(Dis)entangling the ontopolitics of ecological theorizing for critical communication

Abstract

ABSTRACT Amidst the Anthropocene, the contentious term given to our planetary epoch defined by human domination over earth systems, this essay will offer a series of explorations that illustrate the potentialities between critical communication theorizing and ecological thought. To help articulate this convergence, I organize my essay around the thematic figuration of “threads” to constellate an ongoing effort by scholars in and beyond the communication discipline who seek to conjure the theoretical tools necessary to register the complexity of power’s contemporary mode of expression. I navigate this threaded figuration in three ways. First, I demonstrate how the ecosophical model outlined in Félix Guattari’s political manifesto The Three Ecologies offers ground for contextualizing mutations of power in the Anthropocene while warranting a theoretical collaboration between ecosophy and critical communication in the present. Second, I apply Guattari’s ecosophical model to critical rhetoric, advancing a theoretical heuristic resonant with border rhetorics that may help critical communication scholars ontopolitically figure the power formations of our time. Third, I attempt to synthesize three “problematic threads” organizing contemporary discourses of critical and ecological theorizing.