Is Emile in the Garden of Eden? Western ideologies of nature

Abstract

This paper will explore ideologies of nature including the 'Garden of Eden' and 'wildernesses'. It locates these ideologies as morphing to accommodate the later trajectory of the Enlightenment Project and its endorsement of modern Western scientific and technological principles. Beginning with the premise that nature is unknowable, this paper offers a critique of dominant Western cultural ideologies that function to domesticate and order nature. This goes hand in hand with ideologies and practices of domination and control in the name of scientific, technological and capitalist neo-liberal economic 'development'. The assumption that the boundary between nature and humans is crossable through scientific and technological knowledge is one that can be explored and challenged by examining how such knowledge is from the outset ideologically constructed. This paper will look at the concept of alienation from nature (as expressed by Jean-Jacques Rousseau in 'Emile' and Karl Marx) to explore how modern schooling and the capitalist economy shape human-nature relations.

The Natural World in Western Thought

“…All these ideas, with different nuances, are indebted to the positivist assumption that nature exists somewhere out there [2], as an entity separate from humans. It represents an outer world to which we can have truthful access through science, opening the way to a sort of cognitive appropriation [13], which desacralizes nature, the way we perceive nature, and the way we perceive ourselves [14]. As is well known, this dichotomy, splitting human and nature, found its modern expression in the thought of René Descartes.…”

Deliverable D4.1 Overall communication strategy, including an outline of the SHOWCASE narrative

“…Additionally, during the Enlightenment, there was an ontological construction of nature and humanity as separate categories. Following this intellectual tradition nature was also considered as a passive object, separated from 'man', that could be understood under rational laws, but also treated as a resource that can be exploited to extract the most from it (Tulloch, 2015). Industrial agriculture was framed on the idea of progress and control over nature, characterized by mechanistic relationships (Sanford, 2011).…”

Storytelling as an Educational Tool in Sustainable Education

“…The holistic way of thinking seems to be more common in aboriginal population groups than in mainstream society. Some researchers, such as Herman [55], Tulloch [56], and Wolff [57], argue that the mainstream Western way of thinking today is a result of the scientific revolution and Christianity, dominated by a philosophy where nature is perceived as an object to be controlled by technology. This development through the centuries has led to a disconnection between traditional knowledge, culture, and science, and that is why aboriginal cultures have a slightly different view of the sustainability concept than the mainstream Western cultures, according to Throsby & Petetskaya [58].…”