Feminist Ecocriticism
Feminist Ecocriticism: A Posthumanist Direction in Ecocritical Trajectory.
by Serpil Oppermann
ABSTRACT: [Extract in lieu of an abstract] Transnationalism. Translocalism. Ecoglobalism. Ecocosmopolitalism. Posthumanism. Postcolonial Ecologies. Queer Ecology. Trans-corporeality. New Materialisms. Material Feminisms. These are the new trends that noticeably characterize the current phase of ecocritical studies. They distinctively mark the field's expansion into more politically and ethically inflected areas of concern, involving diverse but also disparate methodologies and perspectives which are often grouped together as aspects of a "third wave ecocriticism," a rather controversial labeling coined by Joni Adamson and Scott Slovic in their introduction to the Summer 2009 special issue of MELUS. The wave metaphor that Adamson and Slovic have adopted from Lawrence Buell's wave model of ecocritical developments directly echoes Ynestra King and Val Plumwood's now problematic labeling of ecofeminism as a "third wave of the women's movement," and "third wave or stage of feminism” (Plumwood 39) respectively. In his 2010 essay, entitled “The Third Wave of Ecocriticism," Slovic himself acknowledges that he and Adamson borrowed the wave meraphor “from the idea of first and second wave feminism" (5), but he also recognizes its shortcomings. “The wave metaphor," he writes, “breaks down in the ecocritical context because the waves do not simply end when a new wave begins" (5). Greta Gaard, the first feminist ecocritic who has been overtly critical of the term, objects to its usage on historical grounds. Referring critically to Lawrence Buell's use of the wave theory of ecocritical developments that inspired Adamson and Slovic to write their introduction, Gaard issues a significant warning about what is absent in this model and asks: "where are the analytical frameworks for gender, species, and sexuality? They do not appear” (“New Directions” 644). Gaard's questioning enacts a yet unarticulated concern about ecocriticism's polycentric focus and its rhizomatic trajectory that seems to be strategically all-inclusive but paradoxically exclusive of the implications of gender and sexuality for environmentalism. The current ecocritical exploration of such issues as global and local concepts of place, translocality and bioregionalism, human and animal subjectivities,
CITATION: Oppermann, S. (2013) Feminist Ecocriticism: A Posthumanist Direction in Ecocritical Trajectory. In Greta Gaard (Ed.), International Perspectives in Feminist Ecocriticism (pp. 19-36) Routledge.
REFERENCES:
Adams, Carol J. The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory. New York: Continuum, 1990. Print.
--ed. Ecofeminism and the Sacred. New York: Continuum, 1993. Print.
Adamson, Joni and Scott Slovic. “The Shoulders We Stand On: An Introduction to Ethnicity and Ecocriticism." MELUS 34.2 (Summer 2009): 5-24. Print.
Alaimo, Stacy. “Ecofeminism without Nature? Questioning the Relation between
Feminism and Environmentalism." International Feminist Journal of Politics 10.3 (September 2008): 299–304. Print.
--. "Eluding Capture: The Science, Culture, and Pleasure of Queer' Animals." Queer Ecologies: Sex, Nature, Politics, Desire. Ed. Catriona Mortimer Sandilands and Bruce Erickson, Bloomington, Indianapolis: Indiana UP, 2010. 51-72. Print.
--. "Material Engagements: Science Studies and the Environmental Humanities." Ecozon@: European Journal on Literature and Environment (New Ecocritical Perspectives: European and Transnational Ecocriticism) 1.1 (2010): 69–74. Web. 20 December 2011.
--. Bodily Natures: Science, Environment, and the Material Self. Blooming ton: Indiana UP, 2010. Print. Alaimo, Stacy and Susan Hekman, eds. Material Feminisms. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 2008. Print.
Badmington, Neil. “Theorizing Posthumanism.” Cultural Critique 53 (Winter, 2003): 10–27.
Barad, Karen. Meeting the Universe Halfway: quantum physics and the entanglement of matter and meaning. Durham: Duke UP, 2007. Print.
--. "Posthumanist Performativity: Toward an Understanding of How Matter Comes to Matter." Material Feminisms. Ed. Stacy Alaimo and Susan Hekman. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 2008. 120-154. Print.
Bartlett, Laura and Thomas B. Byers. “Back to the Future: The Humanist Matrix."
