or use a paid video service: part 1; part 2; part 3; part 4; Astronaut’s View of Earth; Science and Spirituality.

• The Vanishing Prairie (1954)

• What the Bleep do we Know? (2011)

THEATRICAL MOTION PICTURES

Nature-venerating/mystical, pantheist, etc.

• American Beauty (1999)

• Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012)

• Evan Almighty (2007)

• Fern Gully (1992)

• Golfing in the Kingdom (2010)

• On the Road (2012)

• Tree of Life (2011)

• The Fountain (2006)

• Thinking Like A Watershed (1998)

Pagan, Wiccan, Druidic

The Secret of Kells (2009); animated

The Mists of Avalon (2001) (links above)

The Wicker Man (1973)

Dancing at Lughsana (1998)

Animistic (many are available online)

Dumbo (1941)

Bambi (1942)

Fern Gully (1992)

The Lion King (1994)

Moana (2016)

Pochahontas (1995)

Spirited Away (2001)

Nature Religion & Dark Green Religion

Avatar (2009)

Epic (2013)

Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002). Peter Jackson (Director).

Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Rings. (2001) Peter Jackson (Director).

Spirit Bear (2005)

Grizzly Man (2005)

New Science/New Age

I Am (2011)

Mindwalk (1990)

The Butterfly Effect (2004)

What the Bleep Do We Know? (2011)

The Fountain (2006)

Apocalyptic and Dystopian (cf. Ecotopian/Utopian, and also Apocalpytic and Dystopian, and Natural Disasters / Phenomena)

Alive (1993)

Planet of the Apes (2001)

12 Monkeys (1995)

Fight Club (1999)

Hunger Games (2012)

Left Behind: The Movie (2001), and sequels

The Perfect Storm (2000)

This is the End (2013)

Twister (1996)

Volcano (1997)

Wall-E (2008); animated.

Outdoor recreation & adventure (Surfing, climbing, fishing)

Way of the Ocean (2011), 62 minutes, ‘explores the connection between man and sea through a visual feast of poetic motion’

Salmon Fishing in Yemen (2011)

Step into Liquid (2003)

Minds in the Water (2011)

Science Fiction

Dune (1984), also a book and 2000f TV series.

2001, A Space Odyssey (1968)

Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)

Paranormal phenomena (including near death, reincarnation, extra-terrestrials, ghosts, etc).

Afterlife (2011)

DMT: The Spirit Molecule (2010)

Signs (2002)

12 Monkeys (1995)

Asian Nature Spiritualities

Princess Mononoke (1997)

The Matrix (1999) Star Wars (1977)

VIDEO GAMES, COMPUTER APPLICATIONS

Captain Planet

Game of Thrones Companion

DMD (or Shadows of the Damned)

COMIC BOOKS

Some are relevant

PERFORMANCES & FESTIVALS

Burning Man

Raves

Welcome Ceremony, World Summit on Sustainable Development (2002)

THEME PARKS

Many are relevant: Disney, Busch Gardens, Sea World, etc.

WEBSITES

Professor Leslie Sponsel’s spiritual ecology website has many resources pertinent to this class and its projects.

FALL 2021, Religion and Nature (in theoretical and historical perspective) (graduate seminar)

Source:

<http://brontaylor.com/courses/pdf/RN.Theory.Syllabus(Fall.2021).pdf>

RELIGION AND NATURE

(Graduate Seminar), FALL 2021

SECTION, TIME, CLASSROOM

REL 6107: Mondays (3:00–6:00 p.m.); Classroom Building 105, Room 0216

INSTRUCTOR

Professor Bron Taylor (Ph.D.)

Email: bron@religion.ufl.edu

Office: Anderson 121; office telephone: (352)273–2942

Office hours: by Zoom & appointment (due to the pandemic)

DESCRIPTION (from UF Catalogue)

Religious dimensions of relationships between what humans call “nature” and

“culture.”

Purpose and Objectives

This course explores theoretical approaches and understandings regarding the complex relationships between ecosystems, religions, and cultures. It will prepare graduate students from diverse disciplines to make informed decisions regarding the unique contributions they might make to the “religion and nature” field. It will enable other graduate students to appreciate the extent to which what people variously construe as “religion” is involved in shaping nature-related behaviors, and to integrate the study of religion into their own chosen fields, whether these are more theoretically or practically inclined.

Although the course will examine religious environmental ethics through a variety of critical lenses and such subjects will certainly be discussed regularly, the coursework and focus of classroom discussions will primarily be historical and scientific rather than normative: the effort will be to understand what has been and is going on in the realm of religions and nature, and how perceptions of nature and religion interactions are understood and contested by scholars, rather than upon what we think ought to occur.

This course will draw on diverse sources. It provides introductions to a variety of theoretical approaches, and background articles on a wide range of nature-related religious phenomena, in readings from The Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature (2005). Books and articles will provide an opportunity for in-depth exposure to some of the approaches discussed in the materials introduced in the encyclopedia. It is expected that guest scholars will serve as resource people during the course.

This course is a seminar, which means it will involve active participation and discussion by all participants as we explore its central questions and themes. This syllabus is tentative. I may revise it during the course and if I do, I will provide and announce the updated version.

To facilitate communication, students must provide a valid email address and download messages at least every 48 hours, so as to not miss important announcements or requests for help from other seminar participants.

This syllabus provides the seminar outline, assignments, and information about evaluation. In it I also provide extended introductions and resources to explore further, beyond what is possible in this course, the conundrums and themes we begin to explore.

Course assignments will include intensive reading and the preparation of critical analyses of them prior to class, written responses to periodically-given, take-home essay questions, and a major research paper. I will provide details about the research paper separately from this syllabus.

Course Outline in Five Modules

The course will unfold through five modules

1. Nature as the Habitat of Religion and Culture

• Evolutionary and Cognitive theories about the roots of religious perceptions and practices. — Primate Spirituality, Paleolithic Religions, and the “Worship of Nature”

2. World Environmental History & Religion

• Agriculture and The Birth of the Gods — Occidental History, Religions, and Nature — Asian Civilizations, Religions, and Nature

3. Scientific Paradigms and the Transformation of “Religion and Nature”

Discourse

• Cosmology, ecology, evolution, ethology, and the emergence of scientific nature spiritualities

• Reactionary responses to scientific worldviews and spiritualities

4. “Religion and Nature” in twentieth century scholarship (from the Sacred and the Profane to “Ecological Anthropology” and “Religion and Ecology”)

• Mircea Eliade, cultural geography, and theories of ‘sacred space’ — Religions as adaptive and maladaptive ecological strategies — Environmental Concern, Religious Studies, the “Religion and Ecology” field

5. Religion, Nature, and the Future of Religion and Nature

• Scientific research on religion and environmental behavior.

• Contemporary Construction of Nature Religions and Pagan Spiritualities — Secularization Theories and ‘Spiritualities of Connection’ to Nature — Religion’s role in the environmental & social collapse and/or in the quest for sustainable lifeways and livelihoods

READINGS

Note: most of the required books are available inexpensively from online and other used booksellers. Wherever available, required book readings will also be available on reserve at the library. Additional articles will be available online via links found in the course schedule.

Required Texts

• Bellah, Robert N. Religion in Human Evolution: From the Paleolithic to the Axial Age. Harvard University Press, 2011.

• Glacken, Clarence. Traces on the Rhodian Shore: Nature and Culture in Western Thought. University of California Press, 1967.

• Norenzayan, Ara. Big Gods: How Religion Transformed Cooperation and Conflict. Princeton University Press, 2013.

• Rappaport, Roy A. Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity. Cambridge University Press, 1999.

• Shepard, Paul. Coming Home to the Pleistocene. Island Press, 1998.

• Taylor, Bron. Dark Green Religion: Nature Spirituality and the Planetary Future. University of California Press, 2010. (Assigned chapters available for free on reserve at UF Library and from the instructor.)

• Wilson, David Sloan. Darwin’s Cathedral: Evolution, Religion, and the Nature of Society. University of Chicago Press, 2003.

• Worster, Donald. Nature’s Economy: A History of Ecological Ideas. (Cambridge University Press, 1993) (second edition).

REQUIREMENTS Course Assignments

• Consistent, quality preparation for class by reading, taking notes, and completing weekly assignments (20% of course grade).

• Preparation and presentation of the designated “Special Assignment” reading (5%).

• Two take-home essay exams (25% each).

• Final research paper or review essay (as negotiated with instructor) (25%).

Weekly Reading Assignments

One of the most important skills for a scholar to master is the ability to understand the most important aspects of scholarly writing and to communicate effectively the key points to readers and students. I have structured this course to enhance your skills in these ways.

Nearly every week you will be asked to write approximately a one-thousand-word review of that week’s main reading or readings. Submit these analyses in single spaced word or rich text documents, and email them to my university email address by no later than Sunday at noon before the next class (as per the schedule).

As you read, these are the questions you should be sure you can answer before moving from section to section and author to author:

• What are the main questions the author is trying to answer?

• What are author’s main arguments in this regard?

• What sorts of evidence does the author muster in advancing this perspective?

• Who (individuals, groups, schools of thought) are the main proponents of views the author is defending or contesting? In other words, who are his or her intellectual allies and adversaries? (In this course, more specifically: What are the main approaches to understanding the relationships between religion and nature that the author is explicitly or implicitly promoting or criticizing?)

• What are the chief objections that these others would raise about the author’s argument and evidence?

• What do the people on the various sides of these arguments think is at stake? Put simply, why does it matter, if it does, and if it does not, why do they think it does?

Students typically have opinions about the course readings. When it comes to your weekly, written work, however, I am not very interested in them, especially if expressing them distracts you from lucid and fair-minded exposition in response to the preceding questions. My strong advice is to refrain from expressing your own views when working up those assignments, and if you cannot do so, first make sure you’ve done justice the above-mentioned questions.

The premium in this class will be to understand the arguments in the readings, the fault-lines between them, and what the authors think is at stake in the debates.

There will be ample time for us to express our own views in class, possibly as well in your final research paper, and when asked for them during the essay exams.

Discussion in class will be, first and foremost, a process of wrestling with the six questions stated above. Come well prepared to do so. Bring your reading notes and summaries. Writing Quality

It is not possible to separate the quality of one’s thinking from the quality of one’s writing. Evaluation of written work will reflect this, therefore, all students should review and consult regularly the course’s _writing well_ primer.

“Special Assignment” Readings & Exams

Every student will read at least one extra book that is important to the questions engaged in this class, and carefully present to the class what they learned in it, both orally and in writing. Students will negotiate with the instructor and jointly select the books and time for their presentations. Students may do more than one of these presentations for extra credit.

Research Paper

You will write a research paper (or in some, negotiated cases, a review essay). Through this research you will identify and analyze one or more scholarly approaches to understand the relationships among what people various construe as “religion,” “culture”, and “nature.” Given the extensive reading list of the course itself, the expectation is not that you will write a long paper, but rather, that you will select an area you are interested in and read as deeply into it as time allows, writing a 5,000–10,000 word paper in which you explain the approach(es) explored and whether and why you find it/them compelling. This project will typically not be the area you envision as the subject matter for your thesis or dissertation. I seek with this course to help you broaden your areas of competence and expertise.

During one of the final class sessions, you will make a 15–20 minute presentation based on your research paper and then must be prepared to answer questions afterward.

EVALUATION

Points Possible for Required Assignments

This chart shows the points it is possible to earn for each assignment:

Assignment	Points per Assignment	Total Possible Points
Weekly Assignments & Participation	(Collected 12 times, mathematically adjusted from 10 points each to 80 possible points total)	80
Special Assignment Reading & Presentation	20 points	20
Take-home Essay Exams (two)	100 points each	200
Final Research Paper or Review Essay	100 points	100
	Total Points / Course =	400

Course instructor reserves the right to lower or raise course grades based on classroom contributions or upon absences. Instructor also reserves the right to change course requirements.

For further information see UF’s grade and grading policies.

Communication, Canvas, and Help Desk.

Students should contact their instructor through the Canvas email link. For technical assistance, including with Canvas, contact the UF helpdesk, or with your UF ID handy, call the Helpdesk’s staff at (352) 392–4357.

Attendance, late or Missing Assignments, and Makeup Exams

Students who do not turn in study guides or reading analyses on the days they are due will not receive points. The total number of points possible for the review essay will be reduced by 20% for each day it is late.

Apart from certain exceptions, which are explained in UF’s Attendance Policies, students are expected to attend every scheduled class period.

Except in the case of a documented emergency, students must inform the instructor of their impending absence before the class they will miss. In most cases, written work must still be turned in according to the class schedule. If an authorized absence prevents a student from taking an exam, they will be able to make up the exam during finals week. The format will typically change in such a case.

Returned Assignments

Assignments are typically returned to students within one week of their due date.

Disability Accommodation

Students with disabilities who experience learning barriers who wish to learn about and possibly request special accommodations should begin by contacting the Disability Resource Center. Students should discuss such needs within the first two weeks of the semester, and share any letter requesting accommodations, with Professor Taylor.

