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Chapter I
Ecology, Deep Ecology and Literary Ecology
Ecology extends to diverse human interactions like aesthetics,
ethics, politics and economics. It is a multidisciplinaty enterprise
and does not f i t precisely into one channel of scientific enquiry.
Ecology ranges frorr~ reductionism in the study of individual species,
populations, through less reductionist approaches in the study of
communities, to the holistic in studies of the totality of communities
on earth. The antc!cedents of modern ecology and ecology as a
science extend to the origins of humanity itself. Conscious
observations of natural surroundings can be traced to ancient
civilizations. Formal and systematic study of environment in the
West began in Greece in the third and fourth centuries B.C.
Ecology was formerly called 'natural history.' There were Aristotle
and Theophrastus among natural historians. The Western Tradition
of scientific observations started by Theophrastus reached its zenith
in the works of renowned natural historians like Charles Darwin.
Hanns Reiter in 1885 appears to have been the first to combine the
Greek words oikos [house] and logos [study of] to form the term
ecology (Kormondy 3). The German biologist Ernest Haeckel
sharpened the perspective and gave clear direction to this branch of
enquiry by defining and also infusing substance into the term,
ecology. Haeckel used the term in 1866 in the following statement
published in 1870:
By ecology wc? mean the body of knowledge concerning the
economy of nature--the investigation of the total relations of
the animal both to its inorganic and to its organic
environment: including above all, its friendly and inimical
relation with those animals and plants with which it comes
directly or indirectly into contact--in a word, ecology is the
study of a l l the complex inter relations referred to by Darwin
as the conditions of the struggle for existence. The science
of ecology, often inaccurately referred to as 'biology' in a
narrow sense, has thus far formed by the principal
component. of what is commonly referred to as 'Natural
history'. (K.ormondy 3-4)
Williarn Howarth in his essay, "Some Principles of Ecocriticism"
remarks:
Haeckel inflected the term natural economy to ecology, or
oikonomia to oikologia, house mastery to house study, a shift
that changed the status of species from resources into
partners of a shared domain. Haeckel's science reflected his
socialist convictions. I n an era torn by violent national strife,
from civil war in America to clashes throughout Europe,
Haeckel considered how organisms sustain complex social
alliances that shape their number and distribution.
Comparing data on the birth, death, and migration of
species, he found that organisms replicate their native form
in widening gyres, from organism to population to
community. Each level of these surroundings or
'environment:;' creates complex, interrelated networks. (73)
By 1913, the term ecology became institutionalized with the
formation of the British Ecological society and shortly thereafter, in
1915, the Ecological Society of America. It was duririg 1960s the
term became popular. Then the field of ecology was determined
and the British ecologist A. Macfadyen's broad definition became
commonly accepted:
Ecology conc:erns itself with the interrelationships of living
organisms, pl3nt or animal, and their environments; these
are studied with a view to discovering the principles, which
govern the relationships. That such principles exist is a basic
assumption--.and an act of faith--of the ecologists. His field
of inquiry is no less wide than the totality of the living
conditions of the plants and animals under their observation,
their systematic position, and their reactions to the
environment and to each other. (Kormondy 5)
The usage of the term was extended politically to encompass a
philosophy that broadly incorporated a variety of environmental
concerns. Since the environmental crisis of 1960s in the West,
there have been numerous active environmental organizations. The
political movement called "Greens" in Germany is the most famous
and influential among them. Charlene Spretnak and Fritjof Capra
make the following prediction:
An anthropocentric world view that has licensed the human
species to exploit the rest of nature as i f from above and
outside it, will give place to an ecological world view. We
shall recognize that survival and self-realization alike require
us to an act: what we really are--integral parts of an
ecosystem much larger, more complex and more powerful
than ourselves. (Green Politics XX)
I n her 1984 lecture of the Schumacher society of America, later