Cultural Critique 53 (Winter 2003): 28-46. Print.
Bennett, Jane. “The Force of Things: Steps Toward an Ecology of Matter.” Political Theory 32.3 (June 2004): 347–372. Print.
--.Vibrant Matter: A Political Ecology of Things. Durham: Duke UP, 2010. Print.
Braidotti, Rosi. “A critical cartography of feminist post-postmodernism." Australian Feminist Studies 20.47 (2005): 169–180. Print.
Coole, Diana and Samantha Frost. Eds. New Materialisms: Ontology, Agency, and Politics. Durham: Duke UP, 2010. Print.
Didur, Jill. “Re-Embodying Technoscientific Fantasies: Posthumanism, Genetically Modified Foods, and the Colonization of Life.” Cultural Critique 53 (Winter 2003): 98-115. Print.
Economides, Louise. “Mont Blanc' and the Sublimity of Materiality.” Cultural
Critique 61 (Autumn 2005): 87–114. Print.
Estok, Simon. "Theorizing in a Space of Ambivalent Openness: Ecocriticism and
Ecophobia.” ISLE 16.2 (Spring 2009): 203-225. Print.
--. “Reading Ecophobia: A Manifesto." Ecozon@: European Journal on Literature and Environment (New Ecocritical Perspectives: European and Transnational Ecocriticism) 1.1 (2010): 75-79. Web. 25 November 2011.
Gaard, Greta. “Ecofeminism' Revisited: Rejecting Essentialism and Re-Placing Species in a Material Feminist Environmentalism.” Feminist Formations 23.2 (Summer 2011): 26-53. Print.
--. Ecological Politics: Ecofeminists and the Greens. Philadelphia, PA: Temple UP, 1998.
--. “New Directions for Ecofeminism: Toward a More Feminist Ecocriticism." ISLE 17.4 (Autumn 2010): 643-665. Print.
--. "Toward a Queer Ecofeminism.” Hypatia 2.1 (Winter 1997): 114-137. Print.
--. “Women, Water, Energy: An Ecofeminist Approach.” Organization & Environment 14.2 (June 2001): 157-172. Print.
Hayles, Katherine, N. “Afterword: The Human in the Posthuman.” Cultural Critique 53 (Winter 2003): 134-137. Print.
Heffernan, Teresa. “Bovine Anxieties, Virgin Births, and the Secret of Life.” Cultural Critique 53 (Winter, 2003): 116-133. Print.
Hird, Myra J. “Animal Trans.” Queering the Non/Human. Ed. Noreen Giffney and Myra J. Hird. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2008. 227–247. Print.
--. "Feminist Engagements with Matter." Feminist Studies 35.2 (Summer 2009): 329–346.
Iovino, Serenella. "Ecocriticism and a Non-Anthropocentric Humanism: Reflections on Local Natures and Global Responsibilites.” Local Natures, Global Responsibilities: Ecocritical Perspectives on the New English Literatures (ASNEL Papers 15). Ed. Laurenz Volkmann, Nancy Grimm, Ines Detmers, and Katrin Thomson. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2010. 29-53. Print.
Kheel, Marti. Nature Ethics: An Ecofeminist Perspective. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, 2008. Print.
King, Ynestra. “The Ecology of Feminism and the Feminism of Ecology.” Healing the Wounds: The Promise of Ecofeminism. Ed. Judith Plant. Santa Cruz, CA: New Society P, 1989. 18-28. Print.
Merchant, Carolyn. Radical Ecology: The Search for a Livable World. New York: Routledge, 1992. Print.
Mies, Maria, and Vandana Shiva. Ecofeminism. London: Zed Books, 1993. Print.
Murphy, Patrick D. Literature, Nature, Other: Ecofeminist Critiques. Albany, NY: SUNY P, 1995. Print.
Mortimer-Sandliands, Catriona. “Ecofeminism on the Edge: A Commentary." International Feminist Journal of Politics 10.3 (September 2008): 305-313. Print.
Mortimer-Sandilands, Catriona and Bruce Erickson, eds. Queer Ecologies: Sex, Nature, Politics, Desire. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 2010. Print.
Oppermann, Serpil. “The Rhizomatic Trajectory of Ecocriticism." Ecozon@: European Journal on Literature and Environment (New Ecocritical Perspectives: European and Transnational Ecocriticism) 1.1 (Spring 2010): 17-21. Web. 18 December 2011
Plumwood, Val. Feminism and the Mastery of Nature. London: Routledge, 1993.