Academic Dishonesty

Students engaged in any form of academic dishonesty, as defined under the “Academic Misconduct” section of the Student Honor Code, will be subject to other disciplinary measures. Students should know what constitutes plagiarism and avoid inadvertent forms of it that can occur, as for example, by cutting and pasting quotations from various digital texts and failing to put them in quotation marks with appropriate crediting of the source.

Course Evaluation

Students and instructors all have much to learn and room for improvement. Your feedback on your courses is critical to their quality. Students will be notified when the window for providing feedback on the course opens, and will be able to do so under the GatorEvals link in the Canvas course menu or here. After the end of the semester students can also review a Summary of Student Evaluations.

In-Class Recording

Students are allowed to record video or audio of class lectures. However, the purposes for which these recordings may be used are strictly controlled. The only allowable purposes are (1) for personal educanonal use, (2) in connecnon with a complaint to the university, or (3) as evidence in, or in preparanon for, a criminal or civil proceeding. All other purposes are prohibited. Specifically, students may not publish recorded lectures without the wripen consent of the instructor.

A “class lecture” is an educanonal presentanon intended to inform or teach enrolled students about a parncular subject, including any instructor-led discussions that form part of the presentanon, and delivered by any instructor hired or appointed by the University, or by a guest instructor, as part of a University of Florida course. A class lecture does not include lab sessions, student presentanons, clinical presentanons such as panent history, academic exercises involving solely student parncipanon, assessments (quizzes, tests, exams), field trips, private conversanons between students in the class or between a student and the faculty or lecturer during a class session.

Publicanon without permission of the instructor is prohibited. To “publish” means to share, transmit, circulate, distribute, or provide access to a recording, regardless of format or medium, to another person (or persons), including but not limited to another student within the same class secnon. Addinonally, a recording, or transcript of a recording, is considered published if it is posted on or uploaded to, in whole or in part, any media plaqorm, including but not limited to social media, book, magazine, newspaper, leaflet, or third party note/tutoring services. A student who publishes a recording without wripen consent may be subject to a civil cause of acnon insntuted by a person injured by the publicanon and/or discipline under UF Regulanon 4.040 Student Honor Code and Student Conduct Code.

Health & Wellness

• U MaAer, We Care: If you or someone you know is in distress, please contact umaper@ufl.edu, 352-392-1575, or visit U Maper, We Care website to refer or report a concern and a team member will reach out to the student in distress.

• Counseling and Wellness Center: Visit the Counseling and Wellness Center website or call 352-392-1575 for informanon on crisis services as well as non-crisis services.

• Student Health Care Center: Call 352-392-1161 for 24/7 informanon to help you find the care you need, or visit the Student Health Care Center website.

• University Police Department: Visit UF Police Department website or call 352-392-1111 (or 9-1-1 for emergencies).

• UF Health Shands Emergency Room / Trauma Center: For immediate medical care call 352-733-0111 or go to the emergency room at 1515 SW Archer Road, Gainesville, FL 32608; Visit the UF Health Emergency Room and Trauma Center website.

Academic Resources

• E-learning technical support: Contact the UF Compunng Help Desk at 352-392-4357 or via email at helpdesk@ufl.edu.

• Career ConnecLons Center: Reitz Union Suite 1300, 352-392-1601. Career assistance and counseling services.

• Library Support: Various ways to receive assistance with respect to using the libraries or finding resources.

• Teaching Center: Broward Hall, 352-392-2010 or to make an appointment 352- 392–6420. General study skills and tutoring.

• WriLng Studio: 2215 Turlington Hall, 352-846-1138. Help brainstorming, formatng, and wrinng papers.

• Student Complaints On-Campus: Visit the Student Honor Code and Student Conduct Code webpage for more informanon.

• On-Line Students Complaints: View the Distance Learning Student Complaint Process.

SCHEDULE

Note: With the exception of the first meeting of the class, which will take place on the first day of the semester, readings are to be completed by noon on the Sunday before the class date/week under which they are listed.

(Introducnon to the Course) 23 August

Religion & Nature in an Evolunonary Context

Module I: Nature as the Habitat of Religion and Culture**

• “Religion and Nature” as a field

• Biology and the Roots of Religion; and Ecological Approaches to the Study of Religion

• Primate Spirituality, Paleolithic Religions, and the “Worship of Nature

Introduction: We begin this course by introducing the “Religion and Nature” field.

This module continues by introducing evolutionary/ecological approaches to the complex relationships between Homo sapiens and their habitats. This module, although brief, is critically important, for we will return to such themes during a number of the subsequent modules.

Assignment

Before our first meeting, read and review the course syllabus and be prepared to come to class with any questions you may have about the course. Also read the two articles listed under ‘readings.’ In all subsequent weeks, students must read and be ready to discuss all of the reading assignments in class.

Readings

• Bron Taylor, “_Introduction_,” Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature (ERN). This provides a broad overview of the religion and nature field. Recommended also: the _Project History_, and _Readers Guide_

• Bron Taylor, _Exploring Religion, Nature and Culture: Introducing the Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture_, JSRNC 1.1 (2007): 5–14.

(Week 1) 30 August

Religion & Nature in an Evolunonary Context

Assignment

1) By noon, 29 August, email first assignment, analyzing the course readings so far. Come to class ready to discuss all the readings from this and the previous week, in depth.

Initial readings

• Raymond Williams, _”Ideas of Nature”_ in Problems in Materialism and Culture (London: Verso, 1980).

• Larry Sullivan, “_Worship of Nature_” from in the Encyclopedia of Religion (2^nd ed., 2005)

Required Core Reading (core readings are the course’s major books not the supplementary, shorter, articles, that extend student’s range and complement the core readings).

• Norenzayan, Big Gods, Princeton University Press, chapters 1–9.

Background and Comparative Reading (bold are the most important)

• From the ERN: _Animism_; _Animism: A Contemporary_

_Perspective_; _Anthropologists_; _Goodall, Jane_; _Primate Spirituality_.

Special Assignment Reading (possibilities)

• Schaefer, Donovan. Religious Affects: Animality, Evolution, and Power. Duke University Press, 2011

• Turner, Jonathan H., Alexandra Maryanski, Anders Klostergaard Petersen, and Armin W. Geertz. The Emergence and EvoluLon of Religion by Means of Natural SelecLon. New York: Routledge, 2018.

(Week 2) 6 September

(no class meenng this week due to Labor Day)

Religion & Evolunon (part II)

Assignment

1. Due to the Labor Day holiday, this week no assignment will be due, so you can focus on the books by Norenzayan and Bellah (assigned week 3). Next week, come to class ready to discuss the Norenzayan book, and evolutionary/cognitive approaches to understanding religions.

2. Be prepared to present ideas for special readings assignments; and all assigned readings, below.

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN: Hunting and the Origins of Religion; Magic; Paleolithic Religions and Paleolithic Art; “Rock Art”; Wonder toward Nature.

Required Core Readings

• Bellah, Religion in Human Evolution, Robert Bellah, Religion in Human Evolution, Preface, and 1–264, 265–606.

• IMPORTANT: SEE ALSO Reading Guide to Bellah Book

Special Assignment Reading

• Frazer, Sir James George. The Golden Bough: A History of Myth and Religion. Chancellor Press, 1994.

Web Resources

• _Pascal Boyer’s website_ (great to peruse)

(Week 3) 13 September

(Religion as Evolunonary Adaptanon?)

Assignments

1. By noon, 12 September send your reading analyses, summarizing the key arguments and approaches found in Norenzayan and Wilson (I will hold off asking you to wrestle with Bellah’s book until the next module.) Since this assignment wrestles with more than two weeks of reading, you may take up to 2,000 words, and the possible points will be doubled to 20. The articles by Bulbulia and Burhenn should help orient you to these theorists.

2. In class this week be especially well prepared to discuss the books by Norenzayan and Wilson.

3. Be prepared to present ideas for special readings assignments in class (or otherwise this week)

Background and Comparative Readings

• Joseph Bulbulia, “_The cognitive and evolutionary psychology of religion_” Biology and Philosophy 19: 655–86, 2004.

• Burhenn, Herbert. “Ecological Approaches to the Study of Religion.” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 9, no. 2 (1997): 111–26 (optional reading, handout or emailed document).

Required Core Reading

• Bron Taylor, _“Ecology and Nature Religions”_ from the Encyclopedia of Religion (2^nd ed., 2005)

• David Sloan Wilson’s Darwin’s Cathedral. Harvard Univ. Press, 2002

Special Assignment Reading

• Boyer’s Religion Explained, Basic, 2002

Module I: Further and Future Reading

Evolution and Religion (focus on origins and the emergence of the scholarly discussion)

• Atran, Scott. In Gods We Trust: The Evolutionary Landscape of Religion. Oxford University Press, 2002

• Bloch, Maurice. Prey Into Hunter: The Politics of Religious Experience. Cambridge University Press, 1992.

• Boyer, Pascal. The Naturalness of Religious Ideas: A Cognitive Theory of Religion. The University of California Press, 1994.

• Boyer, Pascal. Religion Explained: The Evolutionary Origins of Religious Thought. New York: Basic, 2002.

• Burhenn, Herbert. “Ecological Approaches to the Study of Religion.” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 9, no. 2 (1997): 111–26.

• Burkert, Walter. Creation of the Sacred: Tracks of Biology in Early Religions. Harvard University Press, 1996.

• Cauvin, Jacques. The Birth of the Gods and the Origins of Agriculture. Translated by Trevor Watkins. Cambridge University Press, 2000.

• Dennett, Daniel C. Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon. Viking, 2006.

• Frazer, Sir James George. The Golden Bough: A History of Myth and Religion.

Chancellor Press, 1994.

• _______. The Worship of Nature. MacMillian, 1926.

• Guthrie, Stewart. Faces in the Clouds: A New Theory of Religion. Oxford University Press, 1993.

• Hultkrantz, Ake. “Ecology of Religion: Its Scope and Methodology.” In Science of Religion Studies in Methodology, ed. Lauri Honko, 221–36. Berlin: Mouton, 1979.

• Kellert, Stephen R. and Edward O. Wilson, eds. The Biophilia Hypothesis. Press, 1993.

• Lewis-Williams, David. Conceiving God: the cognitive origin and evolution of religion. London: Thames & Hudson, 2010.

• Norenzayan, Ara. Big Gods: How Religion Transformed Cooperation and Conflict. Princeton University Press, 2013.

• Olson, Carl. “Chapter 3: The Quest for the Origins of Religion.” In Theory and Method in the Study of Religion, ed. Carl Olson, 49–99. Wadsworth, 2003.

• _______. Chapter 9: “Ecological/Biological Approaches.” In Theory and Method in the Study of Religion, ed. Carl Olson, 439–75. Wadsworth, 2003.

• Taves, Ann. Religious experience reconsidered: a building-block approach to the study of religion and other special things. Princeton University Press, 2011.

• Turner, Jonathan H., Alexandra Maryanski, Anders Klostergaard Petersen, and Armin W. Geertz. The Emergence and EvoluLon of Religion by Means of Natural SelecLon. New York: Routledge, 2018.

• Wilson, David Sloan. Darwin’s Cathedral: Evolution, Religion, and the Nature of Society. Chicago & London: Chicago University Press, 2002.

• Wilson, Edward Osborne. Biophilia. Harvard University Press, 1984.

• _______. Sociobiology: The New Synthesis. Harvard University Press, 2000.

Module II: Occidental History, Religion, & Nature

Introduction: We have thus far seen some ways in which scholars deploy evolutionary lenses to theorize about the origins of religion and to consider the importance of nature as the habitat in which humans wonder about, make sense of, and cope with, their wide, wild world. An examination with ecological lenses of the emergence and evolution of “Occidental” and “Oriental” civilizations, suggests that, as religions emerged, split, fought, lived, died, splintered, and fused, nature was more than a physical resource for the combatants; nature was a wellspring for reflection, a ubiquitous symbolic resource, the very humus out of which religious life emerged and grew. This did not lead, however, to an ethical valuing of nature. Indeed, a case can be made that while religions were inevitably and inexorably rooted in nature, the more “civilized” they became, the less intrinsically valuable nature became. Instead, the world became a place of religious trial in a broad narrative in which the climax of the story was, in one way or another, divine rescue from this world.

(Week 4) 20 September

Ancient Occidental Religions

Assignment

1) By noon, 19 September send by mail your analysis of Glacken’s treatment of the ‘The Ancient World,’, while noting continuities and discontinuities with Bellah’s book and other readings about the period).

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN, essential readings in bold: Eden and other Gardens; Eden’s

Ecology; Hebrew Bible; Jewish Intertestamental Literature; *Judaism; Christianity-main entries; *Book of Nature; *Natural Law and Natural Rights; Islam; Muhammad; The Qur’an; Gardens in Islam.

Required Core Reading

• Glacken, Clarence. Traces on the Rhodian Shore: Nature and Culture in Western

Thought. University of California Press, 1967. Part I, “The Ancient World” (1–168).

Further and Future Reading

• Foltz, Richard C., Frederick M. Denny and Azizan Baharuddin, eds. Islam and ecology: a bestowed trust. Harvard University Press, 2003.

• Hessel, Dieter T. and Rosemary Reuther. Christianity and Ecology: Seeking the Well-Being of Earth and Humans. Harvard University Press.

