Non-human World Research Articles

The Importance of Aquatic Fauna on Ancient Mesopotamian Healing Practices—An Environmental Humanities Approach to Human Dependency of Non-Human World

Diachronically, Mesopotamian data pertaining to the religious spheres point to a transversal notion that deities were considered responsible for every cause–effect event observed/experienced by humans in their natural/cosmic surroundings. Such notion is especially visible on texts pertaining to the restoration of human health, where such an aspect was ultimately considered as a divine prerogative. Yet, these textual data also show how natural elements were basilar to the success of healing practices when thoroughly manipulated by specialists. Their examination through a perspective that intertwines the apparatus of History of Religions and Environmental History thus reveals great potential for contributing to the topic of human/nonhuman entanglements in the longue durée. With this paper, we propose to revisit the uses of aquatic fauna as displayed in Babylonian and Assyrian healing texts dated to the second half of the 2nd millennium and the first half of the 1st millennium BC. Although at a preliminary stage, our research has been guided by the combined theoretical-methodological perspective above-mentioned, aiming at highlighting the great importance conferred to these animals. Ultimately, we aim at stressing the importance of addressing the dependence of Mesopotamian specialists and patients on such elements of Nature to better understand this ancient context.

Ecology of the ‘Other’: A Posthumanist Study of Easterine Kire’s When the River Sleeps (2014)

In Posthuman Ecology, anthropocentrism, based on the binary division between the privileged human and the ‘other’, gets deconstructed, leading to an acknowledgment of humans as essentially tangled in an intricate web of the natural world. In such ecologies, boundaries between the human and the more-than-human (non-human) worlds become porous, creating fluid identities and conditions of being within a framework of active interplay between the human and the non-human world. The ecology of folktales is replete with Posthumanism, as their narratives consistently break the unbridgeable gap between the human, non-human, and the spiritual and/or supernatural worlds and present certain non-naturalist ontologies that are mostly at odds with naturalism or modern empirical science. Such tales provided much-needed templates for sustainable development in the time of the Anthropocene. This paper attempts to study Easterine Kire’s When the River Sleeps (2014) as a posthumanist narrative where Vilie (a hunter) goes on a fantastical journey to find a fabled magical stone from the bottom of the ‘sleeping river’. Vilie’s journey comes out as a playground for both mundane and fantastic elements. He grows as a human being, and this happens as he transacts with the non-human and the supernatural world and comes across deep metaphysical questions and presents keys to understanding balance-in-transcendence.

A Virtue Ethics Interpretation of the ‘Argument from Nature’ for Both Humans and the Environment

Appeals to the moral value of nature and naturalness are commonly used in debates about technology and the environment and to inform our approach to the ethics of technology and the environment more generally. In this paper, I will argue, firstly, that arguments from nature, as they are used in debates about new technologies and about the environment, are misinterpreted when they are understood as attempting to put forward categorical objections to certain human activities and, consequently, their real significance is often overlooked. Secondly, arguments from nature, particularly as they are used in the context of debates over the use of new technologies, can be understood as appealing to human nature as a way to determine human limitations. Thirdly, arguments from nature can inform our discussion of what it is to be a human being or a person, and this kind of discussion can, in turn, inform our ethical deliberations in such areas of bioethics as euthanasia, abortion, etc. Finally, I conclude that a proper understanding of these arguments can help in establishing which virtues and which vices relate to our relationship with the non-human world—that is, which character dispositions are relevant to an environmental virtue ethics, with human nature as its foundation. A proper understanding of the argument from nature provides the basis for a ‘virtuously anthropocentric’ environmental ethics.

Postcolonial ecocritical reading of Satyajit Ray’s Sikkim and Goutam Ghose’s Padma Nadir Majhi

This article aims to offer an interpretive analysis of two seminal cinematic works: Satyajit Ray’s Sikkim (1971) and Goutam Ghose’s Padma Nadir Majhi (1993). It posits these films as modes of inquiry, elucidating the ecological issues that have spurred a transformative reconsideration of humanity’s relationship with the nonhuman world. Moreover, this study underscores the intricate comprehension of the interdependence between human and natural realms, portraying it as a foundational facet of postcolonial discourse. Postcolonialism has long recognized the inseparable linkage between the ideological constructs of nature and the exploitation of marginalized populations and their respective environments. The psychological ramifications of colonial rule have wrought an indelible impact upon the ecological landscape and the hallowed rapport shared between indigenous communities and their natural surroundings. The indigenous populace’s allure towards Western cultural paradigms, preconceptions, and institutions has often induced a forfeiture of their own cultural heritage in favor of the ex-colonizers’ ideologies. Both of these venerable cinematographers, through their cinematic oeuvre, have meticulously documented the enduring significance of nature within the tapestry of Indian culture, especially in the context of contemporary, globalized milieu.