published under the title "The Spiritual Dimension of Green Politics"
(Green Politics 230-258) the ideas are described in detail and she
uses the term "deep ecology" for designating the new ecological
worldview. The Norwegian philosopher Arne Naess popularized this
term in the early 1970s. Arne Naess introduced this term into
environmental literature in 1972 in his article 'The Deep Ecology
Movement." It was based on a talk he gave in Bucharest in 1972 at
the Third World Future Research Conference. It is distinguished
from "shallow ecology." Arne Naess's 1973 essay --"The Shallow
and the Deep, Long Range Ecology Movement: A Summaryn--is the
source of the term 'deep ecology.' He distinguished between TWO
varieties of environmentalism. One, which he called "shaliow," is t h e
sort of environmentalism which fights "against pollutior! and
resource depletion" as problems for the health and affiuence of
peoples in the developed countries." I n contrast, he suggested
"deep ecology" as a new paradigm that posits humans as
intrinsically (or internally) related to the rest of nature, yielding
some notion of bioc:entric egalitarianism. He explicitly introduced
global and political dimensions into his conception of deep ecology,
calling for an "anti-class posture" and "local autonomy and
decentralization." He acknowledged that, although his position may
be inspired by ecology understood as a science and a prsctice, deep
ecology was explicitly normative, being based in what he callea an
"ecosophy," which h*? saw as a "philosophy of ecological harrnony or
equilibrium" (Andrew McLaughlin 2). Fritjof Capra distinguishes
them in the following way:
Shallow ecology is human--centered. It views humans as
above/outside nature, as the source of all values where
nature has only instrumental or 'use' value. Deep ecology
does not separate humans--or anything for that matter--
from the natural environment. It views humans as just one
particular strand in the web of life. (The Web 7)
There are thousa?ds of grass root environmental groups all over
the world. Such movements are broadly classified by Arne Naess
into two -shallow ecological movements and deep ecological
movementsldeep long range ecological movements. Comparing
these two, Joni Seager remarks:
Both these movements posit the need for the affirmation of a
'deeper' human relationship with the earth-a relationship
that a t its best comprises elements of mysticism, awe and an
appreciation of the 'sacred' in nature. Both movements couctl
their environmentalism in 'woman identified' terms, and deep
ecologists are the only environmentalists, other than
ecofeminists to explicitly assent an affinity with women's
culture and feminist politics. (223)
Joni Seager remarks that the European encounter with new
lands is presented in male imagery (Earth Follies 231). At the deep
layer of philosophical worldview the imperialist or progressive
tradition is human-centric as well as male centric. Seager has
explicated that the ecological approach articulated by Arne Naess,
that is 'deep ecology,' "poses 'deeper' questions about life on earth
than mainstream environmentalists ask" (223). Seager adds:
Deep ecology is rooted in recasting the religious and
philosophical interpretation of human relations with the
necessity of shifting from human centrism to biocentrism, a
commitment to revaluing humanity's oneness with nature
and an appreciation of the intrinsic worth of all life forms.
(223-224)
The two terms, human-centric and male-centric, have to be
explicated before attempting any deep ecological study. Lynn White
in "Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis" remarks 'the Western
anthropocentric Christian philosophy is a root of the world wide
ecological crisis: "
Christianity inherited from Judaism not only a concept of
time as non- repetitive and linear but also a striking story of
creation. By gradual stages a loving and all-powerful God had
created light and darkness, the heavenly bodies, the earth
and all its plants, animals, birds and fishes, Finally, God had
created Adam and an after thought, Eve to keep man from
being lonely. Man has named all the animals, thus
establishing h ~ s dominance over them. God planned all of this
explicitly, for -nanfs benefit and rule; no item in the physical
creation had any purpose save to serve man's purposes.
And, although man's body is made of clay, he is not simply
part of nature: he is made in God's image (9).
The origin of the concept of the human centrism is generally traced
to the Western Christian philosophy and Renaissance humanism,
and deep ecology displaces anthropocentrism with biocentrism.
Christopher Manes in "Nature and Silence" (Glotfelty, ed.