• Tirosh-Samuelson, Hava, ed. Judaism and Ecology: Created World and Revealed World. Religions of the World and Ecology. Harvard University Press, 2002.

(Week 5) 27 September

Occidental Religions through the Middle Ages

Assignment

1) By noon, 26 September, send your analysis of the Glacken’s treatment of the Christian Middle Ages (noting continuities and discontinuities with other pertinent readings about the period).

Required Core Reading

• Glacken, Clarence. Traces on the Rhodian Shore: Nature and Culture in Western Thought. University of California Press, 1967. Part II, “The Christian Middle Ages” 171–351.

Special Assignment Reading

• Guthrie’s Faces in the Clouds

Further and Future Reading

• Bernard, Rosemarie. Shinto. Harvard University Press, 2004.

• Chapple, Christopher Key, ed. Jainism and Ecology. Harvard University Press, 2002.

• Chapple, Christopher Key and Mary Evelyn Tucker. Hinduism and Ecology: The Intersection of Earth, Sky, and Water. Harvard University Press, 2000.

• Girardot, N. J., James Miller and Xiaogan Liu. Daoism and Ecology: Ways within a Cosmic Landscape. Harvard University Press, 2001.

• Tucker, Mary Evelyn and Duncan Ryuken Williams, eds. Buddhism and Ecology:

The Interconnection of Dharma and Deeds. Harvard University Press, 1997.

(Week 6) 4 October

Emerging Civilizanons

Assignment

1. Study to synthesize and master the previous readings, identifying the main approaches, arguments, fault lines, and relevance to contemporary religion and nature entanglements and controversies. Be prepared with notes to this effect to enhance your ability to discuss your views in class. Send these notes to Professor Taylor no later than 11:59 p.m. on 3 October. They need not be long to be excellent. This exercise should well prepare you for the take home exam.

2. Be prepared to discuss and schedule your special reading assignment and your research paper topic.

3. Read ahead into Module III if possible. Note: No additional readings assigned during take home week.

4. The take home exam will be distributed on 4 October.

Required Core Reading

• Glacken, Clarence. Traces on the Rhodian Shore, part III “Early Modern Times” (read carefully: 355–497, then read quickly and/or peruse the rest of the volume to discern its main argument).

Special Assignment Reading

• Eisenberg or Lansing (below)

• Robert Pogue Harrison, Forests: The Shadow of Civilization, University of Chicago Press, 1992.

Module II: Further and Future Reading

Evolution and Religion (focus on origins and the emergence of the scholarly discussion)

• Carrasco, Davíd, ed. The Imagination of Matter: Religion and Ecology in Mesoamerican Traditions. BAR International Series, 1989.

• Eisenberg, Evan. The Ecology of Eden. Random House, 1998.

• Harris, Marvin. “The Myth of the Sacred Cow.” In Man, Culture, and Animals, eds. Anthony Leeds and Andrew P. Vaya, 217–28. American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1965.

• _______. Cows, Pigs, Wars and Witches: The Riddles of Culture. Random House, 1974.

• _______. Cannibals and Kings: The Origins of Cultures. Random House, 1977.

• _______. “The Cultural Ecology of India’s Sacred Cattle.” Current Anthropology 7 (1966): 51–66.

• Lansing, J. Stephen. Priests and Programmers: Technologies of Power in the Engineered Landscape of Bali. Princeton University Press, 1991.

• Lansing, J. Stephen and James N. Kremer. “A Socioecological Analysis of Balinese Water Temples.” In The Cultural Dimension of Development:

Indigenous Knowledge Systems, eds. D. M. Warren, L. Jan Slikkerveer and David Brokensha, 258–68. Intermediate Technology Publications, 1995.

• Lodrick, Deryck O. Sacred Cows, Sacred Places: Origins and Survivals of Animal Homes in India. University of California Press, 1981.

• Oelschlaeger, Max. The Idea of Wilderness: From Prehistory to the Age of Ecology. Yale University Press, 1991.

• Simoons, Frederick J. “Questions in the Sacred Cow Controversy.” Current Anthropology 20 (1979): 467–93.

Module III: Scientific Paradigms and the Transformation of “Religion and Nature” Discourses

Introduction: The advent of natural science through a monkey wrench into the mainstreams of religious perception and identity by, as much as anything else, challenging human understanding of nature itself. The scientific worldview, where it took root, eroded earlier religious understandings and certainties, transforming both religions themselves, and kindling an entire, new, discussion of the relationships between nature and religion. Broadly understood, the encounter between “Religion and Science” has had far reaching impacts that have only just begun, and whose impacts are only in their infancy. Among the most dramatic results is the grafting of scientific understandings onto already existing religious forms, and the invention of entirely new religious forms based on these new understandings.

This and the subsequent two modules explore the cultural earthquake brought on by the transformation of scientific paradigms, and wrestles with questions regarding the possible long-term impacts, including environmental impacts, of these developments.

(Week 7) 11 October

Science, Religion, and “Paradigm Shifts”

Assignment

1. The Take Home Exam is due before class 11 October

2. Be prepared to discuss all readings to date and your take home exam. 3) Be prepared to explain to the assigned readings, below, as well as how you synthesized what you have learned so far when writing up your mid-term exam.

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN: Philosophy of Nature; Western Esotericism; (physics): Bateson,

Gregory; Berman, Morris; Bohm, David; Burroughs, John; Capra,

Fritjof; Chaos; Complexity Theory; Einstein, Albert; Linnaeus, Carl; Pauli, Wolfgang; Peat, F. David; Prigogine, Ilya; Sheldrake, Rupert (biosphere and ecosystem science):Darwin, Charles; Haeckel, Ernst; Holism; Leopold, Aldo; Carson, Rachael; Gaia; Gaian Pilgrimage; Ouspensky, Pyotr Demianovich;

Pantheism; Panentheism; Smuts, Jan Christiaan; Thoreau, Henry David; Wilson, Edward O. (reactionary responses): Creationism and Creation Science; Wise Use Movements.

Required Core Reading

• Worster, Donald. Nature’s Economy: A History of Ecological Ideas. Cambridge University Press. Read the entire book, but especially carefully Parts I, and III — VI. If you have the first edition, borrow the second edition and read part VI (pp. 340–433), which is an expansion of the Epilogue in the first edition.

Special Assignment Reading

• Midgley, Mary. Evolution as a Religion

• Gunderson, Lance and C. S. Holling. Panarchy: Understanding Transformations in Systems of Humans and Nature

• James Gleich, Chaos: Making a New Science. Penguin, 1987

Module III: Further and Future Reading** Scientific Paradigms, Religion, and Nature

• Bateson, Gregory. Steps to an Ecology of Mind. Ballantine, 1972.

• Berman, Morris. The Reenchantment of the World. Cornell University Press, 1981.

• Berry, Thomas. The Dream of the Earth. Sierra Club Books, 1988.

• Bramwell, Anna. Ecology in the 20^th Century: A History. Yale University Press, 1989.

• Capra, Fritjof. The Tao of Physics. third ed. Boston: 1975; reprint, Shambhala, 1991.

• Capra, Fritojf. The Turning Point: Science, Society, and the Rising Culture. Simon and Schuster, 1982.

• Fortey, Richard. Life: A Natural History of the First Four Billion Years of Life on Earth. Knopf, 1998.

• Gleick, James. Chaos: Making a New Science. Penguin, 1987.

• Golley, Frank Benjamin. A History of the Ecosystem Concept in Ecology. Yale University Press, 1993

• Gunderson, Lance H. and C. S. Holling. Panarchy: Understanding Transformations in Systems of Humans and Nature. Island Press, 2002.

• Heisenberg, Werner. Physics and Philosophy. Harper and Row, 1962.

• Lovelock, James. Gaia: A New Look At Life on Earth. revised ed. Oxford: 1979; reprint, Oxford University Press, 1995.

• Macy, Joanna. World As Lover, World As Self. Parallax Press, 1991.

• Midgley, Mary. Evolution as a Religion. London: Routledge (1985, revised with new introduction, 2002).

• McGrath, Alister E. Science and Religion: An Introduction. Blackwell, 1999.

• Odum, Howard T. Environment, Power, and Society. Wiley-Interscience, 1971.

• Primavesi, Anne. Gaia’s Gift, 2003.

• Real, L. A. and J. H. Brown, eds. Foundations of Ecology. University of Chicago Press.

• Ruse, Michael. Darwinism as Religion: What Literature Tells Us About EvoluLon. Oxford University Press, 2017.

• Sagan, Carl. Carl Sagan’s the Cosmic Connection. second ed. Cambridge University Press, 2000 [1974].

• Swimme, Brian and Thomas Berry. The Universe Story: From the Primordial Flaring Forth to the Ecozoic Era: A Celebration of the Unfolding of the Cosmos. Harper Collins, 1992.

Module IV: “Religion and Nature” in twentieth-century scholarship

(from the Sacred and the Profane and “Ecological Anthropology” to

“Religion and Ecology”)

• Religions as adaptive and maladaptive ecological strategies (with special reference to the indigenous societies and “traditional ecological knowledge.”)

• Mircea Eliade, cultural geography, and theories of ‘sacred space’

• Environmental Concern, Religious Studies, the “Religion and Ecology” field, and debates about the environmental tendencies of the “world religions” of the east and west.

• Religion’s role in the environmental & social collapse; and environmental reform.

Introduction: There were not only upheavals in the natural sciences during the 20^th century, cultural anthropology and religious studies went through their own dramatic transformations. Among the most significant that were directly nature-relevant were analyses of the importance of human perceptions of sacred space, and the role of such perceptions in religious and environmental practices. In the latter part of the 20^th century, some anthropologists and religious studies scholars began not only to analyze the relationships between religions, cultures, and environments, but they began to, in some cases explicitly, in others implicitly, promote what they had come to believe were environmentally beneficent forms of religion. This module explores these developments, correlating them with the changing scientific paradigms encountered in the previous one, which sets the stage for asking in the next module about the future of nature-related religion and its likely impacts on nonhuman nature.

(Week 8) 18 October

Religion, Ritual and Ecological Adaptanon

Assignment

1. By noon 17 October, present an analysis highlighting especially the book by Donald Worster (who overlapped a bit but mostly picked up where Glacken left off). Although you have started reading Rappaport and about environmental anthropology, plan on focusing on that material next week.

2. Be prepared to summarize up front in class the readings from the ERN and Rappaport’s reading, thus far.

Background and Comparative Readings

From the ERN:

• *_Ecology and Religion_; *Ecological Anthropology; Ethnobotany; Evolutionary Biology, Religion, and Stewardship; Harris, Marvin; Rappaport, Roy; A ReligioEcological Perspective on Religion and Nature; Sky.

Required Core Reading

• Rappaport, Roy A. Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity (chs. 1–5, pp. 1–168)

Special Assignment Reading

• Jared Diamond’s Collapse, esp, prologue, ch 6–9, and part IV.

(Week 9) 25 October

Indigenous Peoples and “Tradinonal Ecological

Knowledge”

Assignment

1. By noon, 24 October, submit your reading analysis, focusing on Rappaport and the various readings about environmental anthropology and traditional ecological knowledge.

2. Be prepared to discuss Rappaport’s book and the following readings.

Background and Comparative Readings

From the ERN:

• Mother Earth; Native American Languages; Noble Savage

(various); *Traditional Ecological Knowledge; Traditional Environmental Knowledge among Aboriginal Peoples in Canada

Required Core Reading

• Rappaport, Roy A. Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity (chs 6–9, pp.

169–312).

Special Assignment Reading

• Berkes, Fikret. Sacred Ecology: Traditional Ecological Knowledge and Resource Management. Taylor and Francis, 1999 [or 2^nd or 3^rd edition]. Pages 1–55 are especially important.

(Week 10) 1 November

“Sacred Ecology” and Sacred Geography

Assignment

1) By noon, 31 October, send in your reading analysis, providing a pithy summary of Rappaport’s views and agenda, while noting the fault lines between the idea of American Indians as “First Ecologists” and other, relevant, ERN entries you have read.

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN: American Indians as “First Ecologists”; Nobel Savage; Sacred Geography in Native North America; Sacred Mountains; Sacred Groves in Africa; Sacred Sites in England; Sacred Space/Place; Savages.

Required Core Reading

• Rappaport, Roy A. Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity (chs 10–14, pp. 313–461).

Recommended Readings

• John Sears, Sacred Places, re. nature appreciation and pilgrimage, first 1⁄2 19^th century, pp. 1–71

• Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Nature” and other selections.

• Henry David Thoreau, Selections from Bron Taylor’s Thoreau Collection (Dr. Taylor will provide this via email).

• Nash, Wilderness ..., “Preserve the Wilderness” and “Wilderness Preserved,” pp. 96–121, chs. 6 & 7 (read quickly).

Special Assignment Reading

• Nelson, Melissa. K. and Dan. Shilling (eds). Traditional Ecological Knowledge. Cambridge University Press, 2019.

Further Reading

• Bender, Barbara and Margot Winer, eds. Contested Landscapes: Movement, Exile and Place., 2001.

