Gender Essentialism and Ecofeminist Literature

Abstract

Navigating gender identities vis-à-vis the way they shape humans’ relationships with nature is of paramount importance towards understanding and shaping our environmental identities as well as apprehending human interactions with the non-human world. The shaping of each individual environmental identity is moulded by a set of elements including but not limited to the way a person views themselves within the environment they live in, their gender identity, as well as the shape, colour, and health of their bodies. Susan Clayton and Susan Opotow explored the significance of the natural environment in shaping personal and collective identities. They pointed out that environmental scholarship has not paid enough attention to the deep connections between identity and the environment. This chapter takes a step further into exploring these connections. Through the intersectional lens of queer ecofeminism and an intersectional approach, the discussion revolves around the impact of gender on the sculpting of environmental identities. It dives into the problematicness of the gender binary and the imperilments of essentialism on humans’ self-perceptions and sense of belonging with a focus on non-normative gender identities as an underrepresented gender spectrum in environmental studies.