Rigby, Kate. "Ecocriticism." Introducing Criticism at the 21st Century. Ed. Julian Wolfreys. Edinburgh: Edinburgh UP, 2002. 151–178. Print.
Rossini, Manuela. "To the Dogs: Companion Speciesism and the New Feminist Materialism." Kriticos: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal of Post modern Cultural Sound, Text and Image 3 (September 2006). Web. 8 December 2011.
Sandilands, Catriona. The Good-Natured Feminist: Ecofeminism and the Quest for Democracy. Minneapolis: U of Minneapolis P, 1999. Print.
Shiva, Vandana. Staying Alive: Women, Ecology and Development. London: Zed Books, 1988. Print.
Simon, Bart. "Introduction: Toward a Critique of Posthuman Futures.” Cultural Critique 53 (Winter 2003): 1-9. Print.
Slovic, Scott. “The Third Wave Ecocriticism: North American Reflections on the Current Phase of the Discipline." Ecozon@: European Journal on Literature and Environment (New Ecocritical Perspectives: European and Transnational Ecocriticism) 1.1 (2010): 4-10. Web. 8 December 2011.
Sturgeon, Noël. “Considering Animals: Kheel's Nature Ethics and Animal Debates in Ecofeminism.” Ethics Environment 14.2 (2009): 153-162. Print.
--. Ecofeminist Natures: Race, Gender, Feminist Theory and Political Action. New York: Routledge, 1997. Print.
Tuana, Nancy. "Viscous Porosity: Witnessing Katrina.” Material Feminisms. Ed. Stacy Alaimo and Susan Hekman. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 2008. 188-213. Print.
Warren, Karen J. Ecofeminist Philosophy: A Western Perspective on What It Is and Why It Matters. New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000. Print.
--. "Introduction." Ecological Feminism. Ed. Karen J. Warren. New York: Routledge, 1994. 1-7. Print.
Winterson, Jeanette. The Stone Gods. Orlando: Harcourt P, 2007. Print.
Wolfe, Cary. What is Posthumanism? Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 2010. Print.
by Serpil Oppermann
ABSTRACT: [Extract in lieu of an abstract] Transnationalism. Translocalism. Ecoglobalism. Ecocosmopolitalism. Posthumanism. Postcolonial Ecologies. Queer Ecology. Trans-corporeality. New Materialisms. Material Feminisms. These are the new trends that noticeably characterize the current phase of ecocritical studies. They distinctively mark the field's expansion into more politically and ethically inflected areas of concern, involving diverse but also disparate methodologies and perspectives which are often grouped together as aspects of a "third wave ecocriticism," a rather controversial labeling coined by Joni Adamson and Scott Slovic in their introduction to the Summer 2009 special issue of MELUS. The wave metaphor that Adamson and Slovic have adopted from Lawrence Buell's wave model of ecocritical developments directly echoes Ynestra King and Val Plumwood's now problematic labeling of ecofeminism as a "third wave of the women's movement," and "third wave or stage of feminism” (Plumwood 39) respectively. In his 2010 essay, entitled “The Third Wave of Ecocriticism," Slovic himself acknowledges that he and Adamson borrowed the wave meraphor “from the idea of first and second wave feminism" (5), but he also recognizes its shortcomings. “The wave metaphor," he writes, “breaks down in the ecocritical context because the waves do not simply end when a new wave begins" (5). Greta Gaard, the first feminist ecocritic who has been overtly critical of the term, objects to its usage on historical grounds. Referring critically to Lawrence Buell's use of the wave theory of ecocritical developments that inspired Adamson and Slovic to write their introduction, Gaard issues a significant warning about what is absent in this model and asks: "where are the analytical frameworks for gender, species, and sexuality? They do not appear” (“New Directions” 644). Gaard's questioning enacts a yet unarticulated concern about ecocriticism's polycentric focus and its rhizomatic trajectory that seems to be strategically all-inclusive but paradoxically exclusive of the implications of gender and sexuality for environmentalism. The current ecocritical exploration of such issues as global and local concepts of place, translocality and bioregionalism, human and animal subjectivities,
CITATION: Oppermann, S. (2013) Feminist Ecocriticism: A Posthumanist Direction in Ecocritical Trajectory. In Greta Gaard (Ed.), International Perspectives in Feminist Ecocriticism (pp. 19-36) Routledge.
