New Woman Ecologies

A transatlantic phenomenon of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the "New Woman" broke away from many of the constraints of the Victorian era to enjoy a greater freedom of movement in the social, physical, and intellectual realms. As Alicia Carroll reveals, the New Woman also played a significant role in environmental awareness and action. From the Arts and Crafts period, to before, during, and after the Great War, the iconic figure of the New Woman accompanied and informed historical women’s responses to the keen environmental issues of their day, including familiar concerns about air and water quality as well as critiques of Victorian floral ecologies, extinction narratives, land use, local food shortages, biodiversity decline, and food importation. As the Land Question intersected with the Woman Question, women contributed to a transformative early green culture, extolling the benefits of going back to the land themselves, as "England should feed her own people." Carroll traces the convergence of this work and a self-realization articulated by Mona Caird’s 1888 demand for the "acknowledgement of the obvious right of the woman to possess herself body and soul." By the early twentieth century, a thriving community of New Woman authors, gardeners, artists, and land workers had emerged and created a vibrant discussion. Exploring the early green culture of Arts and Crafts to women’s formation of rural utopian communities, the Women’s Land Army, and herbalists of the Great War and beyond, New Woman Ecologies shows how women established both their own autonomy and the viability of an ecological modernity.

This edited volume critically engages with ecofeminist scholarship. It tracks the ongoing dialogue between women’s issues and environmental change by republishing the work of pioneering scholars and activists in the field. Together with new essays by contemporary ecofeminist scholars, the book uncovers the dialectical relationship between environmental and feminist causes, the relational identities of feminists and ecofeminists, and the concept of ecofeminism as a rallying point for environmental feminism. The volume defines ecofeminism as a multidisciplinary project and will appeal to readers working within the field of Environmental Humanities.

The book contains perceptions of nature and ecology in writings by English women authors from the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries. Includes discussion of works by the writers: Mary Wroth (ca. 1586-ca. 1640), Margaret Cavendish (1624?-1674), Mary Rich Warwick (1625-1678), Catherine Talbot (1721-1770), Mary Wollstonecraft (1759-1797).

Gendered Ecologies: New Materialist Interpretations of Women Writers in the Long Nineteenth Century considers the value of interrelationships that exist among human, nonhuman species, and inanimate objects as part of the environment, and features observations by women writers as recorded in nature diaries, poetry, bildungsroman, sensational fiction, philosophical fiction, and folklore. In addition, the edition aims to present a case for transnational women writers who have been involved in participating in the discourse of natural philosophy from the late eighteenth through the early twentieth centuries. The collection engages with current paradigms of thought influencing the field of ecocriticism and, more specifically, ecofeminism. Various theories are featured, informing interpretation of literary and non-literary material, which include Anthropocene feminism, feminist geography, neo-materialism, object-oriented ontology, panarchy, and trans-corporeality. In particular, neo-materialism and trans-corporeality are guiding principles of the collection, providing theoretical coherence. Neo-materialism becomes a means by which to examine literary and non-literary content by women writers with attention to the materiality of objects as the aim of inquiry. Regarding trans-corporeality, contributors provide evidence of the interrelations between the body-as-matter and animate beings along with inanimate entities. Together, neo-materialism and trans-corporeality drive the edition, as contributors contemplate the significance of interactions among human, nonhuman, organic, and inanimate objects.

The relationship between feminism and ecology has grown in importance in recent years. This book provides a comprehensive introduction to the ecofeminist movement and its history, as well as an extended analysis of the main perspectives within it. Mellor examines the connections between feminism and the green movement, and outlines the contributions of the major participants, while contextualizing them within a wider range of debates. She re-examines classic feminist texts from an ecofeminist perspective, and explores the relationship between ecofeminism and other ecological movements, such as 'deep' ecology, social ecology and ecosocialism. Mellor discusses the association of women with biology and 'nature', and argues that the relationship between women and the environment can help us to understand the relationship between humanity and the natural world. Against the trends towards radical economic liberalism, global capitalism and postmodernist pluralism, she argues that there is within the feminist and green movements the basis of a new radical movement which draws on the principles of both. A useful and engaging account of feminist perspectives on ecology, the book will be welcomed by students and researchers in feminism and gender studies, sociology and political theory.

Destined to transform its field, this volume features some of the most exciting feminist scholars and activists working within feminist political ecology, including Giovanna Di Chiro, Dianne Rocheleau, Catherine Walsh and Christa Wichterich. Offering a collective critique of the ‘green economy’, it features the latest analyses of the post-Rio+20 debates alongside a nuanced reading of the impact of the current ecological and economic crises on women as well as their communities and ecologies. This new, politically timely and engaging text puts feminist political ecology back on the map.

Gendered Ecologies considers the value of interrelationships that exist among human, nonhuman species, and inanimate objects, featuring observations by women writers as recorded in texts. The edition presents a case for transnational women writers, participating in the discourse of natural philosophy from the late eighteenth through the early twentieth centuries.

Feminist Political Ecology explores the gendered relations of ecologies, economies and politics in communities as diverse as the rubbertappers in the rainforests of Brazil to activist groups fighting racism in New York City. Women are often at the centre of these struggles, struggles which concern local knowledge, everyday practice, rights to resources, sustainable development, environmental quality, and social justice. The book bridges the gap between the academic and rural orientation of political ecology and the largely activist and urban focus of environmental justice movements.