Ecocriticism 15-29) explains that deep ecology has "stressed the
link between listening to the nonhuman world" and "reversing the
environmentally destructive practices modern society pursues" (16)
and that biocentrism "brings to bear the science of ecology upon
exclusionary claims about the human subject." (24) Manes adds:
From the language of human one could get the expression
that Homo sa liens is the only species on the planet worthy
of being a topic of discourse. Ecology paints quite a
different, humbling, picture. I f fungus, one of the 'lowliest' of
forms on a humanistic scale of values, were to go extinct
tomorrow, the effect on the rest of the biosphere would be
catastrophic, since the health of forest depends on
Mycorrbyzal f.~ngus, and the disappearance of the forest
would upset t:he hydrology, atmosphere, and temperature of
the entire globe. I n contrast, i f homosapiens disappeared,
the event would go virtually unnoticed by the vast majority
of Earth's life forms. As hominids we dwell at the outermost
fringes of important ecological processes such as
photosynthesis and the conversion of biomass in to usable
nutrients. (24)
Discussing the 'Scientific Foundation' (26) of ecological
assumptions, Manes arrives at a "viable environmental ethics" ( 26 )
and also at the importance of desilencing/voicing nature. Deep
ecology argues for such a significant retrieval:
A viable environmental ethics must confront 'the silence of
nature1-the fact in our culture only humans have the status
as speaking srrbjects. Deep ecology has attempted to do so
by challenging the idiom of humanism that has silenced the
natural world. ( 2 6 )
Up to recent times, the scientific tradition has been synonymous
with the imperialist. 7-he publication of Rachel Carson's Silent Sorinq
[ l9621 and similar books from scientists themselves and the
worldview behind counter cultural paradigms have changed this
tradition. To use the term of Ted Hughes, "the environmentai
revolution" (Winter Pm 128-135) has set in. "To most of t h e
world, Rachel Carso.ifs Silent S ~ r i n g came as an absolute shoci<"
(129).
Don Scheese, in his Nature Writina: The Pastoral Imoulse in
America, relating the advent and advancement of social ecology,
nature writing and ecological criticism, remarks that ecocritics hold:
The nonhuman environment is a dominant character in the
worlds both inside and outside the text; that the authors
themselves subscribe to this belief; and that an important
interaction occurs between nonhuman environment and
author, place and text, which can result in a paradigmatic
shift in the consciousness of the protagonist from an ego-
centered (anthropocentric) view of the world to an eco-
centered (biocentric) perspective ... Ecocriticism rejects
absolutely and considers absurd and dangerous the claim of
poststructural~sm that "there is no nature." (8-9)
According to him, two historical developments occurred during
1920-1960 that did transform the genre of nature writing and they
are the emergence of ecology as "a legitimate scientific discipline"
and "a campaign for wilderness preservation" (3). Don Scheese
continues:
Fieldwork once again--nature writing of travel and discovery
of 'new worlds' of colonial explorers of the three centuries
prior to the twentieth had been the result of field work--
became a significant component of scientific study as
ecologists explored wetlands, prairies, and forests, studying
individual spezies and their roles in ecosystems. As species
and habitat continued to diminish, a renewed push was made
for preservation of natural areas, led by such newly formed
groups as the Wilderness Society, founded in [USA] 1935.
(30)
Three events since 1960 have been recognized as paradigmatic
moments in the rise modern environmentalism resulting in further
transformation of the genre of nature writing.
The first was the publication of Silent Spring by Rachel
Carson in 1962. Initially appearing in The New Yorker and
then published as a book, Silent S ~ r i n q is a scientific
monograph by a marine biologist and a best-selling
nonfiction trilogy on the sea. Carson attacks the chemical
industry for is production of pesticides and herbicides used
indiscriminately, resulting in the deaths of countless animals
as the chemicals work their way up the food chain. Carson
eventually won at least a partial victory: commercial use of
DDT was banned in 1971. Silent S ~ r i n q also initiated a new
kind of nature writing, one that would proliferate in the late
1980s: the literature of apocalypse. The second landmark
event occurred in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when the
Apollo astronauts took a series of photographs of Earth from
space [...l This change in the way we see our planet was
officially recognized in April 1970 with the designation of the
first Earth Day, the third major event in the emergence of
modern environmentalism. The widespread recognition that
environmental problems were ultimately global, transcending
artificial nat i~na l boundaries, was both sobering and
energizing: international environmental organizations and
government agencies formed to help solve the ecological
crises of global warming, toxic waste, depletion of the ozone
layer, and destruction of rain forests. (31-32)
Ernest Haeckel's 1870 definition, quoted earlier in this study,
contains no direct mention of humans. This absence of mention has
been interpreted to mean that humankind is something apart from
nature in the imperialist sense. But, after the environmental
revolution, scientists themselves have started interpreting Haeckel's
definition as implying that humans are integral part of, not different
from, other organisms in the ecological or environmental drama of
life. Kormondy observes that "humankind is not independent of
nature's ways ancl thus there is no substantive distinction between
human ecosysterns and natural ecosystems" (385). Such an
acceptance from the part of those who follow scientific tradition has
been the result of' the change in worldview affected by movements
of environmentalism, of counter consciousness and anti-imperialist
discourses.