REFERENCES:
Adams, Carol J. The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory. New York: Continuum, 1990. Print.
--ed. Ecofeminism and the Sacred. New York: Continuum, 1993. Print.
Adamson, Joni and Scott Slovic. “The Shoulders We Stand On: An Introduction to Ethnicity and Ecocriticism." MELUS 34.2 (Summer 2009): 5-24. Print.
Alaimo, Stacy. “Ecofeminism without Nature? Questioning the Relation between
Feminism and Environmentalism." International Feminist Journal of Politics 10.3 (September 2008): 299–304. Print.
--. "Eluding Capture: The Science, Culture, and Pleasure of Queer' Animals." Queer Ecologies: Sex, Nature, Politics, Desire. Ed. Catriona Mortimer Sandilands and Bruce Erickson, Bloomington, Indianapolis: Indiana UP, 2010. 51-72. Print.
--. "Material Engagements: Science Studies and the Environmental Humanities." Ecozon@: European Journal on Literature and Environment (New Ecocritical Perspectives: European and Transnational Ecocriticism) 1.1 (2010): 69–74. Web. 20 December 2011.
--. Bodily Natures: Science, Environment, and the Material Self. Blooming ton: Indiana UP, 2010. Print. Alaimo, Stacy and Susan Hekman, eds. Material Feminisms. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 2008. Print.
Badmington, Neil. “Theorizing Posthumanism.” Cultural Critique 53 (Winter, 2003): 10–27.
Barad, Karen. Meeting the Universe Halfway: quantum physics and the entanglement of matter and meaning. Durham: Duke UP, 2007. Print.
--. "Posthumanist Performativity: Toward an Understanding of How Matter Comes to Matter." Material Feminisms. Ed. Stacy Alaimo and Susan Hekman. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 2008. 120-154. Print.
Bartlett, Laura and Thomas B. Byers. “Back to the Future: The Humanist Matrix."
Cultural Critique 53 (Winter 2003): 28-46. Print.
Bennett, Jane. “The Force of Things: Steps Toward an Ecology of Matter.” Political Theory 32.3 (June 2004): 347–372. Print.
--.Vibrant Matter: A Political Ecology of Things. Durham: Duke UP, 2010. Print.
Braidotti, Rosi. “A critical cartography of feminist post-postmodernism." Australian Feminist Studies 20.47 (2005): 169–180. Print.
Coole, Diana and Samantha Frost. Eds. New Materialisms: Ontology, Agency, and Politics. Durham: Duke UP, 2010. Print.
Didur, Jill. “Re-Embodying Technoscientific Fantasies: Posthumanism, Genetically Modified Foods, and the Colonization of Life.” Cultural Critique 53 (Winter 2003): 98-115. Print.
Economides, Louise. “Mont Blanc' and the Sublimity of Materiality.” Cultural
Critique 61 (Autumn 2005): 87–114. Print.
Estok, Simon. "Theorizing in a Space of Ambivalent Openness: Ecocriticism and
Ecophobia.” ISLE 16.2 (Spring 2009): 203-225. Print.
--. “Reading Ecophobia: A Manifesto." Ecozon@: European Journal on Literature and Environment (New Ecocritical Perspectives: European and Transnational Ecocriticism) 1.1 (2010): 75-79. Web. 25 November 2011.
Gaard, Greta. “Ecofeminism' Revisited: Rejecting Essentialism and Re-Placing Species in a Material Feminist Environmentalism.” Feminist Formations 23.2 (Summer 2011): 26-53. Print.
--. Ecological Politics: Ecofeminists and the Greens. Philadelphia, PA: Temple UP, 1998.
--. “New Directions for Ecofeminism: Toward a More Feminist Ecocriticism." ISLE 17.4 (Autumn 2010): 643-665. Print.
--. "Toward a Queer Ecofeminism.” Hypatia 2.1 (Winter 1997): 114-137. Print.
--. “Women, Water, Energy: An Ecofeminist Approach.” Organization & Environment 14.2 (June 2001): 157-172. Print.
Hayles, Katherine, N. “Afterword: The Human in the Posthuman.” Cultural Critique 53 (Winter 2003): 134-137. Print.