• Carmichael, David L., Jane Hubert, Brian Reeves and Audhild Schanche. Sacred Sites, Sacred Places. Routledge, 1994.

• Chidester, David and David Linenthal, eds. American Sacred Space. Indiana University Press, 1995.

• Gregory, Derek. Geographical Imaginations. Blackwell, 1994.

• Hirsh, Eric and Michael O’Hanlon. The Anthropology of Landscape: Perspectives on Place and Space. Clarendon Press, 1995.

• Ivakhiv, Adrian. Claiming Sacred Ground: Pilgrims and Politics at Glastonbury and Sedona. Indiana University Press, 2001.

• Jones, Lindsay. The Hermeneutics of Sacred Architecture: Experience, Interpretation, Comparison --Monumental Occasions: Reflections on the Eventfulness of Religious Architecture (V. 1 of 2). Harvard University Press, 2000.

• Lane, Beldon. Landscapes of the Sacred: Geography and Narrative in American Spirituality. Paulist, 1988.

• Nelson, Melissa. K. and Dan. Shilling (eds). Traditional Ecological Knowledge. Cambridge University Press, 2019.

• Schultes, R. E. and S. Reis. Ethnobotany: Evolution of a Discipline. Timber Press, 1995.

• Schultes, R. E. “Reasons for Ethnobotanical Conservation.” In Traditional Ecological Knowledge: A Collection of Essays, ed. R. E. Johannes. Geneva: International Union for the Conservation of Nature, 1989.

• Sears, John. Sacred Places: American Tourist Attractions in the Nineteenth Century. Oxford University Press, 1989.

• Shepard, Paul. Man in the Landscape: A Historic View of the Esthetics of Nature. second ed. 1967; reprint, Texas A & M University Press, 1991.

• Tuan, Yi-Fu. “Discrepancies Between Environmental Attitude and Behaviour: Examples From Europe and China.” The Canadian Geographer 12 (1968): 176–91.

• _______. Landscapes of Fear. Blackwell, 1980.

• _______. Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience. University of Minnesota Press, 1977.

• _______. Topophilia: A Study of Environmental Perception, Attitudes, and Values. Prentice-Hall, 1974.

• Turner, Victor. “Pilgrimages as Social Processes,” 166–230, in Dramas, fields, and metaphors: symbolic action in human society. Cornell University Press, 1974).

• Williams, Raymond. The Country and the City. Oxford University Press, 1975.

(Week 11) 8 November

“Sacred Space” Theories, and Environmental

Conservanon (Recognizing / Construcnng / Contesnng Natural Places as Sacred Spaces)

Assignment

1) By noon 7 November send your reading analysis. This week do this in two parts: (a) discuss the fault lines between Eliade and his progeny, religion scholars interested in promoting green religion and their critics.

(b) Summarize the fault lines between Chidester and Linenthal in their Introduction to American Sacred Space and other theorists on sacred space, including Eliade and those discussed by Anttonen.

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN: Earth Mysteries; Eliade, Mircea; *_Religious Studies and Environmental Concern_ (and adjacent entry): Critical Perspectives on

“Religions of the World and Ecology”; Religious Environmentalist Paradigm.

Required Core Reading

• Ingold, Tim. The Perception of the Environment: Essays in Livelihood, Dwelling and Skill. London: Routledge, 2000.Tim. Peruse: _Introduction & Chapter 1_; _Chapter 2_; _Chapter 4_; and read carefully _Chapter 8_, _Chapter 21_.

• David Chidester and Edward Linenthal, “_Introduction_” in American Sacred Space (ed. Chidester & Linenthal); Veikko Anttonen, “_Sacred_” in W. Braun and R. T. McCutcheon, eds., Guide to the Study of Religion.

Special Assignment Readings (two options)

• Animism & Conservation, special issue, Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture 1/4 (December 2007)

• Krech, Shepard (3^rd). The Ecological Indian: Myth and History. Norton, 1999

Recommended Readings

• Mircea Eliade, The Sacred and the Profane

• J. Z. Smith, To Take Place

• Lane, Beldon. Landscapes of the Sacred: Geography and Narrative in American Spirituality

Further and Future Readings ~ Evolution and Religion (focus on indigenous societies and traditional ecological knowledge”)

• Anderson, Eugene N. Ecologies of the Heart: Emotion, Belief, and the Environment. Oxford University Press, 1996.

• Berkes, Fikret. Sacred Ecology: Traditional Ecological Knowledge and Resource Management. Taylor and Francis, 1999.

• Berkes, Fikret, Johan Colding and Carl Folke. Navigating Social-Ecological Systems: Building Resilience for Complexity and Change. Cambridge University Press, 2003.

• Berkes, Fikret and Carl Folke. Linking Social and Ecological Systems. Cambridge University Press, 2002.

• Bloch, Maurice. “People Into Places: Zafimaniry Concepts of Clarity.” In The Anthropology of Landscape: Perspectives on Place and Space, eds. Eric Hirsh and Michael O’Hanlon, 63–77. Clarendon Press, 1995

• _______. Prey Into Hunter: The Politics of Religious Experience. Cambridge University Press, 1992.

• Carrasco, Davíd, ed. The Imagination of Matter: Religion and Ecology in Mesoamerican Traditions. BAR International Series, 1989.

• Eisenberg, Evan. The Ecology of Eden. New York: Random House, 1998.

• Grim, John A. Indigenous Traditions and Ecology: The Interbeing of Cosmology and Community. Harvard University Press, 2001.

• Harris, Marvin. “The Myth of the Sacred Cow.” In Man, Culture, and Animals, eds. Anthony Leeds and Andrew P. Vaya, 217–28. American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1965.

• _______. Cows, Pigs, Wars and Witches: The Riddles of Culture. Random House, 1974.

• _______. Cannibals and Kings: The Origins of Cultures. Random House, 1977.

• _______. “The Cultural Ecology of India’s Sacred Cattle.” Current Anthropology 7 (1966): 51–66.

• Hughes, J. Donald. Pan’s Travail: Environmental Problems of the Ancient Greeks and Romans. John Hopkins University Press, 1994.

• Ingold, Tim. The Perception of the Environment: Essays in Livelihood, Dwelling and Skill. Routledge, 2000.

• Krech, Shepard (3^rd). The Ecological Indian: Myth and History. New York: Norton, 1999.

• Lansing, J. Stephen. Priests and Programmers: Technologies of Power in the Engineered Landscape of Bali. Princeton University Press, 1991.

• Lansing, J. Stephen and James N. Kremer. “A Socioecological Analysis of Balinese Water Temples.” In The Cultural Dimension of Development:

Indigenous Knowledge Systems, eds. D. M. Warren, L. Jan Slikkerveer and David Brokensha, 258–68. Intermediate Technology Publications, 1995.

• Lawson, E. Thomas and Robert M. McCauley. Rethinking religion: connecting cognition and culture. Cambridge University Press, 1993.

• Lodrick, Deryck O. Sacred Cows, Sacred Places: Origins and Survivals of Animal Homes in India. University of California Press, 1981.

• Messer, Ellen and Michael Lambek. Ecology and the Sacred: Engaging the Anthropology of Roy A. Rappaport. University of Michigan Press, 2001.

• Moran, Emilio, ed. The Ecosystem Approach in Anthropology. University of Michigan Press, 1990.

• Oelschlaeger, Max. The Idea of Wilderness: From Prehistory to the Age of Ecology. Yale University Press, 1991.

• Rappaport, Roy A. Ecology, Meaning and Religion. North Atlantic, 1979.

• _______. Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity. Cambridge University Press, 1999.

• Simoons, Frederick J. “Questions in the Sacred Cow Controversy.” Current Anthropology 20 (1979): 467–93.

Module V: Religion, Nature, and the Future of Religion and Nature

• Social Scientific Perspectives on Environmentalism, Nature, and Religion, from Quantitative Data to Colin Campbell’s “Cultic Milieu” Theory.

• Green Nazis and the Shadow Side of Nature Religions.

• Contemporary Construction of Nature Religions and Pagan Spiritualities.

• Secularization Theories and ‘Spiritualities of Connection’ to Nature.

Introduction: Clearly, during the second half of the 20^th century some lay observers and scholarly analysts were hoping for, and in some cases romantically expecting, a revitalization or invention of religious forms that would lead human cultures toward environmentally sustainable lifeways. During the same period, more cautious voices arose questioning whether religion could evolve into an environmentally progressive social force, or even wondering whether religion is an important variable in culturenature interactions. Other voices expressed alarm at the apparent growth of naturerelated spiritualities, noting that such religion has sometimes been closely connected to pernicious political ideologies such as Nazism. Still others wondered whether secularization, fueled by the slow if steady advance of scientific understandings of the universe, would erode religious belief altogether, and thus the influence of nature-related religion. And yet others asserted that the future of religion, if there is to be any millennia from now, would and must be fused to such scientific understandings. All of this raises anew questions about the future of religion.

There is already some evidence of scientific understandings of the universe being consecrated in contemporary religion. In some cases sacralized scientific narratives are grafted onto pre-existing religious forms while in other cases they are emerging and evolving with little explicit reference to previous forms. The question with which we leave this course is whether such forms of “religion” or “spirituality” are likely to be mainstreams in the future of religion, or rather, dry up quickly leaving most of humanity, if they are religious at all, devotees of today’s predominant religions. The answer to that question is one that may well preoccupy much future scholarship inquiring into the nature of the relationships between human cultures, religions, and environments. The answer may also play a role in whether, and to what extent, humans continue to simplify and degrade the earth’s living systems.

(Week 12 & 13) 15 & 22 November

(There will be no class meenng on 22 November due to professional meenngs)

Social Science, Religion and Nature (and considering

Nature Religions and their “Shadow Side”)

Assignment

1) By noon 14 November send your reading analysis focusing in this case on Paul Shepard’s book; by 23 November write an analysis/reaction to the articles by Taylor and others about Lynn White and the Greening of Religion Hypothesis.

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN: ATWA, Corrington, Robert; Elves and Land Spirits in Pagan Norse

Religion; *Fascism; Heathenry (Ásatrú); Odinism; Paganism; Neo-paganism and Ethnic Nationalism in Eastern Europe; Protestant Ethic; Savitri, Devi; *_Social_

_Science on Religion and Nature_; *White, Lynn–Thesis of; Wicca; Unitarianism.

Required Core Reading

• Bron Taylor, The Greening of Religion Hypothesis (Part One): From Lynn White, Jr. and claims that religions can promote environmentally destructive attitudes and behaviors to assertions they are becoming environmentally friendly, Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, 10 (3) 2016.

• Bron Taylor, Gretel Van Wieren & Bernard Zaleha, The Greening of Religion Hypothesis (Part Two): Assessing the Data from Lynn White, Jr. to Pope

Francis, Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, 10 (3) 2016.

• Shepard, Paul, Coming Home to the Pleistocene, read 1, skim 2–5; read 6, skim 7, and read 8, 9

Recommended Readings

• Tuan, Yi Fu. “Discrepancies between environmental attitude and behavior: examples from Europe and China” from the Canadian Geographer 12(3): 176–91, 1968.

• David Haberman (ed.) Understanding Climate Change through Religious Lifeworlds. Indiana University Press, 2021.

• Veldman, Robin Globus. The Gospel of Climate Skepticism: Why Evangelical Christians Oppose Action on Climate Change. University of California Press, 2019.

• Veldman, Robin Globus, Andrew Szasz, and Randolph Haluza-Delay (eds.) How the World’s Religions Are Responding to Climate Change. Routledge, 2014.

Special Assignment Reading

• Carolyn Merchant, Reinventing Eden: The Fate of Nature in Western Culture. Routledge, 2003.

• Michael York, Pagan Theology. New York University Press, 2004.

Further Reading

• Corrington, Robert S. Nature’s Religion. Rowman & Littlefield, 1997.

• Crosby, Donald A. A Religion of Nature. SUNY Press, 2002

• Pike, Sarah. New Age and Neopagan Religions in America. Columbia University Press, 2004.

• Gregory, Derek. Geographical Imaginations. Blackwell, 1994.

• York, Michael. Pagan Theology. New York University Press, 2004.

Further Reading ~ Right-Wing Ideology and Religions of Nature

• Bramwell, Anna. Ecology in the 20^th Century: A History. Yale Univ Press, 1989.

• _______. Blood and Soil: Walter Darré and Hitlers Green Party. Kensal, 1985.

• Ferry, Luc. The New Ecological Order. University of Chicago Press, 1995.

• Gardell, Mattias. Gods of the Blood: The Pagan Revival and White Separatism. Duke University Press, 2003.

• Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas. Hitler’s Priestess: Savitri Devi, the Hindu-Aryan Myth and Neo-Nazism. New York University Press, 1998.

• Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas. The Occult Roots of Nazism: Secret Aryan Cults and Their Influence on Nazi Ideology. New York University Press, 1994.

• Goodrich-Clarke, Nicholas. Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity. New York University Press, 2002

• Kaplan, Jeffrey. “Savitri Devi and the National Socialist Religion of Nature.” The Pomegranate, no. 7 (February 1999): 4–12

• Zimmerman, Michael E. Contesting Earth’s Future: Radical Ecology and Postmodernity. University of California Press, 1994.