The tradition generally followed by pantheists, animists, pagans,
nature-mystics and nature poets or, to a great extent,
environmentalists is designated to be the 'Arcadian.' Arcadia was a
region of ancient Greece inhabited by pastoral people of idyllic
satisfaction--a life of contentment, encompassing a reverence for
nature. Kormondy observes "in large measure this traditior?
developed as a re~c t i on to the birth and growth of industrialism and
a protest against the mechanistic analysis espoused by French
philosopher Rene Descartes (1596-1650) that isolated scientists
from society and its moral fabric" (384). The Arcadian has become a
very broad term and it is very difficult to say whether some because
of nostalgia favors that tradition or not. Moral, aesthetic,
ontological, political, ethnic or scientific reasons can been seen
behind the support of tradition. For example, i f once a resistance
against the destruction of a region's biodiversity--the diversity of
animals, plants ari.1 ecosystems-- was in the name of their
recreative or aesthetic values, now it may be because of its
economic or scientific values. I n 1854, American President Franklin
Pierce offered to buy a large track of Red Indian land from Chief
Seattle. Provoked and hurt, the chieftain made an anguished
appeal for the preservation of nature, underlining its value to man
and the need to safeguard it from modern civilization. At the time
of its production in 1854, Chief Seattle's letter titled "The Sacred
Earth" might have appeared to be a piece of primitive pagan's blind
worship of environm?nt or his inability or indolence to adapt with
reforms.
Taking an example from Kerala, South India, the major shift in
outlook can be made clearer. During 1978-82, there was a
controversy in the state regarding the Silent Valley Project. The
technocrats and officials planned to destroy the Silent Valley maiden
forest to construct a dam. Poets, lovers of nature and some
environmentalists organized and propagated ideas of conservation
all over Kerala. They demanded the abolition of the Project. Those
in power were unwilling to cancel the project and the poets were
ridiculed. They were described to be marakkavikal [tree poets], as
if the poets were idiats and had marathala [tree head, that is pig-
headed]. The poets' organization "Prakruti Samrakshana Samiti"
[The Organization for Conservation] appealed before the Prime
Minister, Indira Gandhi, and the Department of Environment,
Government of India. Finally the project was dropped and the
region was declared to be "Silent Valley National Park" vide
Government of Kerala Notification No. 5462/FSA3/82/AD dated 15
November 1984. Atmaraman, a Malayalam poet and Conservation
activist, finds that the Silent Valley Movement as the
commencement of reo-ecological awareness in Kerala and literary
ecology in Malayalam (Haritaniroopanam [Green Criticism] xxiv).
The poets' appeal to preserve the Silent Valley Forest was mainly
based on ethical and aesthetic values, not on scientific or economic.
But now, as most of the nations have accepted the conservation of
bio-diversity as a matter of policy, there are many values to cite in
favour of conserving a tropical maiden forest. The examples can be
read as a fight between modernity and Arcadian neo-ecological
awareness. I n the Seattle issue of 1854 modernity won as, at that
time, it was advancing. By the time of Silent Valley Controversy, a
new ecological awareness has been well established.
The western imperialist-cum-scientific tradition apotheosizes its
anthropocentric view by alluding to the Old Testament. The
perspective of the imperialist tradition regarding the human-nature
relationship holds that humans have dominion over nature and
derives from the following passages:
Let us make man in our image, after our likeness and let
them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the
fowl of the air and over the cattle and over all the earth, and
over air and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over
every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. (Genesis.
