Environmental Studies

Twinning the Pandemic and the Anthropocene: Crises, Challenge and Conciliation in the Anxious Witnessing of Nonhuman Agency

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Kaustabh Kashyap
PhD Scholar, Cotton University, Assam.ORCID: 0000-0001-8302-2296. Email: eng2091006_kaustabh@cottonuniversity.ac.in

Rupkatha Journal, Vol. 14, Issue 4, December, 2022. https://doi.org/10.21659/rupkatha.v14n4.31
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Abstract

This paper seeks to situate the anxieties engendered by the COVID-19 pandemic within the framework of the Anthropocene to analyse the multi-faceted ramifications of human and nonhuman interaction. By connecting this ongoing global crisis of human health with the politics of climate change, it attempts to read the forgotten agency of the nonhuman microbe in the light of the rude disruption of the traditional understandings of biopolitics (where bare life has taken centre stage) and the difficulties it has brought in bridging the rift between abstract and concrete information, leading to the scapegoating of victims. It ends with the suggestion of preparation for greener futures by imagining human health within planetary health instead of an anxious wait for a return to pre-pandemic times.

Keywords: pandemic, Anthropocene, biopolitics, nonhuman, health.

The Concept of Green School in Bhutan for Holistic Education and Development

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S. Chitra, PhD & Munna Gurung

Assistant Professor & Programme Leader, Yonphula Centenary College, Royal University of Bhutan. Email: schitra.ycc@rub.edu.bt

Teacher, Ministry of Education, Bhutan. Email: 07200012.ycc@rub.edu.bt

  Volume 13, Number 3, 2021 I Full-Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v13n3.03

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Abstract

Green school as mentioned in Thakur S. Powdyel’s book My Green School: An Outline (2014) was developed to support the initiative ‘Educating for Gross National Happiness’, conceived in 2009 by the Ministry of Education, Bhutan. This is to realize the need for holistic development of individuals and for the fulfilment of the true purpose of education. However, the green school domain requires deeper understanding in correlation with the nine domains of Gross National Happiness philosophy to unsettle the hollowness and reductionism of modern education. Therefore, the paper attempts to explore how the process of holistic learning and wholesome education become the key to understand the principles of life, by analysing the concentric sense of the green school concept constituting eight dimensions represented as ‘Sherig Mandala’. The inherent meanings of the elements of greenery categorized as natural, social, cultural, intellectual, academic, aesthetic, spiritual and moral have been closely examined to revitalize the claims of education.

Keywords:  Green school, Sherig-Mandala, holistic education, Gross National Happiness, life & learning.

The Era of Environmental Derangement: Witnessing Climate Crisis in Amitav Ghosh’s Gun Island

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Nupur Pancholi1, Sanjit Kumar Mishra2

1Research Scholar, Department of Applied Science & Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee, India. E-mail: npancholi@as.iitr.ac.in, nupurvpancholi@gmail.com
2Professor, Department of Humanities & Social Science, Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee, India. E-mail: sanjit.mishra@hs.iitr.ac.in

 Volume 13, Number 2, 2021 I Full-Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v13n2.29

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Abstract

Drawing on Amitav Ghosh’s novel Gun Island (2019) together with his nonfictional The Great Derangement (2016), the article strives to present that while advancing endless desires, human-centric culture and the idea of ‘good life’ drive climate change and environmental deterioration. It seeks to enumerate the devastating consequences of changing climatic conditions and degenerating ecosystems and their cumulative impacts on the humankind and non-human world. It aims to locate how human life at the margins has been affected by these cataclysmic consequences through analysing Ghosh’s Gun Island. It attempts to show that human interventions had significantly fuelled the global climate crisis in the seventeenth century, decoding the myth of Bonduki Sadagar that Ghosh identifies in Gun Island.

