The Cambridge Introduction to Literature and the Environment [Paperback]

A comprehensive overview of the arguments in environmental criticism, first published in 2011.Environmental criticism is a relatively new discipline that brings the global problem of environmental crisis to the forefront of literary and cultural studies. This 2011 introduction defines what ecocriticism is and provides a set of conceptual tools to encourage students to look at the texts they're reading in a new way.Environmental criticism is a relatively new discipline that brings the global problem of environmental crisis to the forefront of literary and cultural studies. This 2011 introduction defines what ecocriticism is and provides a set of conceptual tools to encourage students to look at the texts they're reading in a new way.Environmental criticism is a relatively new discipline that brings the global problem of environmental crisis to the forefront of literary and cultural studies. This introduction defines what eco-criticism is and provides a set of conceptual tools to encourage students to look at the texts they're reading in a new way.Preface; Introduction: the challenge; Part I. Romantic and Anti-Romantic: 1. Old World Romanticism; 2. New World Romanticism; 3. Genre and the ethics of nonfiction; 4. Language beyond the human?; 5. The inherent violence of Western thought?; 6. Posthumanism and the 'end of nature'; Part II. The Boundaries of the Political: 7. Thinking like a mountain?; 8. Environmental justice and the move 'beyond nature writing'; 9. European eco-justice; 10. Liberalism and Green moralism; 11. Ecofeminism; 12. 'Postcolonial' eco-justice; 13. Questions of scale: the local, the national and the global; Part III. Science and the Struggle for Intellectual Authority: 14. Science and the crisis of authority; 15. Science studies; 16. Evolutionary theories of literature; 17. Interdisciplinarity and science: two essays on human evolution; Part IV. The Animal Mirror: 18. Ethics and the nonhuman animal; 19. Anthropomorphism; 20. The future of ecocriticlƒ'