1 : 26)
There is another passage asserting human domination:
God said unto them, be fruitful, and multiply and replenish
the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of
the sea an over the fowl of the air and over every living thing
that moveth upon the earth. (Genesis 1:28)
Eco-spiritualists and environmentalists quote certain other
sentences from the same canonized text:
Concerning the estate of the sons of man, that god might
manifest them, and that they may see themselves are
beasts. For that which befalleth the sons of me befalleth
beasts; even one thing befalleth them; as the one dieth so
dieth the other; yea, they have all one breath; so that a man
hath no preeminence above a beast; For all is vanity.
(Ecclesiastes 3 : 18-19)
I n the West, with the advent of deep ecology, such passages
have been retrieved and Saint Francis of Assisi is the saint of
ecology. Lynn White, analyzing the roots of Western ecological
crisis, observes that the victory of Christianity over paganism was
the greatest psychic revolution in the history of Western culture and
the implicit faith in perpetual progress is rooted in, and is
indefensible, apart rom Judeo-Christian teleology (9). Regarding
Saint Francis, Lynn White makes the following comments:
The key to an understanding of Francis is his belief in the
virtue of humility-not merely for the individual but for man
as a species. Francis tried to depose man from his monarchy
over creation and set up a democracy of all God's creatures.
With him the ant is no longer simply a homily for the lazy,
flames a sign of the thrust of the soul toward union with
God; now they are Brother Ant and Sister Fire, praising the
Creator in their own ways as Brother Man does in his (13).
Some ecologically minded literary critics roundly condemn
Western civilization for its oppression of nature and all other forms
of the 'other.' The remarks of the British poet Ted Hughes from "The
Environmental Revolution" (Winter Pollen 128-135) are pertinent
here. Connecting the Western technological progress and "the
fundamental guiding ideas" (129) of the Western civilization, which,
according to him, "are against Conservation" (129) Ted Hughes
indicates:
They are based on the assumption that the earth is a heap of
raw materials given to man by God for his exclusive profit
and use. The creepy crawlies which infest are devils of dirt
and without a soul ... The subtly apotheosized misogyny of
Reformed Chrrstianity is proportionate to the fanatic rejection
of Nature and the result has been to exile man from Mother
Nature-froni both inner and outer nature. (129)
Ted Hughes goes on to say that "When something abandons Nature,
or is abandoned by Nature, it has lost touch with its Creator, and is
called an evolutiona~-y dead-end," (129) and that the Western
"Civilization is an evolutionary error" (129) and the "Developer is
peering at the field through a visor, and behind him stands the
whole army of madmen's ideas, and shareholders, impatient to cash
in the world" (130). He points out that the Western man can also
see
A vision of the real Eden, 'excellent as the first day', the
draughty radiant Paradise of the animals, which is the actual
earth, in the actual universe: he may see Pan, whom
Nietzsche, firs: in the depths, mistook for Dionysus, the vital,
somewhat terrible spirit of natural life, which is new at every
second. (130)
There have been different minority or sublaltern cultures in the
West that have been friendly to ecology. Michael McDowell directs
ecological critics to admire "the best of primitive and Eastern
attitudes and recognize valuable cosmic insights that have been
overlooked in the Western civilization like those of Thoreau" (384).
Analysing Western man's craze for material gain and luxury, its
spiritual emptiness and ecological disasters as pointers of the
limitations of the prevalent quest for progress, Ted Hughes
announces, "the time for conservation has certainly come (132).Ii
The world has to look at the sential and non-sential thing on the
basis of primordial unity. This is what the deep ecologists exhort.
Deep ecologists presume that the primitive man with his intuition
had/has an awareness to perceive the unity behind living and non-
living environment and they try to retrieve that awareness.
I n agricultural or less industrialized nations like India, the
imperialist-cum-scientific tradition has not become as much
dominant as in the West. Goddess worship, sacred-grove worship,
tree-worship and tradition bound ecologically oriented rituals are
still a living tradition. This can be contrasted with that of the West.
