Earthcare: Women and the Environment / Edition 1

by Carolyn Merchant

Overview

Written by one of the leading thinkers in environmentalism, Earthcare brings together Merchant's existing work on the topic of women and the environment as well as updated and new essays. Earthcare looks at age-old historical associations of women with nature, beginning with Eve and continuing through to environmental activists of today, women's commitment to environmental conservation, and the problematic assumptions of women as caregivers and men as dominating nature.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780415908887
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	11/06/1995
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	304
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)
Age Range:	18 Years

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations and Tables, Acknowledgements, Introduction: Women and the Environment, PART ONE THEORY, PART TWO HISTORY, PART THREE PRACTICE, Conclusion. Partnership Ethics: Earthcare for a New Millennium, Notes, Index

Editorial Reviews

Virginia Scharff has used the word "embryonic" to describe the field of women's environmental history ("Are Earth Girls Easy? Ecofeminism, Women's History and Environmental History," Journal of Women's History, Summer 1995). According to Scharff, the melding of gender analysis and environmental history was "singlehandedly" brought to the forefront of women's studies by historian Merchant in her "pathbreaking" work, The Death of Nature: Ecology and the Scientific Revolution (Harper & Row, 1980). In this work, Merchant continues her exploration of the "association of women with nature in Western culture and their roles in the contemporary environmental movement." Earthcare is a blend of some of Merchant's previously published work with the addition of several new essays; it begins with the myth and association of nature as female (Gaia) and fallen from grace (Eve). The greatest strength of Earthcare is its recounting of women's environmental history during the last 100 years. Highly recommended for academic women's studies and environmental history collections.Susan Maret, Univ. of Colorado Lib., Denver

Library Journal

Tells of life in the northeast Florida frontier country in the early decades of this century, based on the recollections of Hughie and Oleta Oesterreicher. They recount their childhoods, courtship, early years of marriage, and their struggles during the Depression. No index. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews

"Earthcare: Women and the Environment is an important book because it provides historical context as well as calling for an environment ehtic that promotes the well-bing of both human and nonhuman life." — Environment
"A leading ecofeminist thinker...She challenges humankind to rethink the way the Western world has conceptualized its relationship with nature." — Environmental Law
"This well-selected one-volume compilation of the work of a leading woman scholar in environmental ethics and history will prove useful to the general reader and to classes in environmental history and ethics and women's studies." — Pacific Historical Review
"A collection of essays covering all of Merchant's work to date, Earthcare offers an impressive range of analyses which represent the best of ecofeminist argument: historically situated, complexly argued, and sesitive to questions of cultural, racial, and class difference...Besides a fine example of the illuminating nature of the best environmental history, the book would be especially appropriate for classes in history of science, American Studies, and ecofeminism." — Environmental History
"Earthcare provides the reader with a thoughtful accounting of how various cultural and scientific depictions of women/nature over time contain positive, negative, and problematic implications for women's (and men's) attempts to forge a stronger partnership with the nonhuman world...Earthcare represents an engaging and highly readable—yet theoretically challenging—ecofeminist work that will be of value to anyone with interests in the field of women's studies, ecophilosophy, or political economy. Suitable for use in either undergraduate or graduate courses, Merchant's book offers students a more interdisciplinary and organic framework for understanding the gendered complexities of our ecological crisis." — Humanity and Society
"I urge you to buy and read this book." — Bob J. Baker, Mountain State Sierran
"Earthcare is as rewarding as its evocative title suggests...[This] is a rich collection of essays on feminism and the environment...Earthcare should be required reading for any environmentalist." — Ethics and the Environment

From the Publisher