(Week 14) 29 November

Religion, Nature, and the Future

Assignment

1. By noon 28 November send your analysis the argument in B. Taylor’s Dark Green Religion and in the conclusions of Ara Norenzayan book, identifying other course readings that appear to have affinity with the described phenomena, as well as the religious forms that do not, and be sure to note connections with the views of Paul Shepard.

2. Student presentations may begin in class this week and continue next week.

Background and Comparative Readings

• From the ERN: _Radical Environmentalism_; Berry, Thomas; Biosphere Reserves and World Heritage Sites; *Christianity (9)—Christianity’s Ecological

Reformation; *Epic of Evolution; Evolutionary Evangelism; Religious

Naturalism; Natural History as Natural Religion; Restoration Ecology and Ritual; Process Philosophy (and Theology cross-reference); Sagan, Carl; Space Exploration.

Required Core Readings

• Taylor, Bron, Dark Green Religion, chs 1–9 (Thoreau Appendix strongly recommended) [chapters will be made available for free from instructor.]

• Norenzayan, Big Gods, Princeton University Press, chapter 10.

Optional Readings

• from _www.earthcharter.org_, _www.ethologicalethics.org_, and see _The Great Story_ for the website of ‘evolutionary evangelist’ Michael Dowd.

• Thomas Berry, “_The human presence_” pp. 13–23 (ch. 3), “_The new story_” pp. 194–215 (ch. 15), in Dream of the Earth. (Alternatively, read the selections from The Great Work, immediately below.)

Special Assignment Reading

• Atlee, Tom. The Tao of Democracy: Using Co-Intelligence to Create a World That Works for All. Cranston, The Writer’s Collective, 2003.

DVDs

• ‘_Journey of the Universe_’ documentary

Further Reading

• Bruce, Steve, ed. Religion and Modernization: Sociologists and Historians Debate the Secularization Thesis. Oxford University Press, 2001.

• _______. God is dead: secularization in the west. Blackwell, 2002.

• Campbell, Colin. “The Cult, the Cultic Milieu and Secularization.” A Sociological Yearbook of Religion in Britain 5 (1972): 119–36.

• Stark, Rodney and William Baines Bainbridge. The Future of Religion:

Secularization, Revival, and Cult Formation. Univ. of California Press, 1985.

• Warner, R. Stephen. “Work in Progress Toward a New Paradigm for the Sociological Study of Religion in the United States.” American Journal of Sociology 98 (1993): 1044–93.

Further Reading ~ Right-Wing Ideology and Religions of Nature

• Bramwell, Anna. Ecology in the 20^th Century: A History. Yale University Press, 1989.

• _______. Blood and Soil: Walter Darré and Hitlers Green Party.

Buckinghamshire, Kensal, 1985.

• Ferry, Luc. The New Ecological Order. Paris: 1992; reprint, University of Chicago Press, 1995.

• Gardell, Mattias. Gods of the Blood: The Pagan Revival and White Separatism. University Press, 2003.

• Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas. Hitler’s Priestess: Savitri Devi, the Hindu-Aryan Myth and Neo-Nazism. New York University Press, 1998.

• Goodrich-Clarke, Nicholas. Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity. New York University Press, 2002.

• Kaplan, Jeffrey. “Savitri Devi and the National Socialist Religion of Nature.” The Pomegranate, no. 7 (February 1999): 4–12.

• Zimmerman, Michael E. Contesting Earth’s Future: Radical Ecology and Postmodernity. University of California Press, 1994.

(Week 15) 6 December [Last day of class] Student Presentanons Assignment

1. Student presentations will be completed during this week’s final class.

2. Non-attendance incurs one grade deduction on research paper and final take home exam.

3. Research Papers Due 5 December at 11:59 p.m.

4. Take home final essay exam will distributed on 6 December. It is due by 11:59 p.m., Tuesday, 13 December, and must be submitted by email.

Nature, Spirituality & Popular Culture (Fall Semester 2025)

Source: <undergrad.aa.ufl.edu/media/undergradaaufledu/uf-quest/quest-course-materials/quest-1-syllabi/Q1_Taylor_Syllabus_1908.pdf>

COURSE NUMBER, TIME & PLACE

Religion (REL) 1107

INSTRUCTORS

Professor Bron Taylor (Ph.D.) Teaching Assistant Rajani Maharjan

Email: bron@ufl.edu Email: maharjanrajani@ufl.edu Office: Anderson 121 Office: Anderson 119

Office hours: Monday 12:30–2:30 p.m. Office hours: M 9:00–11:00 a.m.

COURSE DESCRIPTION

Beginning with the period since Walt Disney began making animal-focused documentaries and animated films in the 1930s, continuing up through the blockbuster motion picture Avatar (2009) and the Animal Kingdom theme park further expressing its themes, this course takes a global tour examining the religious, spiritual, ethical, and political dimensions of artistic productions, scientific representations in museums, and other cultural inventions, in which nature takes center stage. We will explore the international cultural tributaries, influences, and controversies such productions engender, for they constitute important ways that environmental ethics, and quests for environmentally sustainable livelihoods and lifeways, are expressed and promoted. The course will enhance students’ abilities to interpret these cultural productions and their evocative power, explore their own reactions to these social phenomena, whilst learning to think more deeply about their own places in, and obligations to, the natural world.

The course will also help students to recognize how different worldviews — the philosophical, religious, and scientific understandings of the universe and biosphere — are expressed and promoted in popular culture. This will also enhance students’ international sophistication as they learn from where and when the world’s predominant religions emerged — for example Buddhism, Daoism, Confucianism and Hinduism in Asia, Judaism, Christianity and Islam from the Near East — while also learning about the worldviews and ethical orientations typical of indigenous traditions, among contemporary Pagans, New Age devotees, and science-inspired nature spiritualities. Analytic tools from the Humanities and humanistic social sciences will also be provided in order to enhance student understanding of important trends at the intersection of nature, spirituality, and popular culture.

UF POLICIES & PRIVACY EXPECTATIONS

This course complies with all UF policies. For information on those policies and for a list of campus resources, please see this page: https://go.ufl.edu/syllabuspolicies.” Class discussions are for enrolled students in this class and are not to be shared outside of class. This said, students cannot expect that comments made during this class will remain private.

GENERAL EDUCATION | HUMANITIES/INTERNATIONAL | WRITING

REQUIREMENT | QUEST “NATURE & CULTURE” FOCUS

This course has been approved for UF’s General Education credit in the Humanities and

International Studies areas. It has been approved under Humanities (H), International (N) and Quest 1 “Nature and Culture” theme. It also meets the University Writing Requirement (2000 words). Important note: A minimum grade of C is required for General Education credit.

Pages 2–5 explain the purpose and student learning outcomes for these credits. Specific information about the course, such as readings, assignments and grading, begins on page 6.

GENERAL EDUCATION | HUMANITIES & INTERNATIONAL FOCI

Humanities (H)

Humanities courses provide instruction in the history, key themes, principles, terminology, and theory or methodologies used within a humanities discipline or the humanities in general. Students will learn to identify and to analyze the key elements, biases and influences that shape thought. These courses emphasize clear and effective analysis and approach issues and problems from multiple perspectives.

International (N)

This designation is always in conjunction with another program area. International courses promote the development of students’ global and intercultural awareness. Students examine the cultural, economic, geographic, historical, political, and/or social experiences and processes that characterize the contemporary world, and thereby comprehend the trends, challenges, and opportunities that affect communities around the world. Students analyze and reflect on the ways in which cultural, economic, political, and/or social systems and beliefs mediate their own and other people’s understanding of an increasingly connected world.

General Education Subject Areas will be met through:

Regular lectures and near-weekly writing assignments, in-class discussions, and feedback on their assigned research paper, will help students to analyze the geographically diverse and international social contexts, and worldviews, leading to and undergirding the various religious, spiritual, scientific, and ethical understandings that are being expressed in popular culture, which they have encountered through readings and diverse media in the course. Every student will also be expected – and pushed – during the discussion to articulate their understandings and emerging views orally during discussion sections. The weekly topics identified course schedule provides more detail on specific phenomena we will be analyzing and the General Education – relevant issues students will be engaging.

GENERAL EDUCATION STUDENT LEARNING OUTCOMES

The general education student learning outcomes (SLOs) describe the knowledge, skills and attitudes that students are expected to acquire while completing a general education course at the University of Florida. They fall in three main areas:

1. Content: Students demonstrate competence in the terminology, concepts, methodologies and theories used within the subject area.

2. Critical Thinking: Students carefully and logically analyze information from multiple perspectives and develop reasoned solutions to problems within the subject area.

3. Communication: Students clearly and effectively communicate knowledge, ideas, and reasoning in written or oral forms appropriate to the subject area.

General Education / Humanities specific SLOs.

Through exams, written work, and class discussions students will demonstrate that they understand, can think critically, and communicate effectively about the role religion, spirituality, and popular culture often plays in contemporary life. Specifically:

1. Content: 1) Students will show they understand critical course terms such as religion, spirituality, nature, and popular culture, as well as theories scholars use to understand the religious dimension of human life, and specific methodological tools they deploy when analyzing beliefs, perceptions, and practices related to what people variously construe as

religion or spirituality; (2) Students will show they can explain the above mentioned terms, theories, and approaches to the study of religion, nature and popular culture.

2. Critical Thinking: (1) Students will show they understand the major, often competing and incompatible knowledge systems around the world and how these are related theories of environmental ethics, and the assumptions, religious, philosophical, and scientific, upon which they are based; (2) Students will show they can discern differences between differing knowledge systems and understand their origins and the diverse ways they engage the religious/spiritual, affective, ethical, and political dimensions of life; and (3) Student will demonstrate an ability to think reflexively and critically about their own spiritual views and values, how they arrived at them, and whether and if so why any of the many perspectives they are encountering in the course they find emotionally and intellectually compelling.

3. Communication: (1) Nearly every week, students will provide a written response paper showing they understand the week’s assignments and they illuminate the ways nature-related spiritualities and values are constructed, expressed, promoted, and contested in popular culture (2) Students will demonstrate they understand the process of writing research paper by submitting a draft research paper, and after receiving feedback on it, revising it and then submitting a final, properly formatted and referenced original research paper, including a literature review that draws on refereed scholarly research. (3) On their final exam students will demonstrate an ability to write a coherent and well-reasoned essay expressing how, given what they have encountered in this course, their minds have changed or remained the same about their place in the world and responsibilities to it.

General Education / International studies specific SLOs

Through exams, written work, and class discussions students will demonstrate that they understand, can think critically, and communicate effectively about the role religion, spirituality, and popular culture often plays in contemporary life. Specifically:

1. Content: (1) Students will show that they understand the major differences between religious perceptions and practices around the world, including the ways indigenous traditions typically differ from the world’s predominant religions. 2) Students will show that they understand how in the contemporary world popular culture expresses and promotes, in a host of ways, diverse perspectives on the human place in the world and their responsibilities to it and one another, and the stakes involved given the increasingly interconnected nature of Earth’s biocultural systems.

2. Critical Thinking: (1) Students will demonstrate an ability to analyze and think critically about the strengths and weaknesses of competing and incompatible knowledge systems around the world, including those with implicit or explicit environmental ethics. (2) Students will show they can recognize the cultural and international sources of these differing perspectives in a wide variety of cultural productions that engage religious/spiritual, affective, ethical, and political dimensions of life.

3. Communication: (1) Through exams, reading responses, and oral responses during classroom discussions, students will show that they understand how nature-related spiritualities and values are constructed, expressed, promoted, and contested in popular culture, and these are increasingly globalized processes leading to new hybrid religious forms, which variously both hinder and promote proenvironmental behavior and thereby affect biocultural systems. (2) Students will be demonstrate through their exams and written work that they can identify popular culture productions, their international and cultural sources, as well as divergent scholarly perspectives on their impacts upon biocultural systems today and in the future.

WRITING REQUIREMENT

The University Writing Requirement is designed to promote student fluency in writing. Course instructors will assess student’s written assignments with respect to content, grammar, punctuation, usage of standard written English, clarity, coherence, organization, style, and mechanics. To help students improve their writing I have provided a writing well guide. Students who study this guide and avoid the problems identified in it typically improve and do well with their writing assignments. I have also prepared a writing assessment rubric to explain how course instructors will evaluate written work.