Lynn White in "The Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisisr'
indicates, "To a Christian a tree can be no more than a physical
fact. The whole concept of the sacred grove is alien to Christianity
and to the ethos of the West" (12). Anand Veeraraj's "ECG-
spirituality and the Religious Community" presents an ecological or
geographical reason for the lack of complete success for the
Westernization of India:
The Western models turned out to be sepulchral and absurd,
especially in ~rultures where religiosity emerged from human
relatedness to nature. For such cultures in tropicai lands,
nature was more a friend than a foe. Unlike the peasants of
Europe who CO lstantly sought to insulate themselves from
the frosty weather, people of the tropical lands lived
outdoors and sought to integrate their aspirations with their
immediate environment. It was not the insulation and
escape from or the conquest of nature by humans --rather
the integration of peoples and communities with their
environment which became the ethos that nurtured the
religious sensibilities of the East ... Human experience is seen
as part of the great cosmic experience and therefore all
human-to-nature relations are sacred. Popular village cults
vividly express this cosmic awareness and believe that
nature participates fully in all the cultic rituals. The faith
community as such is not complete without the presence of
beasts and birds and the surrounding inanimate
environment. Sacred groves, temple animals, gorgeous
images representing every imaginable species and entity of
nature and shrines reflecting local myths and folklore speak
volumes about this spirituality. (51-52)
Enumerating the (cardinal points of eco-spirituality or ecological
religiosity, Veeraraj contrasts it with the Western ego-spirituality.
"Unlike the western spirituality which shies away from all sensory
experiences, eco-spirituality is open to all senses, including outdoor
and indoor experiences as essential to its religious existence" (52).
I t calls for an understanding of the wisdom in all primal
traditions, tribal cultures and religions. It demands a subscription
to the intrinsic value of every entity in nature both sentient and
non-sentient. I t is bio-centric, not human centric in the sense that
the protection or preservation of a living thing is precious apar-r.
from its human value or whether the life saved is useful to man or
not. Western environmental ethics has come as far as allowing
room for some measure of respect for nature. It has yet t o cross
the threshold of encouraging reverence for nature, A sense of
reverence and sacredness abide where there is the recognition of
the intrinsic value of the other for its own sake (53-54).
The recognition of ecotic needs, biological or somatic or
psychological or dependence on the environmental communism with
nature is diametrically opposed to the domination and mastery over
nature. Nature's bountifulness has to be acknowledged by those
who enjoy it. The eco-spiritual attitude is clearly visible in various
3 8
passages of the Vedas like Shanti Mantra, which implores the sky,
the earth, the rivers and the plants to be peaceful (Atharva Veda
X I - 9 ) and Bhoomi Sookta that prays to the Earth Mother, who bears
the Sacred Universal Fire to impart vitalizing and purifying forces
(Atharva Veda X I I . I ) . Commenting upon the passages like these in
the Vedas, Deena Bandhu observes:
Ecology was i3 sacred science to the Vedic men ... Earth is not
simply matter, a geological substance for exploitation and
domination. Human being is earthly and is of the earth.
Earth is the rnother who gives life. We do not own her but
she owns us. She feeds us and we live on her. She is
loving, pa t i e~~ t , nurturing and self- giving. She is the
foundation and the very basis of life. Human life has no
existence without earth. Therefore it was both matricide as
well as masochism for the Vedic men to attempt to hurt or
exploit earth. (5)
Another major contrast with the West is that apart from that of the
dominant classes, numerous regional, tribal land ethnic cultures,
which are pre-modern and primitive, exist. External and internal
colonizations have rnarginalized them. But, in the West the white
had driven out or destroyed almost all the pre-modern ethnic
groups. So, unlike the Western scene, though rnarginalized, the
Indian tribal ethnic groups have been exercising their influence
upon the composite culture and worldview. Totemic worship or
setting apart certain plants or animals as sacred is still a legacy.
Conservation of land, river or forest is intermingled with the
solidarity and spiritual existence of certain ethnic minorities or
tribes. The following !S an example of such a tribal movement.
The Chipko movement in the Himalayan valley, Garhwal village,
which has been resisting cutting down forest trees, is a world
famous one. Sundarlal Bahuguna, a disciple of Mahatma Gandhi,
has organized the villagers of Garhwal, especially women and they
cover or hug the trees with their hands, body and legs. Those who
come to fell the trees have to kill them before attempting their task.
