Book Description
Living Earth Community: Multiple Ways of Being and Knowing is a celebration of the diversity of ways in which humans can relate to the world around them, and an invitation to its readers to partake in planetary coexistence. Innovative, informative, and highly accessible, this interdisciplinary anthology of essays brings together scholars, writers and educators across the sciences and humanities, in a collaborative effort to illuminate the different ways of being in the world and the different kinds of knowledge they entail - from the ecological knowledge of Indigenous communities, to the scientific knowledge of a biologist and the embodied knowledge communicated through storytelling.
This anthology examines the interplay between Nature and Culture in the setting of our current age of ecological crisis, stressing the importance of addressing these ecological crises occurring around the planet through multiple perspectives. These perspectives are exemplified through diverse case studies - from the political and ethical implications of thinking with forests, to the capacity of storytelling to motivate action, to the worldview of the Indigenous Okanagan community in British Columbia.
Living Earth Community: Multiple Ways of Being and Knowing synthesizes insights from across a range of academic fields, and highlights the potential for synergy between disciplinary approaches and inquiries. This anthology is essential reading not only for researchers and students, but for anyone interested in the ways in which humans interact with the community of life on Earth, especially during this current period of environmental emergency.
This open book is licensed under a Creative Commons License (CC BY-NC-ND). You can download Living Earth Community ebook for free in PDF format (19.5 MB).
Table of Contents
Section I
Presences in the More-Than-Human World
Chapter 1
Creaturely Migrations on a Breathing Planet: Some Reflections
Chapter 2
Learning a Dead Birdsong: Hopes' echoEscape.1 in 'The Place Where You Go to Listen'
Chapter 3
Humilities, Animalities, and Self-Actualizations in a Living Earth Community
Section II
Thinking in Latin American Forests
Chapter 4
Anthropology as Cosmic Diplomacy: Toward an Ecological Ethics for Times of Environmental Fragmentation
Chapter 5
Reanimating the World: Amazonian Shamanism
Chapter 6
The Obligations of a Biologist and Eden No More
Section III
Practices from Contemporary Asian Traditions and Ecology
Chapter 7
Fluid Histories: Oceans as Metaphor and the Nature of History
Chapter 8
Affectual Insight: Love as a Way of Being and Knowing
Chapter 9
Confucian Cosmology and Ecological Ethics: Qi, Li, and the Role of the Human
Section IV
Storytelling: Blending Ecology and Humanities
Chapter 10
Contemplative Studies of the 'Natural' World
Chapter 11
Science, Storytelling, and Students: The National Geographic Society's On Campus Initiative
Chapter 12
Listening for Coastal Futures: The Conservatory Project
Chapter 13
Imaginal Ecology
Section V
Relationships of Resilience within Indigenous Lands
Chapter 14
An Okanagan Worldview of Society
Chapter 15
Indigenous Language Resurgence and the Living Earth Community
Chapter 16
Sensing, Minding, and Creating
Chapter 17
Unsettling the Land: Indigeneity, Ontology, and Hybridity
Section VI
The Weave of Earth and Cosmos
Chapter 18
Gaia and a Second Axial Age
Chapter 19
The Human Quest to Live in a Cosmos
Chapter 20
Learning to Weave Earth and Cosmos