Staying with the Trouble with Wilderness: Reworking Nature and Culture in the Plantationocene

Jordan Johnson
Additional contact information
Jordan Johnson: Southwestern University, 1001 E. University Ave, Georgetown, Texas, United States

Journal of Posthumanism, 2022, vol. 2, issue 3, 229–247

Abstract: This essay analyzes the use of fire on Upland Island Wilderness Area (UIW) to examine how postindustrial wilderness sites rework operative notions of nature, wildness, and preservation within U.S. environmental thinking and politics. Postindustrial wilderness areas complicate conceptualizations of nature as pristine, unspoiled, or even beautiful, challenging us to address biodiversity and ecosystem function in ways that are less centered on human(ist) values. An intensively managed pine plantation prior to wilderness designation, UIW blatantly transgresses liberal humanist boundaries of nature and culture, ecology and industry. I draw on feminist and posthumanist theory to demonstrate how contestations surrounding the use of fire on UIW resituate ethical and epistemic implications of wilderness management, offering a critical counterpoint to the prioritization of pristine nature within U.S. environmental politics and demanding less humanist approaches to the complex forest ecologies of the plantationocene.

Keywords: Feminist posthumanist theory; Naturecultures; Plantationocene; Wilderness management (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.tplondon.com/jp/article/view/1704/2002 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:mig:jpjrnl:v:2:y:2022:i:3:p:229-247

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://journals.tpl ... ormation/librarians/

DOI: 10.33182/joph.v2i3.1704

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Posthumanism is currently edited by S meyra Buran, agdas Dedeoglu, Yunus Tuncel and Pelin K mbet

More articles in Journal of Posthumanism from Transnational Press London, UK
Bibliographic data for series maintained by TPLondon ().