Pub Date : 2022-10-19DOI: 10.1163/15685357-02603011
A. Power
A question that is not widely asked, but perhaps should be, is: how responsible are historians for today’s threats to much of life on earth? What part has been played by western historical constructions of the human past, the sense of temporality and meaning on which it has been based, and the ethical imperatives it encodes? In what ways has the modern, professionalised discipline, with its roots in Judeo-Christian universalism and ideas of historical exceptionalism, together with European imperial, enlightenment, and nationalist projects, taken possession of deep time and used it to delegitimise other ways of thinking about humans and the planetary past? How can thinking with deep time help historians to undo westernised modernity’s tight grip on space and time, and craft approaches to the past that give urgently needed room to all life and non-life, relationships, and possibilities?
{"title":"The History and Deep Time of Climate Crisis","authors":"A. Power","doi":"10.1163/15685357-02603011","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15685357-02603011","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 A question that is not widely asked, but perhaps should be, is: how responsible are historians for today’s threats to much of life on earth? What part has been played by western historical constructions of the human past, the sense of temporality and meaning on which it has been based, and the ethical imperatives it encodes? In what ways has the modern, professionalised discipline, with its roots in Judeo-Christian universalism and ideas of historical exceptionalism, together with European imperial, enlightenment, and nationalist projects, taken possession of deep time and used it to delegitimise other ways of thinking about humans and the planetary past? How can thinking with deep time help historians to undo westernised modernity’s tight grip on space and time, and craft approaches to the past that give urgently needed room to all life and non-life, relationships, and possibilities?","PeriodicalId":43776,"journal":{"name":"Worldviews-Global Religions Culture and Ecology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-10-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47725547","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-08-22DOI: 10.1163/15685357-02603001
P. Jain
{"title":"Ecocritical Analysis of Classics by Three Indian Film Maestros","authors":"P. Jain","doi":"10.1163/15685357-02603001","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15685357-02603001","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":43776,"journal":{"name":"Worldviews-Global Religions Culture and Ecology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-08-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42991020","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-07-18DOI: 10.1163/15685357-tat00002
George C. Nche, Lilly Nortjé-Meyer, Julia Blanc, K. I. Uwaegbute
At the height of the deadlocks around global climate change discussions and negotiations, Pope Francis made entry with a morally captivating encyclical letter (Laudato Si) on the Care for Creation. Using a scoping review approach, we focused on a five-year-old body of research around the encyclical, identifying impacts as well as other issues arising from the scholarly engagements. Here, 150 English written publications from 2015 to 2020 were reviewed. The majority of these texts (80 %) addressed the significance and vision of Laudato Si. The rest were distributed between those that presented criticisms of the letter (11 %) and those that gauged the impact of the letter on environmental worldviews (9 %). Second, the climate change (technological advancement)-poverty (climate justice) connection, which is the encyclical’s major focus, remains contested and inconclusive as some critics have rather found and presented a positive relationship between these variables. Third, Laudato Si has recorded a mixed impact. To some people, it has not only led to increased credibility of the Pope but also the increased concern for climate change, whereas to others, it has led to a decreased credibility of the Pope as well as a lessened concern for climate change. Fourth, studies gauging Laudato Si’s impact is geographically biased as they have largely focused on the US and Europe while neglecting other regions especially Africa. The implications of these findings for research and policy are discussed.
{"title":"Is the Pope’s Hope Being Dashed?","authors":"George C. Nche, Lilly Nortjé-Meyer, Julia Blanc, K. I. Uwaegbute","doi":"10.1163/15685357-tat00002","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15685357-tat00002","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 At the height of the deadlocks around global climate change discussions and negotiations, Pope Francis made entry with a morally captivating encyclical letter (Laudato Si) on the Care for Creation. Using a scoping review approach, we focused on a five-year-old body of research around the encyclical, identifying impacts as well as other issues arising from the scholarly engagements. Here, 150 English written publications from 2015 to 2020 were reviewed. The majority of these texts (80 %) addressed the significance and vision of Laudato Si. The rest were distributed between those that presented criticisms of the letter (11 %) and those that gauged the impact of the letter on environmental worldviews (9 %). Second, the climate change (technological advancement)-poverty (climate justice) connection, which is the encyclical’s major focus, remains contested and inconclusive as some critics have rather found and presented a positive relationship between these variables. Third, Laudato Si has recorded a mixed impact. To some people, it has not only led to increased credibility of the Pope but also the increased concern for climate change, whereas to others, it has led to a decreased credibility of the Pope as well as a lessened concern for climate change. Fourth, studies gauging Laudato Si’s impact is geographically biased as they have largely focused on the US and Europe while neglecting other regions especially Africa. The implications of these findings for research and policy are discussed.","PeriodicalId":43776,"journal":{"name":"Worldviews-Global Religions Culture and Ecology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-07-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42597427","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-02-28DOI: 10.1163/15685357-02601014
Kusumita P. Pedersen
{"title":"Thomas Berry: A Biography, by Mary Evelyn Tucker, John Grim, and Andrew Angyal","authors":"Kusumita P. Pedersen","doi":"10.1163/15685357-02601014","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15685357-02601014","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":43776,"journal":{"name":"Worldviews-Global Religions Culture and Ecology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-02-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46477354","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-02-25DOI: 10.1163/15685357-20221001
B. Golo, H. Majeed, N. O. Myles
In this paper, using ethnographic field data from three indigenous Akan communities, we show that Akan religious ontology about the natural world provides a formidable resource and framework for managing the environmentally destructive tendencies of the human being. We further prove that while these ontologies about the natural world emerge from the intense religiosity of the Akan and the metaphysical worldview of the indigenous Akan, they contain strong environmental ethical norms and values worth resourcing for environmental sustainability in Ghana. We, consequently, argue that significant attention ought to be paid to these religious ontologies—beliefs, norms and practices—of the indigenous Akan, as an effective means of achieving environmental sustainability. We, therefore, propose the resourcing and adoption of indigenous religious ontologies on the natural world that have the potential of informing and enhancing environmental policies and initiatives towards environmental sustainability in Ghana.