	Satisfactory (Y)	Unsatisfactory (N)
Content	Good wri(ng demonstrates an ability to understand and cri(cally evaluate facts, different perspec(ves, and fault lines among the perspec(ves you are analyzing in course materials.	Unsa(sfactory wri(ng has minimal if any relevant discussion or cita(on of content relevant to the assignment.
Clarity & Organization	O?en neglected, one’s wri(ng must be work in a coherent manner that clearly states a thesis and musters evidence in support of it, provides transi(ons where needed (while avoiding tautology, in other words, needless repe((on). Good organiza(on provides readers what they need to follow the discussion.	Unsa(sfactory wri(ng is difficult if not impossible to follow because there is no coherent organiza(on (or flow) to the wri(ng. It typically has abrupt shi?s and material that appears ‘out of the blue.’
Critical Thinking & Argument	Good wri(ng judiciously assembles and evaluates evidence both for and against one’s argument while providing reasons for why the balance of evidence favors one’s findings, conclusions, and arguments.	Unsa(sfactory wri(ng provides no or an obtuse arguments, liJle if any well-sourced evidence, and/or no fairminded analysis of compe(ng perspec(ves.
Expression & Style	Good style involves using word choices that reflect an accurate understanding of their meanings, terminology fiMng the cri(cal perspec(ves introduced in the course, and grammar at an appropriate level of sophis(ca(on for college-level analysis.	Unsa(sfactory wri(ng o?en if not en(rely incoherent – due to failures in organiza(on, word choice, sentence structure, and poor grammar.
Mechanics & Summary	Excellent wriJen work will consistently reflect the above-men(oned virtues. Sa(sfactory work may have flaws but will, nevertheless, demonstrate that the student has mastered key concepts and has been able to make some good points relevant to the specific assignment.	Unsa(sfactory wri(ng fails to communicate. It typically reveals a lack of student effort. When wriJen work is illinformed or confusing due to poor wri(ng, or both, it will be judged unsa(sfactory.
Reflection	Good reflexivity makes connec(ons and provides insights that demonstrates connec(ons with one’s intellectual, personal, and professional growth.	Unsa(sfactory wri(ng is unreflec(ve and does not demonstrate that the student is gaining the kind of insights that lead to personal growth
The Art of Writing	Wri(ng is an art. It is hard work. It requires many revisions. It o?en requires star(ng over and radical reorganiza(on. It benefits from cri(cism from more advanced writers. Welcome Cri(cism. Work the cra?. It’s the only way to be become a good writer.	To avoid an unsa(sfactory evalua(on, work the cra?, and consult my wri(ng well guide, which will help you avoid some of the most common writing mistakes.

Professor Taylor’s Writing Assessment Rubric

** Important note: To receive writing requirement credit, a student must receive a grade of C or higher in the course, and a satisfactory completion of the writing component of the course.

THE QUEST ~ “NATURE & CULTURE” FOCUS

This course has been created for Quest program’s “Nature and Culture” theme by examining naturerelated global processes and the religious, spiritual, political dimensions of artistic productions and scientific representations in ‘popular culture.’ It illuminates the global and international tributaries, hybridities, reciprocal influences, and controversies that flow from these processes in the ongoing struggle of humankind to understand its place in and responsibilities toward one another and the rest of the living world. (The course is also offered to UF Online students.)

By looking at these processes and the contentions related to them students will encounter and wrestle with a variety of religion-related perceptions and claims about non-human organisms and environmental systems, such as: Are any of them sacred and worthy of reverence, or conversely, are any of them spiritually or politically dangerous? Is there some sort of divine agency that has given rise to the world and who enjoins responsibilities to it? Do religious worldviews, which emerged in diverse regions around the world, lead to indifference or hostility to earthly organisms or environmental systems, viewing them as profane, or illusory, or of penultimate value, compared to some extra-worldly sacred place of greater, or exclusive, moral and spiritual value? In short, this course poses longstanding questions regarding the nature of the universe, the biosphere, and the ways humans construct meaning and values as they seek to understand their place in both. The course also intersects with other “essential questions” the Quest program poses: including who are we (identities)? What meaning and values should we uphold (through an examined life)? How ought we to live with one another and the wider community of life? And, how we ought to pursue or defend good and socially just ecological and social systems?

COURSE OBJECTIVES AND STUDENT LEARNING OUTCOMES

The quest program has its own Student Learning Objectives, which include the following text:

During this class, through exams, written assignments, and participation in course discussions, students will be able to ...

• identify, describe and explain the major types and differences in the world’s religions/spiritualities and how these are typically related to environment-related perceptions and behaviors

• identify, describe and explain a wide variety of course-related terms including religion, spirituality, nature, hybridity, globalization, anthropocentrism, biocentrism, and ecocentrism, as well as the “family resemblances” approach to the study of religion-resembling social phenomena

• explain how social contexts and processes of socialization shape nature-related worldviews, beliefs, values, and practices

• identify, describe and explain the theories and methods, grounded in the Arts and Humanities, that analysts introduced in the course use to illuminate the role that artistic productions in popular culture play expressing, promoting, and shaping nature-related perceptions, spiritualities, values, and behaviors, and how these processes are increasingly globalized, lead to cross-cultural influences, new, hybridized religious forms, and influence social and environmental systems.

• demonstrate they can be self-reflexive and evaluate the knowledge systems and ethical perspectives advanced by individuals and groups very different from their own, while connecting the personal quest to arrive at a compelling worldview with their own intellectual, professional, and even (perhaps) spiritual development.

READINGS

The required books are either available for free from UF’s library or can be found inexpensively from online or purchased from the University of Florida bookstore. Additional articles will be available via online links.

Required Texts

Bron Taylor, Dark Green Religion: Nature Spirituality and the Planetary Future (Berkeley & Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2010). A digital copy of this book is available on reserve at UF’s library. Also available at the books’ website are a ‘dark green’ naturevenerating video and nature-venerating music, and other supplementary materials.

Daniel Quinn, The Story of B (Bantam, 1997)

Ernest Callenbach, Ecotopia (Heyday/Banyan Tree 2004) (or any other edition)

Recommended Text

Michael Redfield, The Celestine Prophecy (NY/Warner 1993)

Costs

The main text is available for free digitally via UF’s library, the novels are also available there or inexpensively online. There are no Materials or Supply fees.

REQUIREMENTS

Assignment Due Dates

All due dates are provided in Canvas, which also provides timely reminders.

Movies and Documentaries

Students will view motion pictures pertinent to the course foci. Students will need access to streaming services to view some of the video resources. Students must see required films no later than they are assigned.

Discussion & Quizzes

Nearly every week there will be discussion sessions and quizzes. Students must participate in assigned discussions and take a weekly quiz. Only the highest ten scores from the quizzes will count toward the 100 points possible for this assignment. The regularity and quality of discussion participation will be evaluated by the instructors at the end of the term.

Exams

There will be a midterm and a final exam, with diverse questions to respond to, including essay sections. The exams will be comprehensive, with questions drawing on any classroom experience or assignment that occurred previously.

Research Paper and optional Slideshow Presentation

Students will prepare a 2,000 word research paper directly engages the intersection of religion, nature, and popular culture, and adheres to the University of Florida’s Level-Two Writing Requirement. After submitting a proposal for approval, students will submit a draft of these papers and receive feedback on them. They will then be expected to revise them in the light of the instructor’s suggestions and criticisms (see course schedule for related due dates for the proposal, draft, and revised, final paper). In addition to this research paper, students may submit a related slideshow illuminating the popular culture phenomena analyzed in the written paper. Slideshows will receive up to 25 bonus points (25 if judged outstanding: if excellent, 20; if good,

15; if course relevant but not particularly good, 10). Slideshows will be prepared with PowerPoint, Keynote, or other slideshow presentation programs. For more information see the section “Research Paper Guidelines” (page 19).

Discussions. There will be ample opportunities for students to express confusions and ask questions about all course materials and presentations via the discussion features provided in Canvas. Students themselves will often be able to answer questions or clarify things for one another before course instructors do, but course instructors shall seek to answer all questions within a week.

EVALUATION

Points & Percentages for Required Assignments

Assignment	Proportion of Course Grade
Ten Quizzes adjusted to 75 total points	7.5%
Participation in Discussions (75 points)	7.5%
Research Paper (250 points; up to 225 if optional slide show also provided.)	25%
Midterm (250 points)	25%
Final (350 points)	35%

Evaluation of Contributions to Discussions

Participation in discussions is essential to student learning and enhancing the experience in the class by connecting students personally to one another as well as their instructors. Responses to each discussion question can be usually be provided succinctly, in one to three sentences. Students are also expected to provide feedback, to respond, to what their colleagues and instructors say during the discussion sections. Student contributions to discussions will be evaluated on a scale of 1–5, every week that discussions questions are posed. Excellent contributions will receive 5 points, good contributions 4 points, fair contributions 3 points, and insufficient contributions will receive 1 or 0 points.

Most weeks there will be 6–8 questions posed. Excellent performance will involve providing well written and accurate responses to two or more of these questions, and in cases where others have answered well, responding to them in agreement, and if possible, adding one’s own insights.

Excellent contributions will also, often, involve making specific references to relevant course materials, and they may also include unique insights. In short, as much as can be approximated with online discussions, excellent responses will actively engage the questions in the way a lively and collegial conversation would take place in person. This can include agreements, disagreements, adding additional perspectives and relevant facts. Good contributions will involve much of the same but some occasional misapprehensions and writing flaws. Fair contributions will involve less engagement, fewer direct references learning materials and/or inaccurate statements about them (indicating that the student is not studying courses materials in the depth, and with the effectiveness, needed). Fair contributions may also suffer from less lucid and grammatically correct writing. Insufficient contributions will be judged when engagement is low or absent and when extant, indicates that the student is not engaging the courses learning materials.

In summary: the more lively one’s participation the more one will learn during discussions and contribute to the learning of others. As importantly, the more one participates in discussions the better one will soon the quizzes that flow directly from the questions engaged in them.

Evaluation of Written Research Assignments

See the explanations on page 3 & 4 about UF’s Writing Requirement, the Evaluation Rubric, and Professor Taylor’s writing guide.

University of Florida Grading Policies & Grade Point Assignments

For UF grading policies and information about the grade points assigned for specific grades, see: University of Florida grades and grading policies.

Calculating Grades

At the end of the semester, the total number of points earned by each student will be divided by the total number earned by the highest-scoring student. The resulting percentage will be used to calculate each student’s grade for the course. Put in a formula, it looks like this:

the score of each individual student (your score)

(divided by) the highest score earned by a student

The percentage arrived at by means of this formula will be evaluated by this scale:

A	≥95
A-	90
B+	87
B	83
B-	80
C+	77
C	73
C-	70
D+	67
D	63
D-	60
F	<59.99

This kind of scoring is fairer than many other forms of grading because: (1) It is based on what students actually achieve rather than some preconceived standard held by the professor; (2) Each student can receive a high grade; (3) Hard-working students will not be penalized for staying in a demanding course full of equally industrious students. With a traditional curve, demanding courses that “weed out” less industrious students, leaving hard-working ones, can unintentionally harm good students putting them in competition with each other. This will not occur in this course. Final grades are determined without rounding (e.g., 89.9 B+).

Extra credit

Extra credit can be earned in a number of ways. Exams may include extra credit questions. If so, any extra credit points will be added to the individual student’s score but only after the highest score earned by a student has been established. This ensures that the extra credit earned will not increase the difficulty of the grading scale. Students who contribute significantly to classroom discussions— by pointing instructors to course-related phenomena (including events in Gainesville or nearby that could provide extra credit opportunities for the entire class); or who attend and submit 300–500 word reports from events approved by instructors as extra credit opportunities—will receive extra credit. Apart from extra credit points earned on exams such points will be awarded at the end of the semester after the grading scales have been finalized. Students can also earn extra credit by turning in an optional powerpoint presentation to accompany their research paper.

Attendance, late or Missing Assignments

Students who do not make discussion posts on time will not receive credit for them. Students who cannot take an exam on time for UF authorized excuses, must inform the course instructors before the exam of the reason for their impending absence, and provide evidence verifying the reason. No accommodation will be made after the fact apart from a contemporaneous emergency immediately prior to the exam. Any makeup exams will take place during finals week. For further information about what constitutes acceptable absences or late assignments, see UF’s Attendance Policies.

Academic Dishonesty

Students engaged in any form of academic dishonesty, as defined under the “Academic Misconduct” section of the Student Honor Code, will be subject to other disciplinary measures. Students should know what constitutes plagiarism and avoid inadvertent forms of it that can occur, as for example, by cutting and pasting quotations from various digital texts and failing to put them in quotation marks with appropriate crediting of the source.

Ethical Use of AI in Coursework

Students may use generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools (such as ChatGPT or similar tools) to support learning, brainstorming, or refining ideas. However, all submitted work must reflect the student’s own understanding, analysis, and critical thinking. Directly submitting AI-generated text as one’s own, or relying on AI in place of independent research and writing, constitutes academic dishonesty. In your research paper, if any AI tools are used, students must clearly acknowledge this assistance (e.g., in a footnote or acknowledgment section). Ethical use of AI involves treating it as a supplement to—not a substitute for—scholarly effort, careful research, and original writing. AI may not be used in any form during quizzes or exams; these assessments must be based entirely on memory, comprehension, and independent reasoning developed through the course.

Reviewing exams

Academic dishonesty is so pronounced that faculty need to take precautions to ensure the integrity of exam processes. For this reason, in some classes, exams or parts of them will not be returned, but students may review them during office hours. At the end of the semester, work that was available for student pickup will be available in the Religion Department office in Anderson 107 for 30 days after the official date that grades are posted by the registrar. After this time, they will be shredded & recycled.

Student Evaluations of this Course

Students and instructors all have much to learn and room for improvement. Your feedback on your courses is critical to their quality. Students will be notified when the window for providing feedback on the course opens, and will be able to do so under the GatorEvals link in the Canvas course menu or here. After the end of the semester students can see summaries of their evaluations at Student Evaluations.

