The Colors of Nature: Culture, Identity, and the Natural World
Our perception of nature is a cultural construct formed in part by nature writing, which has long been dominated by Euro-American voices. The exclusion of writings by people of color about place, nature's wonders, and our species' uncanny ability to wreak havoc on the natural world has skewed and limited the genre, and cheated society out of a fuller understanding of the connection between social injustice and environmental destruction. Coeditors Deming, a poet and nature writer, and Savoy, a geologist, begin to remedy this omission with their unprecedented and invaluable collection of forthright and bracing essays by writers of "diverse cultural origins and disciplinary backgrounds." Jamaica Kincaid and Francisco X. Alarcon write about nature and imperialism in the "New" World. American Indian writer Joseph Bruchac writes about owls, turkeys, turtles, and protecting his ancestors' burial grounds from developers. Memories of her Kentucky hill childhood inspire bell hooks to portray nature-wise "country black folks," while poets and scientists ardently and knowledgeably discuss everything from parrots to ethnobotany, and environmental racism. A salient contribution to the increasingly important nature-writing canon.Donna SeamanCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.