Heffernan, Teresa. “Bovine Anxieties, Virgin Births, and the Secret of Life.” Cultural Critique 53 (Winter, 2003): 116-133. Print.
Hird, Myra J. “Animal Trans.” Queering the Non/Human. Ed. Noreen Giffney and Myra J. Hird. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2008. 227–247. Print.
--. "Feminist Engagements with Matter." Feminist Studies 35.2 (Summer 2009): 329–346.
Iovino, Serenella. "Ecocriticism and a Non-Anthropocentric Humanism: Reflections on Local Natures and Global Responsibilites.” Local Natures, Global Responsibilities: Ecocritical Perspectives on the New English Literatures (ASNEL Papers 15). Ed. Laurenz Volkmann, Nancy Grimm, Ines Detmers, and Katrin Thomson. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2010. 29-53. Print.
Kheel, Marti. Nature Ethics: An Ecofeminist Perspective. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, 2008. Print.
King, Ynestra. “The Ecology of Feminism and the Feminism of Ecology.” Healing the Wounds: The Promise of Ecofeminism. Ed. Judith Plant. Santa Cruz, CA: New Society P, 1989. 18-28. Print.
Merchant, Carolyn. Radical Ecology: The Search for a Livable World. New York: Routledge, 1992. Print.
Mies, Maria, and Vandana Shiva. Ecofeminism. London: Zed Books, 1993. Print.
Murphy, Patrick D. Literature, Nature, Other: Ecofeminist Critiques. Albany, NY: SUNY P, 1995. Print.
Mortimer-Sandliands, Catriona. “Ecofeminism on the Edge: A Commentary." International Feminist Journal of Politics 10.3 (September 2008): 305-313. Print.
Mortimer-Sandilands, Catriona and Bruce Erickson, eds. Queer Ecologies: Sex, Nature, Politics, Desire. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 2010. Print.
Oppermann, Serpil. “The Rhizomatic Trajectory of Ecocriticism." Ecozon@: European Journal on Literature and Environment (New Ecocritical Perspectives: European and Transnational Ecocriticism) 1.1 (Spring 2010): 17-21. Web. 18 December 2011
Plumwood, Val. Feminism and the Mastery of Nature. London: Routledge, 1993.
Rigby, Kate. "Ecocriticism." Introducing Criticism at the 21st Century. Ed. Julian Wolfreys. Edinburgh: Edinburgh UP, 2002. 151–178. Print.
Rossini, Manuela. "To the Dogs: Companion Speciesism and the New Feminist Materialism." Kriticos: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal of Post modern Cultural Sound, Text and Image 3 (September 2006). Web. 8 December 2011.
Sandilands, Catriona. The Good-Natured Feminist: Ecofeminism and the Quest for Democracy. Minneapolis: U of Minneapolis P, 1999. Print.
Shiva, Vandana. Staying Alive: Women, Ecology and Development. London: Zed Books, 1988. Print.
Simon, Bart. "Introduction: Toward a Critique of Posthuman Futures.” Cultural Critique 53 (Winter 2003): 1-9. Print.
Slovic, Scott. “The Third Wave Ecocriticism: North American Reflections on the Current Phase of the Discipline." Ecozon@: European Journal on Literature and Environment (New Ecocritical Perspectives: European and Transnational Ecocriticism) 1.1 (2010): 4-10. Web. 8 December 2011.
Sturgeon, Noël. “Considering Animals: Kheel's Nature Ethics and Animal Debates in Ecofeminism.” Ethics Environment 14.2 (2009): 153-162. Print.
--. Ecofeminist Natures: Race, Gender, Feminist Theory and Political Action. New York: Routledge, 1997. Print.
Tuana, Nancy. "Viscous Porosity: Witnessing Katrina.” Material Feminisms. Ed. Stacy Alaimo and Susan Hekman. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 2008. 188-213. Print.
Warren, Karen J. Ecofeminist Philosophy: A Western Perspective on What It Is and Why It Matters. New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000. Print.
--. "Introduction." Ecological Feminism. Ed. Karen J. Warren. New York: Routledge, 1994. 1-7. Print.
Winterson, Jeanette. The Stone Gods. Orlando: Harcourt P, 2007. Print.
Wolfe, Cary. What is Posthumanism? Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 2010. Print.
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