Guérison et transformations rituelles dans les mondes autochtones au Québec : l’expérience de la loge à sudation (sweat lodge) comme acte politique chez les Atikamekw Nehirowisiwok

In this article, we will analyze the political significance and the dynamics of transformation related to the sweat lodge ritual in the indigenous context of Quebec. While tracing the historical context of this ritual practice, which is well known throughout the Americas, we will show how it can be understood through the relational dynamics that it allows to set up : relations between the actors of the ritual, between the participants and the territory, between human and non-human world, between the present and the colonial history, between future perspectives and the heritage of ancestors. This relational perspective of ritual allows us to question the way in which it is inscribed in different healing initiatives while referring to current processes of political affirmation in the indigenous context.

Shallow vs. Deep Geoethics: Moving Beyond Anthropocentric Views

At its inception, geoethics was envisioned as a type of professional ethics concerned with the moral implications of geoscientific research, applications, and practices. More recently, however, some scholars have proposed versions of geoethics as public and global ethics. To better understand these developments, this article considers the relationship between geoethics and environmental ethics by exploring different aspects of the human-nature relation (i.e., the moral status and role of humans in relation to the non-human world). We start by noting that the main strains of geoethical thought elaborated so far represent examples of environmental virtue ethics and defend moral weak anthropocentric positions (e.g., “ethical”, “responsible” or “enlightened” anthropocentrism). Some scholars propose that such weak anthropocentric geoethics can synthesize the different positions in environmental ethics and move beyond them toward a novel and distinct approach. We compare the meaning and the use of the term “anthropocentrism” in both environmental ethics and geoethics, stressing that although geoethics is inevitably epistemically anthropocentric (i.e., anthropogenic), it does not need to be morally anthropocentric. We consider the compatibility of non-anthropocentric stances with current geoethical theory and argue for the integration of normative non-anthropocentric accounts (e.g., ecocentric) into geoethical debates and geoscience education.

The Reformation of National and International Policy on Ancient Trees

Following Brexit, the UK has an opportunity to reform its environmental policies. Previously, the UK was locked into EU legislative frameworks, and while many principles of these regulatory structures remain, such as the notion of Special Areas of Conservation (SACs), the models for environmental assets and services are undergoing significant change. Specifically, the climate crisis necessitates the adoption of novel approaches to valuing natural resources. Through fieldwork at an SAC in England, I will examine some of the implications of these policy shifts on ancient tree conservation, and how tree valuation is changing as a result. This scholarship primarily aims to trace the evolving landscape of national and international policies concerning ancient tree conservation in the UK. It assesses the grounded outcomes of policy reforms, and provides nuanced insights into their implementation, shedding light on broader implications for ancient trees across social, political, and scientific domains. In order to contribute to a deeper understanding of sustainable conservation practices, this work builds on existing discourses and attempts to address whether or not new environmental policies and models foster or detract from collaboration between human and non-human worlds.

Reconnecting with the Non-human World: Loss and Uncertainty in Esther Woolfson’s Field Notes from a Hidden City: An Urban Nature Diary

Reconnecting with the Non-human World: Loss and Uncertainty in Esther Woolfson’s Field Notes from a Hidden City: An Urban Nature Diary

Exploring Ecological Crisis: A Study of Climate Change in Uzma Aslam Khan’s Thinner Than Skin

This article investigates Uzma Aslam Khan’s Thinner Than Skin (2012), through the critical lens of ecocritical perspectives. It shows engagement with ecological ideologies that have informed our understanding of climate change. Khan’s novel enlists the devastating consequences of environmental and ecosystem degeneration and their cumulative effects on humanity, and the non-human world. Indeed, ecological degradation has become a global issue, where desertification and deforestation are significant environmental concerns worldwide. This study probes the portrayal of the indigenous people of Pakistan’s Kaghan Valley, their land, history and culture by underscoring the hazards of growing capitalism and increasing urbanisation. Khan examines the issues of endangering biodiversity and laments the materialistic forces depleting the planet’s natural resources. By doing so, she exhorts practical consideration of possible defences against ecocide. This research demonstrates the issues of ecological crisis and its devastating impact on northern Pakistan’s natural environment and people.