 Keywords: Climate change, human-centric culture, the idea of ‘good life’, environmental derangement, myth of Bonduki Sadagar

Consciously eco-conscious: An eco-conscious re-reading of Bibhutibhushan Bandyopadhyay’s Moon Mountain as young adult literature

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Narendiran S1 and Dr. Bhuvaneswari R2

1Research Scholar, School of Social Sciences and Languages, Vellore Institute of Technology, Vandalur – Kelambakkam Road, Chennai-600127, Tamilnadu, India. Email: narendiran10@gmail.com. ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9280-9178

2Assistant Professor (Sr.), School of Social Sciences and Languages, Vellore Institute of Technology, Vandalur – Kelambakkam Road, Chennai-600127, Tamilnadu, India. Email: bhuvanadoss@yahoo.co.in. ORCID iD: https:// orcid.org/0000-0003-4660-7118

 Volume 13, Number 2, 2021 I Full-Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v13n2.25

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Abstract

A better physical environment is quintessential for a comfortable life; this conscious of environment has been one of the post-world-war effects. The predominance of colonialism is accompanied by exploitation of forest and environment.  Since then, land is nothing more than a resource that conferred wealth and materials for the colonizers. The depletion of forest for agriculture and urban development is a historical phenomenon. It is then aggravated by industrial revolution and colonization. The legacies of colonialism have influenced the mindset of the colonized. Recently, the scarcity of the resources and climate change are the rising concerns of the world. This is mainly because of the humans’ insensitivity towards nature and literature plays an effective role in spreading the need for being eco-conscious. This article highlights the role of young adult narratives in spreading social awareness and interprets the classic Indian young adult novel Moon Mountain by Bibhutibhushan Bandyopadhyay, which has symbolic references offering ecological insights. The journey of the protagonist through the African continent is critiqued to highlight the enfeeble consciousness about the natural ecology of an individual who seizes material development. This study partly brings out how the colonial legacies continues to influence the contemporary environmental challenges, and discusses the literary relationships between nature and youth influence readers’ attitudes towards the contemporary anxieties such as climate change and related environmental crises.

 Keywords: Eco-consciousness, Habitat, Young, Adult, Environment, Nature

The Lioness Defending Her Clan in the North East: A Study of Ecospiritual Elements in Mamang Dai’s Fiction

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551 views

Meghamala Satapathy1 & Ipsita Nayak2

1PhD Research Scholar, KIIT Deemed to be University; Email: satapathymeghamala@gmail.com; ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3519-766X

2Assistant Professor in English and Research Supervisor, KIIT Deemed to be University; Email: ipsita.teacher@gmail.com; ORCID ID:  https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4584-7470

 Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s18n1

Abstract

Ecospirituality signifies spiritual evolution in consequence of one’s response to ecological stimuli. Mamang Dai is a powerful tribal voice from the North East India who has explored in depth the theme of Ecospirituality in her books. The article explicates those ecological attributes manifested in Dai’s works which form an integral part of the spiritual voyage of her characters. In an attempt to define the term ‘Ecospirituality,’ a review of existing literature has been placed at the beginning which is followed by discourse analysis of the five works of fiction which Dai has to her credit. All the arguments put forth in the article are substantiated by textual evidence from her books. The analysis of the said texts is followed by a conclusion suggesting a way forward. The present study examines the elements of Ecospirituality in Dai’s ‘fictional’ works alone hence the exclusion of her books of non-fiction. It shows how a slew of ecospiritual elements are identifiable in the fictional outputs of Dai and yet the theme demands more elaborate treatment due to the advent of new theoretical constructs.

