Ecocriticism and Indigenous Studies

Subtitle
Conversations from Earth to Cosmos

Edited by Salma Monani and Joni Adamson

This book addresses the intersections between the interdisciplinary realms of ecocriticism and indigenous and Native American studies, and between academic theory and pragmatic eco-activism conducted by multiethnic and indigenous communities. It illuminates the multi-layered, polyvocal ways in which artistic expressions render ecological connections, drawing on scholars working in collaboration with Indigenous artists from all walks of life, including film, literature, performance, and other forms of multimedia to expand existing conversations.

Both local and global in its focus, the volume includes essays from multiethnic and indigenous communities across the world, visiting topics such as Navajo opera, Sami film production history, south Indian tribal documentary, Maori art installations, Native American and First Nations science-fiction literature and film, Amazonian poetry, and many others. Highlighting trans-indigenous sensibilities that speak to worldwide crises of environmental politics and action against marginalization, the collection alerts readers to movements of community resilience and resistance, cosmological thinking about inter- and intra-generational multi-species relations, and understandings of indigenous aesthetics and material ecologies. It engages with emerging environmental concepts such as multispecies ethnography, cosmopolitics, and trans-indigeneity, as well as with new areas of ecocritical research such as material ecocriticism, biosemiotics, and media studies.

In its breadth and scope, this book promises new directions for ecocritical thought and environmental humanities practice, providing thought-provoking insight into what it means to be human in a locally situated, globally networked, and cosmologically complex world.

Bio

Joni Adamson is professor of English at Arizona State University, where she directs the Environmental Humanities Initiative and is a Senior Sustainability Scholar in the Julie Ann Wrigley Global Institute of Sustainability. She is also affiliate faculty of ASU's Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing and the School for the Future of Innovation in Society.