Reimagining Nature in Selected Hawaiian Literature: An Indigenous Ecological Perspective

This study analyzes four selected works of Hawaiian literature, focusing on the refiguration of nature, presenting it as an active and conscious subject. Contrary to Western anthropocentrism, which instrumentalized nature, Hawaiian literature underscores the profound interconnectedness shared between humanity and the more-than-human world. This distinctive environmental imagination permeates the narratives and rejects Western distinctions between the human and non-human realms by intertwining the supernatural and human agency. The reading of selected Hawaiian literature analyzes how nature is positioned as an active subject with its agency, not merely a passive, static setting. Personification in Hawaiian literature primarily focuses on female figures, Pele as the volcano goddess and various ancestral spirits known as ‘aumakua. This critique of anthropocentrism is deeply entrenched in Hawaiian cultural and spiritual traditions, where gods, goddesses, and ‘aumakua personify various elements and forces within the environment. This reimagining invites us to consider a different environmental imagination, recognizing the active agency of the non-human world. In conclusion, this study highlights how the Native Hawaiians ecological discourse seeks to reorient humanity’s relationship with the natural world.

Analysing Bijaya Hitan’s some Selected Stories from an Eco-centric Approach

This paper makes the Ecocritical reading of three stories, namely, “Bagmati Blues”, “Saharle Panchhayeki Buhari” (My translation “A Daughter-in-Law Disregarded by a City”) and “Nawabarshale Janmayeka Brykshyaharu” (My translation “The Groves Bred by New Year”), written by an ecowriter, Bijaya Hitan. Drawing on the Ecocritical and Ecofeminist theories of Lawrence Buell, Vandana Shiva, Greta Gaard, and some relevant journals and books, it analyzes the portrayals of non-human world that is the Bagmati river and her declining physical environment. As soon as Bagmati river enters the Kathmandu valley near Sundarijal, the water starts to deteriorate. The river has been used as dumping site for domestic and industrial waste water and solid waste. Besides that, the river has been widely used for sand extraction and land encroachment through squatter settlements at the bank of the river. Hitan, in his three short stories questions the ethics, policies, and cultural values of people at Kathmandu for treating Bagmati as an instrument, only a means of human ends. This paper scrutinizes the power of words, subject, images and narrative of aforementioned stories to reinforce to understand the oppressive human-environment relations causing multiple forms of ecodegradation that afflict Bagmati river today. The significance of this study is to exhibit how Hitan’s ecowriting has proved to be an effective means of communicating the burgeoning environmental concerns of Bagmati and resolving this environmental harm through the adoption of possible alternatives practically and morally.

Biebrza hydrosocial landscape. Analysis of environmental discourses in the largest Polish national park

The author analyzes narratives about the environment in the largest national park in Poland. She attempts to present the socio-cultural aspect of water in Podlasie, based on the concept of the hydrosocial cycle as interpreted by Jamie Linton and Jessica Budds, yet extending it to the non-human world. In the Biebrza Valley there are many different environmental discourses, as well as conflicts related to the different perception of nature - human relationship. Two of them are dominant: the discourse of the employees and experts of the Biebrza National Park ("institutional") and that of the dissatisfied inhabitants ("agricultural"). The author moves away from the knowledge relativism traditional for ethnography.

More than just a tree: Ecolinguistics and responses to the felling of ‘Hadrian’s tree’

In the current climate ecolinguistic research has arguably never been more important, as its basic premises regard the survival of life on Earth and key philosophical questions hitherto under-acknowledged by mainstream science. In recent decades, environmental thinking has made great advances in shaping current opinions towards nature and the non-human world. The goal of this paper is to explore certain currents of mediated thinking in modern Britain regarding nature, in order to assess how far expressions of sorrow for the felling of a prominent tree might correspond to a genuine ecological sentiment. The study explores public responses to an apparent case of eco-vandalism, the felling of the Sycamore Gap tree in September 2023 in Northumberland, using data taken from social media and other online sources such as e-newspapers. From the point of view of Ecolinguistic theory and that of Positive Discourse Analysis it applies critical lenses such as Evaluation and Discourse Pragmatics to dig beneath the surface of texts produced on the topic, in order to explore diverse current attitudes to trees in the UK. The paper finds that, though there are instances in which people appear to express grief for the loss of the Sycamore Gap tree, it is possible to account for these in ways that lessen the likelihood that they are motivated by purely ecological sentiment. In practice human attitudes towards trees tend to be superficial and instrumental, and this tendency is also found here. The Sycamore Gap event brings many latent social attitudes into play, and this paper thus contributes to the developing field of Ecolinguistics by focusing on tree-centred narratives, distinguishing between inherent ideologies of pseudo- and authentic environmental sensitivity.