Keywords: Ecospirituality, North East, Ecospiritualism, Mamang Dai, ethnography, folklore, Deep ecology, topography, ethnic identity

Sustainability, Civilization and Women- An Environmental Study of The Overstory by Richard Powers

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Nikita Gandotra1 & Dr Shuchi Agrawal2

1PhD scholar, Amity Institute of English Studies and Research, Amity University, Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India. Email: nikitagandotra55@gmail.com

2Associate Professor, Amity Institute of English Studies and Research, Amity University, Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India. Email: sagarwal2@amity.edu

 Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s10n6

Abstract

The Overstory by Richard Powers is a reflection of the environmental issues gripping the human civilization once ozone depletion and global warming loomed into focus. Global warming and an intensive exploration of environmental effects on the human civilization have gained significance over time and they persist to be eminent topic of debate in both local and global context. While Emerson and Thoreau pay serious literary attention in nineteenth-century America; Robert Frost engages with ecology in the twentieth century. Likewise contemporary American literature reflects the conflicts that surfaced due to the industrial and technological moves affecting the environment. Richard Powers’ novel forms an example how individuals and communities negotiate with these phenomena. There is nothing like Wordsworth and the English romanticists in fiction like The Overstory; there is nevertheless a romantic idealism in the characters whose engagement and commitment to environment and trees is portrayed by Powers. His reference to the Chipko movement is a gesture towards radical practical need and towards human commitment. Powers lets his character Mother N to affirm the strength of the Chipko women in India and the Kayapo Indians in Brazil, who stood up for trees. This strongly underlines the author’s intention:  women are central to civilization and sustainability. The paper aims to establish a relationship between sustainability and trees which symbolize life, and women who play a crucial role in sustaining both nature and civilization, in a sense, an ecofeminism.

Keywords: Richard Powers, The Overstory, Sustainability, Trees, Ecofeminism.

“Sense of Place and Sense of Planet”: Local-Planetary Experiences of Climate Change in Barbara Kingsolver’s Flight Behavior

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324 views

Sonam Jalan

Ph.D. Research Scholar, Bankura University, West Bengal. E-mail: sonam0726@gmail.com

 Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s10n5

Abstract

Climate change has become a harsh reality of our present times. It is happening here, there, and everywhere unbound by the spatial and temporal dimensions. The vacillating impact of such a global crisis equally demands multiple and concurrent scales in order to accurately comprehend the complexity of the problem. Borrowing the title of my paper from Ursula K. Heise’s book, Sense of Place and Sense of Planet: The Environmental Imagination of the Global, where she proposes the concept of ‘eco-cosmopolitanism’, this article aims at reflecting upon the globalization of the present ecocatastrophes, musing upon the local (the experiences of the working class people) and the global scale (Unnatural Migration and thereby extinction of the Monarch Butterflies) impact of the climate crisis. Ursula K. Heise believes that the ‘deterritorialization’ of the local knowledge is not always detrimental rather can open up new avenues into ecological consciousness. Giving consideration to a deterritorialised environmental vision my paper will fall back on Barbara Kingsolver’s Flight Behavior– a novel dealing with the eco-apocalypse, climate change and global warming. In providing a deeply humane account of the working people’s response to the local effects of the global crisis along with a poignant account of the impact on a planetary scale- the Migration of the Monarch Butterflies and their extinction, Kingsolver in this novel contextualizes the micro-geographically bounded human experience and memory within the larger context of the global Anthropocene thereby calling for a ‘sense of planet’ along with a ‘sense of place’- which get along with each other.

Keywords: Climate change, Eco-cosmopolitanism, Monarch Butterflies, Global warming, Anthropocene

Two Oils, One Evil: an Appraisal of Contemporary Dilemma of the Indigenous Population of Nigeria’s Oil-Delta Communities, 1956-2019

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Victor O. Ukaogo1 & Nwakuya Cecilia Ogechi2

1Department of History & International Studies, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Enugu State, Nigeria. Email: victor.ukaogo@unn.edu.ng

2Careers Unit (Registry Department), University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Nigeria. Email: Ogenwakuyah@yahoo.com

Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s32n3

 Abstract

This study examines the processes of economic transition and the corresponding impact on the Niger-Delta communities. It argues that the region has witnessed several epochs of economic transition; all of which came with damning consequences. While the major focus of the study is the change from palm oil to crude oil (two oils), the study explores the curious linkage between economic transitions, contemporary poverty and environmental violence in the region (one evil). The integration of the region into the vortex of oil globalization has paradoxically and inversely increased the poverty amongst the rural poor. The study argues that while the ‘oily debacle’ yield endless violence against the indigenous population, issues of environmental governance exacerbates. This is evidenced in the government’s militarized mediation strategies that worsen the prospects of peace in the enclave. Typical of ‘resource curse’ philosophy, the wealth from crude oil that should improve the lot of the rural poor has directly shut them out of the expected benefits of oil extraction. The study investigates and avers that the unholy alliance between the State and global capital is a challenge and concludes that capitalist exploitation of the region on account of crude oil explains the contemporary dilemma of the indigenous population.

