Ecocriticism as a Call to Action

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Ecocriticism emerged not just as another academic discipline, but as a fundamentally different way of thinking about literature's relationship to the world we inhabit. As Cohen explains, this field refuses the luxury of detached analysis: "by definition, ecological literary criticism must be engaged. It wants to know but also wants to do… Ecocriticism needs to inform personal and political actions, in the same way that feminist criticism was able to do only a few decades ago" (Cohen 27; qtd. in Slovic 3). This isn't scholarship for scholarship's sake—it's scholarship with skin in the game.

The urgency behind this approach becomes clear when we consider our daily reality. "The modern thinking person, daily confronted with new information about natural and social disasters, is confronted as well with incessant ethical decisions: how to consume goods and services, how to travel from home to the office, how to communicate concerns to public officials, how to allocate money to a dizzying array of worthy causes" (Slovic 4). Every choice feels weighted with consequence, every action a potential betrayal of our values or the planet itself.

But here's where ecocriticism offers something more nuanced than guilt-ridden paralysis. The field embraces what E.B. White captured perfectly: "I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve (or save) the world and a desire to enjoy (or savor) the world. This makes it hard to plan the day" (qtd. in Slovic 4). The response? Don't choose. "Plan to do both" (Slovic 4). This isn't naive optimism—it's recognition that sustainable engagement requires joy alongside responsibility.

What makes ecocriticism distinct is its fundamental orientation toward life itself. "We are an inventive, imaginative species this is our nature. But we can apply our minds and our physical energy in sustaining or destructive ways" (Slovic 6). The field positions itself clearly: it "tries to be 'on the side of life'" and seeks to "make 'fresh and resilient forms' in order to extend 'the possibilities of being alive'" (Slovic 6). This isn't just about analyzing texts—it's about using literature as a tool for imagining better ways of being in the world.

The scope of ecocriticism itself reflects this ambitious vision. The term encompasses both "the study of nature writing by way of any scholarly approach" and "the scrutiny of ecological implications and human-nature relationships in any literary text, even texts that seem (at first glance) oblivious of the nonhuman world" (Slovic 27). Nothing escapes its purview because everything connects to the ecological web we're embedded within.

Perhaps most importantly, ecocriticism rejects the ivory tower mentality that quarantines academic work from real-world concerns. "Literature is a lens through which we're able to sharpen our understanding of the world's vital problems—and literary criticism the mechanism for articulating what we come to understand. The 'literary critic' is not quarantined in the realm of textual analysis, restricted from striking out to take stands on public issues and tell stories about life" (8). As Hans argues, "literature does not exist in its own discrete space, so to limit our discussions of it to its 'literariness' is to denude it of its crucial links to the other systems that combine to articulate our sense of values" (qtd. in Slovic 8).

This integrated approach—combining "narratives of engagement and retreat" (Slovic 7)—offers a model for scholarship that doesn't just analyze the world but actively participates in shaping it. The goal isn't to produce more academic graffiti marking "I was here" (Slovic 9), but to create work that inspires others "to recommit themselves to the issues, places, people, and writings that matter most to them" and "to live up to their own visions of responsive and responsible citizenship" (Slovic 9).

In essence, ecocriticism represents literature's attempt to break free from what could be called academic anthropocentrism—the tendency toward "interiority and human-centeredness" (Slovic 137) that characterizes much literary scholarship. Instead, it insists that our reading practices must expand to include the more-than-human world, not as backdrop but as active participant in the stories that shape our understanding of what it means to be alive on this planet.

Work Cited:

Slovic, Scott. Going Away to Think: Engagement, Retreat, and Ecocritical Responsibility. University of Nevada Press, 2008.