This book explores the development and significance of an Earth-oriented progressive approach to fostering global wellbeing and inclusive societies in an era of climate change and uncertainty.
Developing Earthly Attachments in the Anthropocene examines the ways in which the Earth has become a source of political, social, and cultural theory in times of global climate change. The book explains how the Earth contributes to the creation of a regenerative culture, drawing examples from the Netherlands and Iceland. These examples offer understandings of how legacies of non-respectful exploitative practices culminating in the rapid post-war growth of global consumption have resulted in impacts on the ecosystem, highlighting the challenges of living with planet Earth. The book familiarizes readers with the implied agencies of the Earth which become evident in our reliance on the carbon economy – a factor of modern-day globalized capitalism responsible for global environmental change and emergency. It also suggests ways to inspire and develop new ways of spatial sense making for those seeking earthly attachments.
Offering novel theoretical and practical insights for politically active people, this book will appeal to those involved in local and national policy making processes. It will also be of interest to academics and students of geography, political science, and environmental sciences.
1. Fluid Being 2. Mumbling Mud 3. Where to Start 4. Changing Mindsets – (Re)-Value Life 5. Changed Practices 6. ‘Be Kind to Earth It Gives Us Chocolate’ 7. Earthly Attachments
Biography
Edward H. Huijbens is a geographer and graduate of Durham University, England. He chairs Wageningen University’s research group in cultural geography. Edward works on tourism theory, issues of regional development, landscape perceptions, the role of transport in tourism and polar tourism.
"This book is a penetrating attempt to understand the ontological transformations through which meaning comes to matter and mattering comes to mean. Through telling the story of how the Earth and the Humans are speaking to each other, through self-referential mappings Iceland and the Netherlands Edward manages to complete an excursion into the taboo-laden lands of understanding, a visit to the void beyond the limits of language."
- Gunnar Olsson, Professor Emeritus, Department of Social and Economic Geography, Uppsala University, Sweden
"The Age of Humans, the Anthropocene, not only involves escalating human refashioning of Earth, conflating in the process categories for long seen as one of the cornerstones of Western thought, the notions of nature and society. It also implies strong human attachments to both place and "deep" time, to the material world, the planet "itself", and their histories. Huijbens skilfully addresses these vital attachments, outlining the framing of geosocial bonds in current social and environmental theory. Quite appropriately, the theoretical discussion is complimented by meaningful cases studies and personal reflexion. Earthly attachments, as the author shows, are not only facts of life in the current Anthropocene with all its threats to life as we know it, they need to be carefully studied, developed, and nurtured. Well written and well thought, this book has much to offer for all those who are interested in the state and future of natural history, environmental humanities, and planetary science."
- Gísli Pálsson, Professor Emeritus, Department of Anthropology, University of Iceland
