A way with nature: notes on methodology

Abstract

This essay inquires into the status of the category of nature in contemporary critical theory of culture, as well as the possible environmental consequences of the interpretation of nature representations. By introducing environmental issues to literary analysis, I wish to draw attention to alternative approaches to ‘the natural’ in the frame of our critical methodologies and pedagogic practices. I borrow Antonio Gramsci's formulations of the ‘organic intellectual’ in order to suggest connections between teachers and the concept of nature, and between Marxist conceptions of nature/culture and contemporary environmental decline. What could ‘the natural’ be for the present theory of culture? What could be considered ‘natural’ in the ways we teach, interpret and teach interpretation?

Keywords:

• cultural studies
• environmentalism
• Gramsci
• intellectual history
• Kafka
• literary eco-criticism
• Marxism
• nature
• pedagogy