Ecocriticism of the Global South

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This new book is the second volume in a two-volume mini-series devoted to representing diverse and innovative ecocritical voices from throughout the world, particularly from developing nations (the first volume, Ecoambiguity, Community, and Development, appeared in 2014). The vast majority of existing ecocritical studies, even those which espouse the postcolonial ecocritical perspective, operate within a first-world sensibility, speaking on behalf of subalternized human communities and degraded landscapes without actually eliciting the voices of the impacted communities. We have sought in Ecocriticism of the Global South to allow scholars from (or intimately familiar with) underrepresented regions to write back to the worlds centers of political and military and economic power, expressing views of the intersections of nature and culture from the perspective of developing countries. This approach highlights what activist and writer Vandana Shiva has described as the relationship between ecology and the politics of survival, showing both commonalities and local idiosyncrasies by juxtaposing such countries as China and Northern Ireland, New Zealand and Cameroon. The two volumes of the Ecocriticism of the Global South Series point to the need for further cultivation of the environmental humanities in regions of the world that are, essentially, the front line of the human struggle to invent sustainable and just civilizations on an imperiled planet.

Reviews

Ecocriticism of the Global South is a rare and much needed achievement in ecocriticism. It speaks from geographical and political contextsgiving it unprecedented planetary reach. In this process, it both extends and transforms the significance of the ecocritical project as a world phenomenon. -- George B. Handley, Brigham Young University

Author Bio

Vidya Sarveswaran works as an assistant professor of English in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at the Indian Institute of Technology Jodhpur. Scott Slovic edits the journal ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment, and is professor and chair of the English Department at the University of Idaho. Swarnalatha Rangarajan is associate professor of English at the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at the Indian Institute of Technology Madras.