Keywords: Niger-Delta; Globalization; Foreign Interest; Environmental Governance; Resource curse; Environmental security; Capitalist exploitation

Reconceiving the Ecological Wisdoms of Ved?nta in Anthropocene: An Eco-aesthetical Perspective

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Pankaj Kumar Verma1 & Prabha Shankar Dwivedi2

1Research Scholar, Indian Institute of Technology Tirupati, India. ORCID: 0000-0001-8952-7906. Email: hs18d002@iittp.ac.in

2Assistant Professor, Indian Institute of Technology Tirupati, India. ORCID: 0000-0003-1620-2830. Email: prabhas.dwivedi@iittp.ac.in

  Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s29n2

Abstract

The paper aims to lay out a critical analysis of eco-aesthetical wisdom of pan-Indian society through the lens of ancient seers whose insights for environment and ecology were shaped in the form of the teachings of Vedas and Upani?ads. With the passage of time, the bond between humans and non-humans has largely weakened, and humans have increased exploiting the natural resources without caring for their regeneration. Consequent nature bred hostility is emerging as a bigger crisis in front of the 21st Century world that may sooner turn to be, if not taken seriously, an existential crisis for the whole human race. The Upani?ads enlighten us not only with the knowledge of maintaining the relationship between human beings and physical environment but also among various inhabitants of ecology. Therefore, as Deep Ecology proposes, there should be a shift from human at the centre (anthropocentricism) to ecology at the centre (ecocentrism) which very much was existing in Indian society. So, this paper attempts to deal with the global ecological crisis co-opting with the ecological/environmental ideas and attitude of the classical Indian treatises.

Keywords: Ecology, Eco-aesthetics, Ved?nta, Upani?ads, Anthropocene, Ecocentricism

Retracing Deep Ecology in the reorientation of Naga identity with special reference to the select works of Easterine Kire Iralu

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470 views

Subhra Roy

Research Scholar, Department of English, Tripura University.  E-mail: suvizimu@gmail.com

  Volume 12, Number 5, 2020 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s17n5

Abstract

The Naga myth of origin underscores the co-existence of and the interconnectivity between the human and the natural world. It is believed that the Nagas once lived in Makhel and a tree stands there as the witness and symbol of Naga origin and unity. The Angami Nagas used to believe that before their dispersal to different parts of the world, three monoliths were erected at Makhrai-Rabu, and these structures represent the Tiger, the Man and the Spirit which stand for the flora and fauna, the human society and the spirit world. With the fall of the first monolith the destruction of the world is initiated and with the fall of the last one the earth witnesses complete doom. It has been reported that only one of these monoliths is standing erect, and it would not be too naive to say that it reminds us of the impending doom that perhaps has already been previewed in the form of natural disasters and other life threatening diseases. In the Naga cultural milieu, nature existed as an independent entity that breathed life into Naga myths, folklores and way of life. In short, it used to define the identity of the primordial Nagas, until their animist world view was replaced by that of Christianity. It was followed by the Indo-Naga conflict, and the Nagas were soon left with confused identities and crises that ran deep into their psyche. Easterine Kire Iralu, the author from Nagaland, tries to reorient the Naga identity by reclaiming the age-old myths and rituals.She tries to retrace the inherent Naga faith in deep ecology that gives equal importance to the distinct parts of the ecosystem that function as a whole.

 Keywords: co-existence, monoliths, ecosystem, Christianity, identity, deep ecology

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