Explorations in Ecocriticism: Advocacy, Bioregionalism, and Visual Design

(Hardback)

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A chief innovation ofExplorations in Ecocriticismis to push ecological criticism beyond its focus on literary studies to engage with other arts and culture. One chapter closely examines the pictures commissioned by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation to valorize its big dam projects. Previously, no one has written about the large art collection that toured the nation under the auspices of the Smithsonian in the early 1970s, when the Bureau of Reclamation was under fire and new environmental regulations were becoming law. Another chapter, An Iconography of Sabotage, previously published in France as part of a Paris symposium, looks at the pictorial dimension of saboteurs throughout American history, with a special emphasis on the IWW and Earth First! The book draws extensively on the social sciences. Ecology and environment are treated too often as technical topics that go over the heads of lay readers. Many Americans care about air and water quality, the extinction of species, and the unfortunate politicization of science. But they also find the discourse daunting, the details exceedingly complex. By leavening such heavy subjects with current events,Explorations in Ecocriticismmakes environmental issues accessible to lay readers and offers routes to sustainability in the United States today.

Reviews

[The author's] chapters cut across genres and fields of research, including literary analysis, cultural critique, advocacy for activism, and pedagogy. . . .Repeatedly, Lindholdt has the good sense to answer the question a reader might ask: so what One is never in doubt that what these writers, such as John Josselyn, William Wood, and William Bartram, published is relevant for us to analyze today. * ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment *
Lindholdt has given us a strong new collection that stretches the conceptual boundaries of ecocriticism. Explorations represents a laudable addition to Lexington Books recent ecocriticism series. The three terms of his subtitle explain the collections innovation, for the unexpected connections between advocacy, bioregionalism, and visual design demonstrate his reach into less familiar territory. Lindholdts wide, comfortable interdisciplinarity is commendable. Perhaps Lindholdts most innovative work concerns his subversive reading of the Bureau of Reclamations commissioned art collection (196873), now dispersed and incomplete, through the conceptual lens of ecopornography. Here is a story few know, and his ecocritical undressing of this propagandistic initiative by a federal agency most known for out-of-control dam building persuasively exposes its agenda. The essay illustrates Lindholdts diverse, innovative paths, and Explorations inspires readers to further their own. * Western American Literature *
Following his very well received volume of autobiographical ecocriticism,In Earshot of Water, Paul Lindholdt delivers this new collection of scholarly ecocriticismdeeply researched, beautifully written, and no less comprehensive and compelling. Ranging from colonial natural histories to the reformist sabotage by contemporary eco-warriors, he surprises again and again with his revisionary insights into America's ongoing exploitation of the land. -- Harold Fromm, University of Arizona
This is a passionate, well written account of the manifold underpinnings of environmental thought, one which re-energizes and re-vivifies the strengths and possibilities of ecocriticism. It is up-to-date, thoughtful, and displays a great depth of scholarship while conveying the urgency and complexity ofthe environmental dilemmas facing us. -- Rebecca Raglon, University of British Columbia
Lindholdt contributes to the sea-change of literary activism. As scholarly and personal voices merge, he finds a way to profess, to compel an audience, to persist. From early American ecologies to ecopornography, he gives us a book that matters. -- Aaron M. Moe, author of Zoopoetics: Animals and the Making of Poetry

Author Bio

Paul Lindholdt is professor of English at Eastern Washington University.