More-than-human ‘rhuthmanalysis’ in Mónica Giron’s art installation Ajuar para un conquistador

This paper explores the relationships between humans and more-than-humans through the analysis of the rhythmic elements of the contemporary art installation Ajuar para un conquistador. An interdisciplinary approach bridges Art Studies and More-Than-Human Geographies to examine Ajuar and its environmental concerns, including the relationships between human and non-human worlds. Through ‘rhuthmanalysis’ – a new concept and word developed in the paper – textual and image analysis, and conversations with the artist, this study examines the social, cultural, and ecological meshwork of rhythms articulated within and by the art installation. ‘Rhuthmanalysis’ expands upon Henri Lefebvre and Catherine Régulier’s rhythmanalytic project by incorporating Indigenous knowledge and an ecocritical standpoint while redefining the understanding of rhythm. The analysis explores how Ajuar, concerned with the endangerment of Patagonian birds, promotes a performative understanding of the artwork’s capacities in the context of the interplay between the affective dimensions and politics of the creation of the Argentine nation-state. The paper argues that Ajuar participates in the social and political production of space and place, opening new forms of being together and challenging colonial narratives through a rhythmic lens. Moreover, this study seeks to offer a singular perspective on how approaching art as a rhythmic configuration of an intricate choreography of coexistence can provide unique insights into space and the environment. The paper concludes that ‘rhuthmanalysis’ is a privileged tool to address the need for a transdisciplinary methodology capable of giving account of the mutual unfolding of human and non-human existences and decolonising posthumanist geographies and rhythm studies.

Reimagining Organicism

Does it make sense to refer to musical sounds as “animated beings”? What does it mean to treat music as an essential part of our sonic reality? How do Sciarrino’s music and his general aesthetic, both of which he describes as organic or ecological, respond to theories of organicism, ecological approaches to musical perception, and ties between the human and non-human worlds? In this article, I attempt to weave together a framework that facilitates fruitful answers to these questions. The starting points for this theorization of Sciarrino’s organicism are Holly Watkins’s (2017, 2018) biotic aesthetics of music and Eric Clarke’s (2005) ecological approach to the perception of musical meaning, which emphasize the role of the listener and question the stance that separates meaning from form, culture from nature, and the human from the non-human. Through analyses of examples from works including Lohengrin, Azione invisibile (1982–84), Il cerchio tagliato dei suoni (1997), and Studi per l’intonazione del mare (2000), I argue that Sciarrino’s music and thinking venture into a holistic reinvention of organicism. A key aspect of this organicism is its formal affinity with behaviors characteristic of systems of chaos, including self-similarity, circularity, and turbulence. In addition, I illustrate how the wide-ranging analogies that Sciarrino’s music draws to the world of animate and inanimate beings involve both formal issues and the bodily, performative, and societal dimensions of music-making.

In Search for a nonanthropocentric humanism

A non-anthropocentric humanism is almost a contradiction in terms. But I still propose just that. Humanism explicitly places human beings at the centre, as their dignity and well-being are the goal of this thinking. In the humanism of antiquity and the Renaissance, it was felt necessary to define man as opposed to gods, animals and things. Later, in Marxism, for example, the term delineates a contrast with social and technological developments that seem to have become so independent of human beings that they are harmful to them. It stands for an ideal humanity that is promoted by education or Bildung and the norms and practices of civility. Bildung is indeed the context in which it was coined.1 So far, this is a familiar narrative. In direct opposition to this ideal and the ideas behind it, many and prominent voices such as Latour, Haraway, Descola and Chakrabarty 2 call for a decentralisation of humanity, a new world view in which non-human beings and entities are not grouped around human beings in the centre and in which the division between nature and culture is obsolete. That culture and nature were ever seen as different at all is seen as a mistake, and the thinking around it as in need of correction. And indeed, even if one considers only human life and the atrocities that have been inflicted upon it, the idea seems to have failed horribly. Looking more broadly at the world as a whole, the multiple pressing ecological crises are leading many to question the centrality of humans in the world. The label Anthropocene for the age we are in further supports this questioning: a world in which human power is the strongest force and nothing can be clearly attributed to non-human influence can even be seen as a logical consequence of humanism. The idea of decentring human beings seems to be a necessary and overdue step. The efforts for human welfare that flow from humanism, which are central to education and the many ways in which humans care for each other and the non-human world, are an important part of human agency, but they are only a part of what human agency is capable of.

