Ecological Entanglements in the Anthropocene

This edited collection explores the relationships between humans and nature at a time when the traditional sense of separation between human cultures and a natural wilderness is being eroded. The ‘Anthropocene,’ whose literal translation is the ‘Age of Man,’ is one way of marking these planetary changes to the Earth system. Global climate change and rising sea levels are two prominent examples of how nature can no longer be simply thought of as something outside and removed from humans (and vice versa). This collection applies the concepts of ecology and entanglement to address pressing political, social, and cultural issues surrounding human relationships with the nonhuman world in terms of ‘working with nature.’ It asks, are there more or less preferable ways of working with nature? What forms and practices might this work take and how do we distinguish between them? Is the idea of ‘nature’ even sufficient to approach such questions, or do we need to reconsider using the term nature in favour of terms such as environments, ecologies or the broad notion of the non-human world? How might we forge perspectives and enact practices which build resilience and community across species and spaces, constructing relationships with nonhumans which go beyond discourses of pollution, degradation and destruction? Bringing together a range of contributors from across multiple academic disciplines, activists and artists, this book examines how these questions might help us understand and assess the different ways in which humans transform, engage and interact with the nonhuman world.

Ecological Entanglements in the Anthropocene travels across the planet, offering critical analysis of the multiple contexts which define the ecological mess we are in; these travels from British coal mines to Antarctica, across oceans and seas to New Zealand and many other localities provides an interdisciplinary and convincing argument to approach the Anthropocene along the lines of the (post-)colonial legacies and the current political economy of disaster capitalism.

Nicholas Holm is lecturer of media studies at Massey University.Sy Taffel is lecturer of media studies at Massey University.