Courtesy to fellow students and instructors

One of the beautiful things about higher education, at its best, is the ability to wrestle with wildly diverse perspectives on critically important issues and ideas. Exchanges among all course participants should remain collegial, even when serious and emotionally-charged perspectives are being advanced and criticized. Guidance on how to give feedback in a professional and respectful manner is available at https://gatorevals.aa.ufl.edu/students/.

Communicating with instructors

Students should contact their instructors through the Canvas email link. Your instructors pride themselves on being responsive to students and will usually respond within 48 hours. This is not always possible, however, and such rapidity should not be expected. Plan ahead.

In-Class Recording

Students are allowed to record video or audio of class lectures. However, the purposes for which these recordings may be used are strictly controlled. The only allowable purposes are (1) for personal educational use, (2) in connection with a complaint to the university, or (3) as evidence in, or in preparation for, a criminal or civil proceeding. All other purposes are prohibited. Specifically, students may not publish recorded lectures without the written consent of the instructor.

A “class lecture” is an educational presentation intended to inform or teach enrolled students about a particular subject, including any instructor-led discussions that form part of the presentation, and delivered by any instructor hired or appointed by the University, or by a guest instructor, as part of a University of Florida course. A class lecture does not include lab sessions, student presentations, clinical presentations such as patient history, academic exercises involving solely student participation, assessments (quizzes, tests, exams), field trips, private conversations between students in the class or between a student and the faculty or lecturer during a class session.

Publication without permission of the instructor is prohibited. To “publish” means to share, transmit, circulate, distribute, or provide access to a recording, regardless of format or medium, to another person (or persons), including but not limited to another student within the same class section. Additionally, a recording, or transcript of a recording, is considered published if it is posted on or uploaded to, in whole or in part, any media platform, including but not limited to social media, book, magazine, newspaper, leaflet, or third party note/tutoring services. A student who publishes a recording without written consent may be subject to a civil cause of action instituted by a person injured by the publication and/or discipline under UF Regulation 4.040 Student Honor Code and Student Conduct Code.

Health & Wellness

• U Matter, We Care: If you or someone you know is in distress, please contact umatter@ufl.edu, 352-392-1575, or visit U Matter, We Care website to refer or report a concern and a team member will reach out to the student in distress.

• Counseling and Wellness Center: Visit the Counseling and Wellness Center website or call 352-392-1575 for information on crisis services as well as non-crisis services.

• Student Health Care Center: Call 352-392-1161 for 24/7 information to help you find the care you need, or visit the Student Health Care Center website.

• University Police Department: Visit UF Police Department website or call 352-392-1111 (or 9-1-1 for emergencies).

• UF Health Shands Emergency Room / Trauma Center: For immediate medical care call 352-733-0111 or go to the emergency room at 1515 SW Archer Road, Gainesville, FL 32608; Visit the UF Health Emergency Room and Trauma Center website.

Academic Resources

• E-learning technical support: Contact the UF Computing Help Desk at 352-392-4357 or via email at helpdesk@ufl.edu.

• Library Support: Various ways to receive assistance with respect to using the libraries or finding resources.

• Writing Studio: 2215 Turlington Hall, 352-846-1138. Help brainstorming, formatting, and writing papers.

• Student Complaints On-Campus: Visit the Student disCode and Student Conduct Code webpage for more information.

• On-Line Students Complaints: View the Distance Learning Student Complaint Process.

SCHEDULE

Important notes:

• The specific due dates for discussion responses, quizzes, exams, and papers, are provided in Canvas.

• Readings average about 55 pages per Module.

(Orientation) ~ Introducing the Course Goals and Instructor

Assignments

View the Professor Taylor’s welcome message, review the course goals, familiarize yourself with Canvas, our online course venue, and if possible, get started on the assignments Module One.

(Module 1; 8.21–8.31) ~ The Quest for Knowledge & Introducing NSPC

In broad terms, this course is about the quest for knowledge, so we begin by examining how knowledge is acquired, expressed, promoted, and ultimately integrated into the worldviews (aka cosmovisions) that provide people with meaning and guidance for the course of their lives. We also begin introducing the terminology — such as religion, spirituality, culture, and popular culture — that we will need to analyze the social phenomena that are the focus of this course.

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Selections from Genesis 1–12 (which includes commentary from Professor Taylor).

Daniel Quinn, Animism: Humanities Original Worldview

Popular Culture itself is defined in different ways so we begin by looking at a discussion of the term in Wikipedia, an online source that some would and others would not consider to be an expression of popular culture

Lectures:

-> Welcome to UF & ‘The Great Quest’

-> Epistemological Humility & the Libera(ng Power of the Sociology of Knowledge -> Course Framework & Key Terms

Note: Every week there will be discussions and nearly most weeks, a short quiz, to evaluate learning during that week’s module.

(Module 2; 9.1–9.7) ~ Abrahamic Cosmogonies

Assignments/Readings & Viewing (before class)

Bron Taylor’s Overview of Daniel Quinn’s Ishmael. This book was the inspiration for the motion picture “Instinct”, and it precedes chronologically The Story of B

Daniel Quinn, The Story of B, Bantam, 1997 (begin reading this week)

Optional readings; valuable and will enhance your understanding of the lectures:

Lynn White Jr., The Historical Roots of our Ecological Crises William French, _Francis of Assisi_

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Genesis & Abrahamic cosmogonies

-> Lynn White’s thesis about religion and environmental behavior; Saint & Pope Francis

-> Mo(on Picture: Noah (2014), directed by Darren Aronofsky; highly recommended mo(on picture; at least view and understand the significance of the excerpts, provided.

(Module 3; 9.8–9.14) ~ Animism & Pagan Cosmogonies

Assignments/Readings & Viewing Motion Pictures:

Brother Sun, Sister Moon (1972) (required)

Bambi (1942), 79 minutes (recommended)

Daniel Quinn, The Story of B, Bantam, 1997 (finish reading this novel; the “Epilogue” & “Public Teachings appendices are optional”)

Graham Harvey, Contemporary Paganism

Presentations & discussions

-> Brother Sun, Sister Moon (1972); prologue, mo(on picture, epilogue, and discussion.

-> Explana(on of research paper & deadlines.

(Module 4; 9.15–9.21) ~ Analyzing Religion

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Dark Green Religion, Preface, Readers Guide and Introductory Chapter (ix-12), Chapter 2, Dark Green Religion (pp. 13–41) Movie: The Wicker Man (1993).

Presentations

-> Two Analy(c Approaches to Religion -> Paganism & The Wicker Man

(Module 5; 9.22–9.28) ~ Types of Religion

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Dark Green Religion in North America (Ch 3., 42–70)

Jo Pearson and Sarah Pike, Wicca

Michael York, New Age

Michael Redfield, The Celestine Prophecy (NY/Warner 1993) (optional but strongly recommended; read the first 50 pages)

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> “I AM” — documentary & discussion

(Module 6; 9.29–10.5) ~ Disney’s Natures & the New Age

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Bron Taylor, “Rebels against the Anthropocene? Ideology, Spirituality, Popular Culture, and

Human Domination of the World within the Disney Empire,” JSRNC 2019

Bron Taylor, Celestine Prophecy

Jose Arguelles, Harmonic Convergence

Michael Redfield, The Celestine Prophecy (NY/Warner 1993) [read first 100 pages]

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Disney’s Natures

-> Nature, Science & New Age Nature Spirituali(es (in the Celes(ne Prophecy, and beyond) -> New Age v. indigenous spirituali(es & compe(ng understandings of the sacred (featuring excerpts from “In the Light of Reverence: The Wintu & New Age on Mt. Shasta” [29:00].

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> “The Winto & New Age on Mt. Shasta” (required documentary, 29 minutes)

-> “Hopi Four Corners / Black Mesa” (recommended documentary) [25:00]

-> “The Lion King” (recommended Disney animated film) [1:29:00]

(Module 7; 10.6–10.12) ~ Ecotopias & Dystopias

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

• Michael Redfield, The Celestine Prophecy, conclude recommenced reading.

• Ernest Callenbach’s, Ecotopia, read first ½.

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Utopias, Dystopias and Ecotopias

-> Last chance for pre-exam Q & A

(Module 8; 10.13–10.19) ~ Pagan & Radical Environmentalism

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Dark Green Religion, Ch 4. Radical Environmentalism (71–102).

Bron Taylor, Animism, Tree Consciousness and the Religion of Life, the backstory to Richard

Powers’ Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Overstory. Ernest Callenbach’s, Ecotopia, read next ½.

Recommended reading:

John Seed, Re-Earthing

“Earth First!” (60 minutes, 1990) [14:35]

“Earth Liberation Front” 60 minutes, 2001) [13:39]

Recommended Movies (available various ways with streaming services; extra credit for movie reviews): The East (2013) FernGully (1992); The Last Rainforest (1992), Hoot (2006), Butterfly (2000), If a Tree Falls, and Pickaxe (1999).

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Midterm exam debriefing

-> Radical Environmentalism and Nature Spirituality in novels and cinema.

(Module 9; 10.20–10.26) ~ Surfing Spirituality and Outdoor Nature Spiritualities

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Ernest Callenbach, Ecotopia (conclude, if necessary)

Dark Green Religion, Ch 5. Surfing Spirituality (103–126)

Bron Taylor on Surfing, Nature and Spirituality [3:30]

Tina Grandinetti, “Indigenous Surfing Rides High: The ocean is my totem,” The Guardian. Decolonizing Surfing with Native Like Water | Sea of Change [5:02]

This interview is recommended but not required: “How Surfer Britt Merrick Found His ‘Spiritual Home’ Among the Waves”Links to an external site. This is an interview with a Christian surfer, former pastor, and son of one of America’s best-known surfboard company founders, about the value of the practice for his life and spirituality.

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Surfing into Spirituality lecture (with excerpts from Point Break (1991), Five Summer Stories (1972), Whale Rider (2002), Step into Liquid (2003), Blue Horizon (2004), and Inten(o (2012).

-> Climbing Devil’s Tower: Religious Ritual or Desecra(ng Act? Lecture with excerpts from “In the Light of Reverence”

-> Discussion of outdoor recrea(on & nature spirituali(es

(Module 10; 10.27–11.2) ~ Pantheism, Gaian Naturalism, & Dark Green Religion

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Dark Green Religion, Ch 6. Globalization with Predators & Moving Pictures (127–154)

Jack Loeffler, Edward Abbey, “Either everything is divine, or nothing is”

Bernard Zaleha, Pantheism in American Popular Culture (82–90; “Panetheism in the Movies,” the rest is optional)

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Dark Green Spirituali(es (Part 1): Pain(ng, Photography, and Prose

-> Dark Green Spirituali(es (Part 2): Museums, Aquariums & Science Performances

-> Pantheism in the movies and music (including discussion of Zaleha ar(cle), including excerpts and discussion of the mo(on picture S(gmata and the role of the Dead Sea scrolls in Chris(an Pantheism today.

Videos & Mo,on Pictures

Michael Jackson, Earth Song

S(gmata (1999) (recommended)

Monterey Bay Aquarium Jelly Cam (discussed in lecture; link just for fun)

(Module 11; 11.3–11.9) ~ Nature spirituality from pilgrimage to the future

Assignments/Readings & Viewings

Ch 7. Globalization in Arts, Sciences, and Letters (155–179) Get started on the Avatar readings (listed under week12):

B. Taylor, Prologue: Avatar as Rorschach; and, Introduction: The Religion and Politics of Avatar

Recommended reading:

Britt Istoft, Avatar Fandom, Environmentalism, and Nature Religion

Kari Sonde (2020). “How ‘Avatar: The Last Airbender’ Became One of the Summer’s Most

Popular Shows 15 Years After Its Debut, Movie: Avatar (2009)

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Dark Green Spirituali(es (Part 3): From Pilgrimage to the Future -> Introduce and begin watching Avatar excerpts.

(Module 12; 11.12–11.16) ~ Avatar, Contact & Cultural Conflict over Religion & Nature in Motion Pictures

Assignments/Readings & Viewing

Watch the motion picture, Avatar

Chapters from Avatar and Nature Spirituality (available gratis through Professor Taylor):

• Lisa H. Sideris, I See You: Interspecies Empathy and Avatar

• B. Taylor, Truth and Fiction in Avatar’s Cosmogony and Nature Religion

Recommended

• C. Klassen, Avatar and Nature Spirituality, “Becoming the Noble Savage.” This is a harsh critique of the film.

• Video online: Amazon Watch, Defending the Rivers of the Amazon with Sigourney Weaver

(2010, 10:39); Avatar: A Message from Pandora (James Cameron on protecting the

Amazon; optional, 20.00); and from indigenous rights websites: Indigenous Environmental Network; Amazon Watch

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Conclude Avatar.

-> discuss & debate the compe(ng perspec(ves described in Avatar & Contact, and how they reflect compe(ng views in society at large.

Lecture: Avatar (2009) and indigenous peoples, nature, and popular culture: exploring changes from vilification to (sometimes romantic) vindication, with more popular culture exemplars, including excerpts from Dances with Wolves (1990).