Arctic childhood in data-driven culture: Wearable technology and children’s right to privacy in Finland

The article discusses the definition of ‘Arctic childhood’: how it affects the ideal of childhood in the Arctic countries while differentiating it from understandings of childhood in more temperate climates. Arctic childhood offers novel viewpoints to the concept of childhood. It grants agency to the non-human world: environment, weather and design solutions such as clothes and wearable technology. It also highlights how these shape the concept of childhood in the Arctic and beyond. The article focuses on wearable technology, which brings new legal issues to considerations of childhood in data-driven culture. The central argument is two-fold. As design solutions, wearable technology may preserve the ideal of the active child, essential to Arctic and Finnish childhoods. Legally, however, there are some issues: since wearable technology is designed to bring forth and share with others the vital functions of the child’s body, it raises concerns about children’s fundamental right to privacy and data protection. By bringing together fashion studies and the doctrinal study of law, and by using wearable technology as an example, the article argues that multidisciplinary approaches are needed when new technologies designed to track and monitor individuals are offered to minors in the name of staying healthy.

Finding hope and fulfillment in meaningful work: An interpretative phenomenological analysis of conservation and stewardship practitioners’ experience, values, and motivations

Values and motivations can shape natural resource management decision-making as individuals set conservation goals based on diverse, unique backgrounds, histories, and experiences. Recent literature points to the need to understand, evaluate, and articulate practitioner values to make explicit how experiences shape their work. Our research responds to calls to explore a diverse range of values and motivations among conservation practitioners. We used a qualitative approach grounded in phenomenology to advance an in-depth understanding of how conservation and stewardship practitioners experience, acknowledge, and make sense of conservation decision-making in Maine, USA. We interviewed 21 conservation and stewardship practitioners. Our results indicate the presence of complex value systems, including strong biospheric, altruistic, eudaimonic, as well as egoistic values. These values interact and intersect with motivations for participants’ careers in conservation in unique ways, driving participant actions and decision-making. Within Maine specifically, our results highlight the many areas for convergence of broad values among seemingly diverse groups that can inform opportunities for collaboration. Participants expressed various pathways to careers in conservation, where their work enables them to make a meaningful contribution to the environment and society. However in situations where personal and organizational values are misaligned, the role of organizational transparency, employee empowerment, and agency are key. Our results have implications for conservation groups seeking to achieve high employee satisfaction, as well as researchers, policymakers, and practitioners who hope to inspire individuals to take on conservation careers to create sustainable and transformative action for the future. Fostering early experiences in place, including interactions with the non-human world and local community, are important for influencing and reinforcing values and motivations for conservation action.

The Nature of Ostension

The initiating comparison for this essay is between two images, or shots; one appears in Jessica Sarah Rinland’s Black Pond (2018), and shows two people looking offscreen, surrounded by dense woodland; the other is reprinted and described in Bruno Latour’s essay “Circulating Reference” (1999) and shows three scientists near a border between a savanna and a forest, looking and gesturing in different directions. Rinland and Latour share an ethnographic interest in the material and gestural minutiae of scientific engagement with the non-human world. This essay explores their common interest in pointing, and in ostension more generally, as it emerges in both case studies. Latour provides a rich and suggestive framework through which to understand Black Pond, particularly in its conception of natural-history study as a multi-stage process of mediation, made up of tools and gestures and inferences – rather than the momentary encountering or witnessing more familiar to eco-film aesthetics.

Indigenous Methodologies of Care and Movement

In this essay, I examine how research methodologies can draw from Indigenous peoples’ care work and mobilities to contribute towards Indigenous futurities. I draw on stories of my own research trajectory, that has been shaped by the support of Mushkegowuk women, and bring them into dialogue with Indigenous feminist theorizations of futurities, relationalities, care ethics and movement. I examine how methodologies of care can act as extensions of relations of care, and in the process, activate the complexities and expansiveness of Indigenous community, or what I call Indigenous relational geographies, through movement across lands and waters. I reflect on how Indigenous movement is learned and embodied through relations with the non-human world by grounding my discussion in the significance of water relations in the muskegs in so-called northern Ontario Canada and how they have helped me understand Mushkegowuk kinship relations as rippling out in and beyond that region. Overall, I am interested in how mobile relations of care evoke full and fluid conceptions of Indigenous kinship that exceed colonial spatialities, and end by considering how these relationships are crucial in shaping the visions and material relations of Indigenous and anti-colonial futurities moving forward.