58勛圖

Further information on which modules are specific to your programme.

Module description

This module invites us to engage with nature and place as crucial forces that shape our understanding and experience of world politics. It is not a module about climate change, sustainability, ecology, or nature writing, though aspects of these will emerge in discussions each week. Rather, the module asks: How have scholars considered the natural world in their analyses of violence, peace, and politics? How are nature and place represented and how do those representations inform our understanding of relationships, communities, and hierarchies? What role does the human play in these narratives? Ultimately, what do we talk about when we talk about nature and place and what kind of politics is the politics of nature and place? Drawing from interdisciplinary texts that address both scholarly audiences and readers outside the academy, the reading list, activities, and assessments associated with this module invite students to not only think about politics, nature and place, but also feel and experience these questions in their lives.

Intended learning outcomes

• Analyze how different narratives about the natural world define and engage with politics and the political
• Engage with different ways of thinking and writing about humans, non-humans, and their relationships in the study of politics
• Apply critical lenses, including but not limited to intersectional feminist, anti-racist, indigenous, and decolonial perspectives, to the understanding of nature and its representations
• Examine how contemporary social movements articulate, enact, and challenge various understandings of the politics of nature
• Locate not only the mechanisms of human destruction and extraction of nature, but also the potential for symbiotic relationships and the sites of care, beauty, joy, and thriving
• Practice reflexivity and experiential learning about nature through field trips and observation