Environmental Humanities South: Decolonizing Nature in Highland Asia

Dan Smyer Yü (), Ambika Aiyadurai (), Mamang Dai, Razzeko Delley, Rashila Deshar, Iftekhar Iqbal, Chi Huyen Truong, Bhargabi Das, Mongfing Lepcha, Thinley Dema, Madan Koirala, Zainab Khalid and Zhen Ma
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Dan Smyer Yü: School of Ethnology & Sociology, Yunnan University, Kunming 650091, China
Ambika Aiyadurai: Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar, Palaj 322055, India
Mamang Dai: Independent Researcher, Papum Pare 791111, India
Razzeko Delley: Jomin Tayeng Government Model Degree College, Lower Dibang Valley 792110, India
Rashila Deshar: Central Department of Environmental Science, Tribhuvan University, Kathmandu 44618, Nepal
Iftekhar Iqbal: Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, The Universiti Brunei Darussalam, Jalan Tungku Link, Gadong, Bandar Seri Begawan BE1410, Brunei
Chi Huyen Truong: Secretariat, The Himalayan University Consortium Kathmandu, Lalitpur 44700, Nepal
Bhargabi Das: School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Shiv Nadar University, Gautam Buddh Nagar District 201314, India
Mongfing Lepcha: Department of Anthropology, Sikkim University, Gangtok 737102, India
Thinley Dema: Faculty of Social Sciences, Royal Thimphu College, Thimphu 11001, Bhutan
Madan Koirala: Central Department of Environmental Science, Tribhuvan University, Kathmandu 44618, Nepal
Zainab Khalid: Department of Geography, University of Bonn, 53001 Bonn, Germany
Zhen Ma: Institute of National Culture Research, Dali University, Dali 671003, China

Challenges, 2025, vol. 16, issue 2, 1-19

Abstract: We, a group of native scholars based in the Himalayan region, co-author this article to propose an environmental humanities South—concurrently as an Asia-specific interdisciplinary field and a planetary human–nature epistemology of the Global South inextricably entwined with that of the Global North. Framed in the broader field of planetary health, this article begins with a perspectival shift by reconceptualizing the Global South and the Global North as the Planetary South and the Planetary North for the purpose of laying the epistemological groundwork for two interconnected arguments and subsequent discussions. First, the Planetary South is not merely epistemological, but is at once geographically epistemological and epistemologically geographical. Our debates with the currently dominant epistemologies of the South open up a decolonial conversation with what we call the Australian School of the environmental humanities, the initial seed bank of our interdisciplinary environmental work in Asia’s Planetary South. These multilayered epistemological debates and conversations lead to the second argument that the South and the North relate to one another simultaneously in symbiotic and paradoxical terms. Through these two arguments, the article addresses the conundrum of what we call the “postcolonial continuation of the colonial environmentality” and attempts to interweave the meaningful return of the eroding Himalayan native knowledges of nature with modern scientific findings in a way that appreciates the livingness of the earth and is inclusive of nonwestern environmental worldviews.

Keywords: Himalayas; environmental humanities South; epistemologies of the South; decolonizing nature (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A00 C00 Z00 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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