Garrard and Ecocriticism

Plainly put, I think Garrard's Ecocriticism is a good place to start for someone who, like me, is new to a more formal, constructed study of ecology in English studies. Garrard's approach, or at least his goal, is to provide a horizontal snapshot of ecocriticism as a critical lens, as he provides a run-down of theoretical positions (ecofeminism, cornucopia, Heideggerian Ecophilosophy, deep Ecology, Eco-Marxism, etc.) to verse the reader on terminology and ideology. Garrard constructs this snapshot by using tropes, which act both as an organizational tool and a diving board of sorts. For example, the chapter/trope on "Dwelling" provides Garrard with a space in which to discuss the give-and-take relationship (or lack thereof) between humans and land. But, like the other tropes, "Dwelling" allows space for Garrard and ideally the reader to dive into the current discussion about Georgic Ecology (am I using this term correctly?) and the "Ecological Indian," using key figures, in this case Wendell Berry, John Berger, Kirkpatrick Sale, Leslie Marmon Silko, and Louise Erdrich, to propel the discussion of given topics. At the end of most chapters--all except "Animals" I think--Garrard problematizes the trope.

So, all in all, I felt exposed to new ideas and names in reading Ecocriticism, which is great. However, because I'm not well-versed in ecocriticism (yet), I feel vulnerable to Garrard. I have little to base his "facts" off of, and while he frequently criticizes oversimplification in various aspects of scientific approaches, I can't help but wonder if he's guilty of oversimplification with this text. Can the ideologies presented in "Positions" really be so easily divided and summed up as to fit nicely in Garrard's box? Do Garrard's dismissals and approvals fairly represent general consensus among ecocritics? Probably not.

Despite my feelings of vulnerability, I found a majority of Garrard's work to be a great spring board. From the first few pages onward I was amazed at the number of dimensions ecocriticism embodies. Religion, gender, class, capitalism, health, geography, sexuality, literature/humanities, science--the number of subjects and lenses associated with ecocriticism goes on. Although we're focusing on English studies in class, I think we should keep in mind the reach that ecocriticism truly has and the holistic values it encourages.

Here are a few specific questions/ideas:

• Garrard creates a lot of opposition within the eco-critic community, which made me wonder if these separations are over-shadowing the unified cause? Is there a unified cause at all?
  
• How does the consideration of time in elegy, idyll, and utopia change or represent the way we view time and the environment now? Do we feel like we're running out of time to "save" the environment?
  
• Do we gain anything from positing the old world pastoral against the new world idea of wilderness?
• What exactly is the back-to-the-land Maoist catastrophe Garrard refers to on pg. 115?
• Towards the end (page 151-ish) Garrard discusses the effects of nature documentaries on the general public's perception of nature. I'm intrigued by this idea in a way that's hard for me to solidify. Does it really matter if shows like Life or Planet Earth create Hi-Def, slowed down, sped up, saturated images of nature? Are these shows a celebration or commercialization of nature? And (how) do these effects, or more generally nature documentaries as a whole, change/shape/destroy/inhance/create our images of the pastoral/wilderness/dwelling/pollution/apocalypse/animals. Is that all we can really know of certain tropes?
• Are Christianity and Ecology inherently at odds as Garrard seems to suggest? The whole idea of religion, both monotheistic and polytheistic, really seems to complicate and be complicated by the environment. What can I/we make of this? I always looked at nature, especially the weird stuff, as a sign that there must be something in/up/out/down there to create such an intricate system. But Garrard gives me the feeling that a true ecologist/ecocritic values scientific beliefs over religious ones, which are admittedly human constructs that when interpreted literally are often ridiculous (to me). But where does spirituality fit in?