(Module 13; 11.17–11.23) ~ Civil Religion & Terrapolitan Earth Civilization

Readings:

* Dark Green Religion, Ch 8, “Terrapolitan Earth Religion (180–99); ch 9 recommended now.

Presenta,ons & discussions:

-> Civil and Terrapolitan Earth Religion, from Abraham Lincoln to Robert Bellah and Daniel Deudney

-> Civil Religion and “America’s Best Idea” — the PBS documentary about our Na(onal Parks — and what it reveals about nature spirituality (and Na(onalism) in America.

-> Patriotism, environmentalism, and the consecration of The National Parks: America’s Best Idea (2009), with excerpts from this PBS documentary series.

Assignments/Readings & Viewings

• Mo(on Picture to watch: Contact (1997)

• Documentary excerpts to watch: The Na(onal Parks

Important: many things are introduced during the 12 hour series on the National Parks that are not included in the assigned excerpts, so here is some important background to have in mind when viewing them, as well as a few things to think about while doing so:

1. The establishment of America’s National Parks, in most cases, depended upon the violent subjugation and displacement of the indigenous populations already living there.

2. Their establishment would not have happened, or at least to the extent and within the specific time frames, were it not for both commercial interests (railroads and tourism, for example) and nationalism, including its ideology of ‘manifest destiny.’

3. The Parks also include historical and cultural sites, and examples in many places in America including Florida.

4. Episode 2 has more historical information about John Muir’s battle against the Hetch Hetchy Dam in Yosemite National Park. Before the 1906 earthquake in California, which led to most of San Francisco being burnt to the ground, it looked as though he would win that battle, but afterward, the public switched to supporting it, being misled into believing that the water from it was needed to safeguard the city. Brokenhearted, Muir died soon afterward. But historians say for the most part his loss solidified the notion that National Parks should be off limits to commercial incursions.

5. Wallace Stegner is one of the countries greatest western writers. He is often quoted in the documentary but the excerpts shown do not introduce him.

6. Many of the cultural sites promote and reinforce patriotism and civil religion, which are in turn often linked to the exceptional natural landscapes and used to foster both we feeling and place feeling, and sometimes even superiority, over other people and places. Is a ‘civil earth religion,’ or a ‘terrapolitan earth religion’ expressed and promoted in the parks, or a narrower nationalistic civil religion, or neither?

7. Notice how different the reactions of people are to nature, that these reactions are at least some extent ‘socially constructed’, namely, a reflection of the preexisting cognitive and cultural frames people bring to the experience. This was seen in the history chapter in the Dark Green Religion book; What examples of it to you see in this film? E.g., some people were and are horrified by wild, sometimes geothermal nature, others find the sublime in the continent’s wild places, others find evidence for the grandeur and goodness of God.

8. In a section not excerpted, the National Park Ranger Sheldon Jacobs discussed how he had no connections with wild places growing up in Detroit, but was immediately moved and enraptured by bison during his first visit to Yellowstone National Park. At the time of the filming, he was an interpretive ranger in Yosemite National Park. A good question when considering his mystical experiences with the bison in Yellowstone is whether for him, that was a socially constructed experience, or a more personal one grounded in an experience, and a felt relationship, with the beings and place where bison still are allowed to live.

9. Are there examples of animistic or Gaian spiritualities depicted in, and even expressed by the filmmakers, in this documentary? If so, where/when?

10. What role did photographers and landscape painters play in expressing and promoting nature spirituality and the establishment and protection of National Parks?

11. What role did the nature writer Terry Tempest Williams play; and what if anything did it have to do with nature religion and environmental ethics?

(Module 14; 11.24–12.3) ~ Popular Culture & the Future of Religion & Nature

Assignments/Readings & Viewings

• Mo(on Picture to watch: The Fountain (2006)

Readings

* Dark Green Religion, Ch 9. Conclusion: Dark Green Religion and the Planetary Future (200–222).

Presentations

Lecture: Darwinian Nature Spirituality, Evolutionary Ethics, and The future of Religion and Nature, including “Symphony of Science” music videos & Cosmos video excerpts; includes discussion and excerpts from The Fountain (2006, dir. Darren Aronofsky), 96 minutes

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

The rest of this syllabus provides resources and guidelines for the fieldwork assignment and the research paper; followed by a more extensive bibliography of scholarly books and novels, and lists of documentaries, feature films, websites, and other exemplars of the entanglement of religion, nature and popular culture; followed by additional, recommended readings and other resources paralleling the weekly course schedule. These materials can be especially helpful to students when considering research topics. Links to yet more resources, such podcasts, music, slideshows, video, music, and websites, will be made available during the course. Students are encouraged to send to course instructors their own ideas for additional resources.

Research Papers will often if not usually also draw on scholarly articles or books that you find in the library that illuminate your subject matter. This is not absolutely necessary because there may not be scholarly resources for some things you may wish to focus with the kind of focus we are taking in this class. You may, therefore, be plunging into a completely novel area, using lenses learned in or beyond this class as heuristic (interpretive) devices. For this reason, your research paper may also involve fieldwork.

Consider what the artists themselves are trying to convince you about, or evoke some emotion in you, or call you to some action. Alternatively, you may elect to focus on the audiences who experience these productions. Consider also whether the social phenomena in question are advancing not only a spiritual approach to nature but also a political ideology, namely, ideas, aims and assertions that constitute a socio-economic-political program. Doing so will also bring into focus the perspectives with which your subject matter is in contention. Good questions to ask include: What do the producers of what you are examining think is at stake? With whom are they in contention? Can their means of artistic expression be considered ‘technologies of the sacred’ and if so, how? If there is a view of where humanity went wrong spiritually and with regard to nature, what is it? And if they are explicitly or implicitly envisioning or advocating a certain kind of future (e.g., a utopian or ‘ecotopian hope), what would it be?

To decide on a research project it would be a good idea to carefully review the entire class schedule to see what is coming up later on during the course.

Hints: In some cases, the theoretical approach and arguments found in Dark Green Religion will be helpful as you work up your own paper. Do you find these arguments and the evidence mustered for them compelling? Does your own focus evidence such arguments? Or, does your research cast into question those findings? Alternatively or additionally, Avatar and Nature Spirituality might be helpful to you analytically because it exemplifies the sorts of analyses I am looking for in your own papers. You may, therefore, find it helpful to read ahead to find the range of issues it explores that may also be ripe for analysis in your own research.

You are by no means restricted to the many possibilities to be found in the syllabus but being familiar with it may trigger ideas about things you know about that would be fitting. I especially like learning about things I had no idea even existed!

Finally, do not assume that you must focus on social phenomena in popular culture that promotes environmental concern and action. Much of popular culture is indifferent to and a distraction from any environmentalist agenda, and some is in direct opposition to such an agenda, including due to religious, political, and moral beliefs that view environmentalist worldviews as religiously, politically, and ethically misguided or even dangerous.

The more innovative and creative your research paper is, the better argued and evidenced, the better your grade for it will be; the same applies to your slide show presentation if you elect to do one to complement your research paper. If your paper is exceptional, I may encourage you to develop it further in order to submit to a scholarly journal, including the Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, which I edit.

SCHOLARLY BOOKS AND ARTICLES

* most course relevant

• David Ingram, Green Screen: Environmentalism and Hollywood Cinema (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2000).

• Adrian Ivakhiv, Ecologies of the Moving Image: Cinema, Affect, Nature (WLU Press 2013) (N)

• John C. Lyden, Film as Religion: Myths, Morals, and Rituals (New York University Press, 2003) (N)

• Jeffrey Kripal, Mutants and Mystics: Science Fiction, Superhero Comics, and the Paranormal (University of Chicago Press, 2011).

Verlyn Flieger, “Taking the Part of Trees: Eco-Conflict in Middle-Earth,” in J. R. R. Tolkien and His Literary Resonances: Views of Middle-Earth, (Westport, CT & London: Greenwood Press, 2000. 147–58).

Lee Gilmore, Theatre in a crowded fire: ritual and spirituality at Burning Man (University of California Press, 2010)

Robert K. Johnston, Reel Spirituality: Theology and Film in Dialogue (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2000)

John May, ed, New Image of Religious Film (Kansas City: Sheed & Ward, 1997).

Eric Mazur, ed., Encyclopedia of Religion and Film (ABC-CLIO, 2011)

Margaret Miles, Seeing and believing: religion and values in the movies (Beacon: 1996).

Joel Martin & Conrad Ostwalt, eds, Screening the Sacred: Religion, Myth, and Ideology in Popular American Film (Boulder: Westview Press, 1995).

Jolyon Mitchell and S. Brent Plate, eds., The Religion and Film Reader (Routledge, 2007). S. Brent Plate, Religion and Film: Cinema and the Re-Creation of the World (2009).

Graham St. John, Global Tribe: Technology, Spirituality and Psytrance (Equinox Press, 2012).

(engages trance and psychedelic, nature-related shamanism)

Graeme Turner, Film as Social Practice (London and New York: Routledge, 1999). Gregory J. Watkins, Teaching Religion and Film (Oxford University Press, 2008)

NOVELS

Margaret Atwood, The Year of the Flood: A Novel (Bloomsbury, 2009. London: Virago Press, 2010).

Dan Brown, Origin (New York: Doubleday 2017).

Robert A. Heinlein, Stranger in a Strange Land (New York: Putnam, 1961).

Barbara Kingsolver, Flight Behavior (New York: Harper, 2012).

Michael Murphy, Golf in the Kingdom (New York: Viking, 1972).

Starhawk, The Fifth Sacred Thing (New York: Doubleday, 1993).

Richard Powers, The Overstory (New York: Norton, 2018)

Kim Stanley Robinson, Ministry of the Future (Orbit, 2020)

Alice Walker, The Color Purple: A Novel (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1982).

DOCUMENTARIES

Nature-venerating (and/or conservationist)

American Buffalo: Spirit of a Nation (1999) I Am (III) (2010), Tom Shadyac Greenfire: Aldo Leopold (2011) In the Light of Reverence (2001)

Journey of The Universe (2001) RamDass | Fierce Grace (2001)

The National Parks: America’s Best Idea (2009f)

The Sacred Balance (2002); based on David Suzuki’s book by this title, narrated by him. Excerpts are sometimes available for free on youtube; if these links do not work, search for them or use a paid video service: part 1; part 2; part 3; part 4; Astronaut’s View of Earth; Science and Spirituality.

• The Vanishing Prairie (1954)

• What the Bleep do we Know? (2011)

THEATRICAL MOTION PICTURES

Nature-venerating/mystical, pantheist, etc.

• Thinking Like A Watershed (1998)

• American Beauty (1999)

• Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012)

• Evan Almighty (2007)

• Fern Gully (1992)

• Golfing in the Kingdom (2010)

• On the Road (2012)

• Tree of Life (2011)

Pagan, Wiccan, Druidic

• The Fountain (2006)

• The Secret of Kells (2009); animated

• Dancing at Lughsana (1998)

• The Mists of Avalon (2001) (links above)

• The Wicker Man (1973)

Animistic (many are available online)

• Dumbo (1941)

Bambi (1942)

Fern Gully (1992)

The Lion King (1994)

Moana (2016)

Pochahontas (1995)

Spirited Away (2001)

Nature Religion & Dark Green Religion

Avatar (2009)

Epic (2013)

Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002). Peter Jackson (Director).

Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Rings. (2001) Peter Jackson (Director).

Spirit Bear (2005)

Grizzly Man (2005)

New Science/New Age

I Am (2011)

Mindwalk (1990)

The Butterfly Effect (2004)

What the Bleep Do We Know? (2011)

The Fountain (2006)

Apocalyptic and Dystopian (cf. Ecotopian/Utopian, and also Apocalpytic and Dystopian, and Natural Disasters / Phenomena)

Alive (1993)

Planet of the Apes (2001)

12 Monkeys (1995)

Fight Club (1999)

Hunger Games (2012)

Left Behind: The Movie (2001), and sequels

The Perfect Storm (2000)

This is the End (2013)

Twister (1996)

Volcano (1997)

Wall-E (2008); animated.

Outdoor recreation & adventure (Surfing, climbing, fishing)

Way of the Ocean (2011), 62 minutes, ‘explores the connection between man and sea through a visual feast of poetic motion’

Salmon Fishing in Yemen (2011)

Step into Liquid (2003)

Minds in the Water (2011)

Science Fiction

Dune (1984), also a book and 2000f TV series.

2001, A Space Odyssey (1968)

Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)

Paranormal phenomena (including near death, reincarnation, extra-terrestrials, ghosts, etc).

Afterlife (2011)

DMT: The Spirit Molecule (2010)

Signs (2002)

12 Monkeys (1995)

Asian Nature Spiritualities

Princess Mononoke (1997)

The Matrix (1999)

Star Wars (1977)

VIDEO GAMES, COMPUTER APPLICATIONS

Captain Planet

Game of Thrones Companion

DMD (or Shadows of the Damned)

COMIC BOOKS

Some are relevant

PERFORMANCES & FESTIVALS

Burning Man

Raves

Welcome Ceremony, World Summit on Sustainable Development (2002)

THEME PARKS

Many are relevant: Disney, Busch Gardens, Sea World, etc.