Such non-violent resistance for saving trees has a tradition,
centuries old, in India. Bishnoys in Rajasthan used to protect their
tree, Khejari, by this method. At least from 1604, they have
adopted this. I n that year two women belonging to Rajasthan
became martyrs. Many Bishnoy sages sacrificed themselves to save
Khejari trees. Of all such 'tree-martyrdoms,' that happened in 1720
is the most famous one. Three hundred and sixty three Bishnoys,
including women and children, sacrificed themselves to save their
sacred trees. Beheading them one by one, the officials cut down
Khejari trees. The Bishnoy-martyrs had been hugging trees to
ward-off the tree-fellers. Knowing the heroic sacrifice, the king of
Jodhpur, Abhayasing, as a part of his repentance, banned the felling
of Khejari in Jodhpur. I n 1982, a pillar was raised glorifying the
Bishnoy martyrs and their names were recorded on it. The
Bishnoys inspired the Chipko movement, Himalayan tree-hugyers,
The discussion of' the three terms, ecology, deep ecology anu
human ecology, --ecology as a body of knowledge resulting from
pure unemotional scientific enquiry regarding the inter relatedness
of biotic and abiotic environments, deep ecology as a philosophical
or spiritual world view in which the ultimate realization or value is in
the harmony or interdependence among the living and non-living
things or the preservation of diversity of life in itself a value, and
human ecology, the manipulation of ecological knowledge for
humankind only-- dtmand as conclusion the classification of values
that have cropped up during the analysis in this chapter. Edwarti
Kormondy, the renowned environmental biologist, enlists sevel-1
major values- economic, life-support, recreational, scientific,
aesthetic, life and ethical (386). Economic value is related to
considering 'nature' as a resource for human gain, for food, shelter,
cloths, medicine, or in short, all somatic needs. Life support value
looks how life is tethered to the biosphere, to its air, water and
land. Recreational value finds in environmental a place to play,
climb, swim, walk or run which gives pleasurable appreciation and
allows for participation using nature as a milieu for intellectual
activity is the look out of scientific value. Aesthetic value of
environment searches for a vehicle for non-utilitarian searching for
organic beauty. Lif<, value is interesting to those who are curious
about the evolutionary kinship of the living. Regarding the ethical
values Kormondy remarks:
The ethical values in human-nature relationships devolve
from the tradition of imperialism [humans apart form nature]
and Arcadian~sm [humans as part of nature] and this often
lead to dilemmas and non-humans, between rights and
entitlements of individuals and of society, as well as those
choices between present and future generations. The ethics
of manipulating nature ... derives from a consideration of
whether the knowledge of how to control nature at any cost
is prized or whether human kind is regarded as one of the
species, but of no higher rank in the biosphere. (386)
Kormondy's analysis, being in a scientific point of view, does not
mention spiritual value or, in other words, the spiritual value of T
environment is mistaken for recreational and aesthetic values. A
purely naturalistic, scientific or utilitarian or rational evolution may
not recognize the spiritual. The sense of belonging to environment
in itself is a value and it is contrasted with the sense of alienation or
rootlessness felt by m.dny in the Postnatural/urban societies. The
spiritual view is perceivable in the discussion of passages from Chief
Seattle's Letter and the Vedas.
This study requires the explication of the term 'Literary Ecology.'
It can be put in simple terms as the application of neo-ecological
ideas and ideals for interpreting literary works. There are passages
in literature, which cannot be classified either as 'ecological
literature' or 'literary ecology.' Ecological literature comprises of any
writing on ecology-scientific, artistic or spiritual. Literary ecology is
used only in the cont?xt of critical studies of literary or artistic
works. Sueellen Campbell in "The Land and Language of Desire:
Where Deep Ecology and Post-Structuralism Meet" (Glotfelty, ed.
Ecocriticism 124-136) finds the confluence of literary ecology and
ecological literature upon certain sites and the West's concern for it:
Ecologists also see an experience of lost unity and a desire to
regain it as central to our human nature ... As Emerson wrote
in Nature 'We are much strangers in nature as we are aliens
from God. We do not understand the notes of birds ...'
Because our culture does not teach us that we are plain
citizens of the earth, because we live apart from the natural
world and derly our intimacy with it, we have lost the sense
of unity that is still possible in other cultures. Our desire
marks what we have lost and what we still hope to regain.
(134-135)
Literary ecology ~Jiscusses the environment through literature.