{"title":"Akan Religious Ontology and Environmental Sustainability in Ghana","authors":"B. Golo, H. Majeed, N. O. Myles","doi":"10.1163/15685357-20221001","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15685357-20221001","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 In this paper, using ethnographic field data from three indigenous Akan communities, we show that Akan religious ontology about the natural world provides a formidable resource and framework for managing the environmentally destructive tendencies of the human being. We further prove that while these ontologies about the natural world emerge from the intense religiosity of the Akan and the metaphysical worldview of the indigenous Akan, they contain strong environmental ethical norms and values worth resourcing for environmental sustainability in Ghana. We, consequently, argue that significant attention ought to be paid to these religious ontologies—beliefs, norms and practices—of the indigenous Akan, as an effective means of achieving environmental sustainability. We, therefore, propose the resourcing and adoption of indigenous religious ontologies on the natural world that have the potential of informing and enhancing environmental policies and initiatives towards environmental sustainability in Ghana.","PeriodicalId":43776,"journal":{"name":"Worldviews-Global Religions Culture and Ecology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-02-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44897973","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-02-18DOI: 10.1163/15685357-20211211
Jenny L Mace, S. McCulloch
Yoga is a spiritual discipline originating from ancient India. Most notably, yoga has links with Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism. This research explores UK yoga teachers’ attitudes toward plant-based diets and beliefs about the moral status of farmed animals. It uses qualitative interviews as the second phase of a mixed-methodology study. In the first phase, an online questionnaire found that over two thirds of UK yoga teachers believed a plant-based diet was most aligned with their yoga practice due to the teaching of ahimsa, or non-harm. Nevertheless, over 70 % were not following a plant-based diet. Interviews revealed this dissonance was related to views about the necessity of consuming animal products for health, especially when pregnant, breastfeeding, or nourishing growing children. The communal nature of eating also meant that family moderated dietary ideals. Interviews further revealed an alternative conception of ahimsa, permitting the consumption of animals in order to prioritize personal non-harm.
{"title":"Yoga Teachers on Consuming Animals","authors":"Jenny L Mace, S. McCulloch","doi":"10.1163/15685357-20211211","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15685357-20211211","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Yoga is a spiritual discipline originating from ancient India. Most notably, yoga has links with Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism. This research explores UK yoga teachers’ attitudes toward plant-based diets and beliefs about the moral status of farmed animals. It uses qualitative interviews as the second phase of a mixed-methodology study. In the first phase, an online questionnaire found that over two thirds of UK yoga teachers believed a plant-based diet was most aligned with their yoga practice due to the teaching of ahimsa, or non-harm. Nevertheless, over 70 % were not following a plant-based diet. Interviews revealed this dissonance was related to views about the necessity of consuming animal products for health, especially when pregnant, breastfeeding, or nourishing growing children. The communal nature of eating also meant that family moderated dietary ideals. Interviews further revealed an alternative conception of ahimsa, permitting the consumption of animals in order to prioritize personal non-harm.","PeriodicalId":43776,"journal":{"name":"Worldviews-Global Religions Culture and Ecology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-02-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45123402","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-02-02DOI: 10.1163/15685357-20211206
Dhivan Thomas Jones
Some scholars have argued that early Buddhism offers little theoretical support for an environmental ethics because it regards nature as having no intrinsic value, since it is impermanent and unsatisfactory. I disagree, and argue that the mythic context of the Buddha’s life-story shows the Buddha in an intimate relationship with nature, and gaining Awakening while dependent on it. The Bodhi tree is not just a sacred tree but a symbol of the place of Awakening and a version of the Tree of Life. The mythical snakes or nāgas who support and encourage the Bodhisattva on his way to the Bodhi tree represent chthonic powers of living nature. The Earth Goddess who appears to witness the Bodhisattva’s practice of the perfections represents a culmination of this relationship. Her image derives historically from the Greek goddess Gaia. Nature therefore has an intrinsic value in relation to Awakening.