'Literary ecology,' 'e~ocriticism' and 'green studies' are terms, which
are used synonymously. Laurence Coupe, the editor of Green
Studies Reader, defines: "Green studies an emerging academic
movement, which seeks to ensure that nature is given as much
attention within the humanities as is currently given to gender,
class and race" (302-303) and "Ecocriticism [is] the most important
branch of green studies, which considers the relationship between
human and non-human life as represented in literary texts and
which theorises about the place of literature in the struggle against
environmental desti uction" (302). Terms like eco-aesthetics,
environmental aesthetics and literary ecology are also used as
synonyms. Literary ecology is a broad term that encornpasses and
explores the ways that writinglliterature reflects and influences
human kind's interac~tion with the natural world. Literary ecology is
distinguished from ecology and deep ecology discussed earlier.
Literary ecology, simply put, is the study of relationship between
literature and the physical environment. Just as feminist criticism
examines language and literature from a gender/conscious
perspective and Marxist criticism brings an awareness of modes of
production and economic class to its reading texts,
ecocriticism/literary ecology takes an earth-centred approach to
literary studies. I t is the publication of The Ecocriticism Reader:
Landmarks in Literary Ecoloav [1996], an anthology of twenty-two
ecocritical studies, which popularized the term literary ecology, in
American Academic circles. The book has three parts-"Ecotheory:
Reflections on Nature and Culture," (3-146) "Ecocritical
Considerations of Fiction and Drama" (149-222) and "Critical
Studies of Environmental Literature" (225-391)-apart from Cheryll
Glotfelty's "Introduction: Literary Studies in an Age of
Environmental Crisis" (xv-xxxvii).
I n the "Introduction," Glotfelty traces a brief history of the birth
of environmental literary studies in America:
I f your knowledge of the outside world were limited to what
you could infer from the major publications of the literary
profession, you would quickly discern that race, class,
gender were the hot topics of the late twentieth century, but
you would ne\ er suspect that the earth's life support systems
were under st:ress. (xvi)
But, the newspaper headlines have been full of environmental
issues and moverrlents from 1970s. There has been a wide
discrepancy between current events and the preoccupations of the
literary profession. While related humanities disciplines, like history,
philosophy, law, sociology and religion have been 'greening' since
1970s, literary stl~dies have apparently remained untinted by
environmental concerns. But, there have been individual studies,
which relate the environmental problems and literary works and in
the early nineties ~t grew. Harold Fromm, one of the editors of
Ecocriticism Reader, organized, in 1991, a literary conference
entitled "Ecocriticism: The Greening of Literary Studies." I n the next
year, a new Association for the Study of Literature and Environment
[ASLE] was formed I n 1993 Patrick Murphy established a new
journal, I ~terdiscip l inarv Studies in Literature and
Environment,
To provide a forum for critical studies of the literary and
performing arts proceeding from or addressing
environmental considerations. These would include ecological
theory, environmentalism, conceptions of nature and their
depictions, the humanlnature dichotomy and related
concerns. (Glotfelty, ed. Ecocriticism xviii)
Some of the major problems posed by ecocritics when literary
texts are studied are the representation of nature, the role played
by physical setting, ecological values/wisdom expressed, metaphors
of land and their influence on the voice, vision and craft,
presentation of environmental crisis, race/class/gender-oriented
attitude to environment and the relationship between science of
ecology and literary studies.
Despite the broad scope of inquiry and disparate levels of
sophistication, all ecological criticism shares the fundamental
premise that human culture is connected to the physical world,
affecting it and is affected by it. Cheryll Glotfelty points out:
Ecocriticism takes as its subject the interconnections
between nature and culture, specifically the cultural artifacts
of language and literature. As a critical stance, it has one
foot in literature and the other on land; as a theoretical
discourse, it negotiates between the human and the
nonhuman. (_Ecocriticism xix)
Glotfelty distinguishes ecocriticism from other critical approaches:
Literary theory, in general, examines the relations between
writers, texts, and in most literary theory 'the world' is
synonymous with society-the social sphere. Ecocriticism
expands the notion of 'the world' to include the entire
ecosphere. If we agree with Larry Commoner's first law of
ecology, 'Everything is connected with everything else,' we
must conclude that literature does not float above the
material world in some aesthetic ether, but, rather, plays a
part in an immensely complex global system, in which
energy, matter, and ideas interact. (xix)