{"title":"The Tree, the Snake and the Goddess","authors":"Dhivan Thomas Jones","doi":"10.1163/15685357-20211206","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15685357-20211206","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Some scholars have argued that early Buddhism offers little theoretical support for an environmental ethics because it regards nature as having no intrinsic value, since it is impermanent and unsatisfactory. I disagree, and argue that the mythic context of the Buddha’s life-story shows the Buddha in an intimate relationship with nature, and gaining Awakening while dependent on it. The Bodhi tree is not just a sacred tree but a symbol of the place of Awakening and a version of the Tree of Life. The mythical snakes or nāgas who support and encourage the Bodhisattva on his way to the Bodhi tree represent chthonic powers of living nature. The Earth Goddess who appears to witness the Bodhisattva’s practice of the perfections represents a culmination of this relationship. Her image derives historically from the Greek goddess Gaia. Nature therefore has an intrinsic value in relation to Awakening.","PeriodicalId":43776,"journal":{"name":"Worldviews-Global Religions Culture and Ecology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-02-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43712275","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-01-24DOI: 10.1163/15685357-20211210
Nora Ward
I explore the environmental philosophy of Irish philosopher-poet, John Moriarty, particularly focusing on his use of narrative to convey philosophical principles and ideals relating to a sustainable co-existence. It is through story that Moriarty redirects environmental philosophy from a domain of knowledge in an epistemic objectivist sense to one of imagination, inviting the reader to experientially cultivate categories of perception and identification that supplement and transcend dominant forms of scientific-reductionism. Moriarty’s philomythical approach attests to an inherent strangeness, invoking those aspects of reality that lie outside the causal paradigms of human understanding, and problematizing a posture of human hubris in relation to the land. To draw out these characteristics, I locate Moriarty’s work in the framework of ontopoetics, suggesting that Moriarty is an environment animateur of sorts, opening up the symbolic and poetic potential of the landscape, and fostering relations of meaningful engagement with the natural world.
{"title":"Ontopoetics and the Environmental Philosophy of John Moriarty","authors":"Nora Ward","doi":"10.1163/15685357-20211210","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15685357-20211210","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 I explore the environmental philosophy of Irish philosopher-poet, John Moriarty, particularly focusing on his use of narrative to convey philosophical principles and ideals relating to a sustainable co-existence. It is through story that Moriarty redirects environmental philosophy from a domain of knowledge in an epistemic objectivist sense to one of imagination, inviting the reader to experientially cultivate categories of perception and identification that supplement and transcend dominant forms of scientific-reductionism. Moriarty’s philomythical approach attests to an inherent strangeness, invoking those aspects of reality that lie outside the causal paradigms of human understanding, and problematizing a posture of human hubris in relation to the land. To draw out these characteristics, I locate Moriarty’s work in the framework of ontopoetics, suggesting that Moriarty is an environment animateur of sorts, opening up the symbolic and poetic potential of the landscape, and fostering relations of meaningful engagement with the natural world.","PeriodicalId":43776,"journal":{"name":"Worldviews-Global Religions Culture and Ecology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2022-01-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44938984","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-11-26DOI: 10.1163/15685357-20210901
Tanhum Yoreh
The prevailing stance in Jewish orthodoxy is that environmental issues are extra-legal and not under the purview of halakhah (Jewish law). While considered important, environmental protection falls only under “midat haḥasidut” (extraordinary piety). This ultimately translates into environmental protection being treated as non-obligatory and only under the purview of righteous behavior rather than obligation. This has created a significant barrier to halakhically driven environmental decision-making. I argue that this worldview emerges from the process of conceptualizing the prohibition of bal tashḥit—“waste not,” the prohibition against wastefulness originating in Deuteronomy 20:19. This verse gave rise to two worldviews: one which was prioritized of not destroying the environment out of compassion for the non-human world, and another marginalized worldview that emphasized a self-concerned environmentalism which equates harm to the environment as self-harm. Privileging this latter worldview creates a pathway to advance Jewish legal discourse and align it with mainstream environmentalism.
{"title":"Compassion and Self-Concern in Halakhic Environmental Decision-Making","authors":"Tanhum Yoreh","doi":"10.1163/15685357-20210901","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15685357-20210901","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 The prevailing stance in Jewish orthodoxy is that environmental issues are extra-legal and not under the purview of halakhah (Jewish law). While considered important, environmental protection falls only under “midat haḥasidut” (extraordinary piety). This ultimately translates into environmental protection being treated as non-obligatory and only under the purview of righteous behavior rather than obligation. This has created a significant barrier to halakhically driven environmental decision-making. I argue that this worldview emerges from the process of conceptualizing the prohibition of bal tashḥit—“waste not,” the prohibition against wastefulness originating in Deuteronomy 20:19. This verse gave rise to two worldviews: one which was prioritized of not destroying the environment out of compassion for the non-human world, and another marginalized worldview that emphasized a self-concerned environmentalism which equates harm to the environment as self-harm. Privileging this latter worldview creates a pathway to advance Jewish legal discourse and align it with mainstream environmentalism.","PeriodicalId":43776,"journal":{"name":"Worldviews-Global Religions Culture and Ecology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2021-11-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42952979","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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