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Abstract
In this article, ecosexuality – as popularized by activist-artists Beth Stephens and Annie Sprinkle – is explored through archaeological and genealogical means. Through an archaeological lens, what emerges is that ecosexuality, notwithstanding its provocative appearance, follows in the discursive footsteps of thinkers associated with critical environmental thought, such as Herbert Marcuse of the Frankfurt School and the materialist ecofeminist Ariel Salleh. Briefly, ecosexuality features the emergence of erotic nature as a discursive object entailing motifs either explicit or implicit in the work of the above thinkers. However, through a genealogical lens, what emerges is that ecosexuality undermines the difference it might otherwise entail by remaining entangled in the discourses and subjectivities associated with what Michel Foucault terms the deployment of sexuality. This results in some profound contradictions that ecosexual scholars and activists need to engage with far more critically than they have done to date, to avoid the movement reaching an impasse.
disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1 Throughout this article the word nature is used in a tentative sense, seeing as it is a linguistic construct that has served to artificially separate humankind from the rest of the environment of which the species nonetheless forms a part. However, given the culturally ingrained usage of the term it is employed here – but keeping the above caveat in mind at all times.
2 Stephens and Sprinkle, “Earthy.”
3 Sprinkle and Stephens.
4 Allain and Harvie 68.
5 See, for example, Babbling Brooke; A Face for Radio.
6 See, for example, Konik and Konik; A. Konik; I. Konik.
7 Foucault, “Subject” 336.
8 Idem, Will 156.
9 Idem, “What is Enlightenment?” 315.
10 Idem, Archaeology 45–46.
11 Ibid. 47.
12 Matthews 56. Further, as Evelleen Richards explains, “[f]rom his earliest to his last published references to progressive organic development, Erasmus Darwin relied explicitly on the powerful appeal of the gestation metaphor […] He attributed a common origin not just for warm-blooded animals, but for all living things,” maintaining in The Temple of Nature that “[l]ife was born from nature’s womb” (Richards 66).
13 Green 148–49.
14 Moine 93.
15 Ross 16.
16 Marcuse, Eros 142, 164–65.
17 Idem, “Art” 119; idem, “Jerusalem” 155.
18 Schweppenhäuser, “Afterword” 251.
19 Marcuse, “Art” 119.
20 Kellner 24.
21 Marcuse, Eros 94.
22 Idem, One-Dimensional Man 76.
23 Idem, Eros 40.
24 Kellner 24.
25 Marcuse, Eros 201.
26 Ibid. 216.
27 Ibid.
28 Salleh, “From Metabolic Rift” 208, 210–12.
29 Idem, “Nature” 27.
30 Idem, “On Production” 211.
31 Mellor 255.
32 Salleh, Ecofeminism 133.
33 Idem, “On Production” 213.
34 Ibid. 215.
35 Ibid. 211.
36 Foucault, Archaeology 46.
37 Anderlini-D’Onofrio.
38 Stephens, “An Introduction.”
39 Reed; Morris 36–38, 58–60, 70, 167–69, 185–87. Admittedly, an irreconcilable tension exists between ecofeminism and cyborg feminism, on account of how the former’s technological skepticism contrasts with the latter’s embrace of the mutual becoming and intertwining of humans and machines (see, on the one hand, Salleh, “Ecosocialism” 28, 33–34, and, on the other, Morris 167–69).
40 Gaard 175.
41 Foucault, “The Father’s ‘No’” 9.
42 Idem, This is Not a Pipe 37.
43 Nietzsche 309.
44 Meecham and Sheldon 245.
45 Ibid.
46 Morris 7.
47 “Podcast Interview.”
48 Morris 2.
49 Stephens and Sprinkle, “Ecosex.”
50 Reed.
51 Weadick 90.
52 Stephens and Sprinkle, “Ecosex.”
53 Some ecosexual advocates even actively promote the joining of humans and machines, or at the very least they accept as a fact of life the presence of technology and technologically driven societal developments (see, for example, Morris 167–68). Indeed, in an interview, Stephens and Sprinkle themselves admit that the ecosexual movement is heavily if not entirely dependent on technology for marketing purposes, but still, they personally appear to remain quite conflicted about technology and its impacts in general (see, for example, “Podcast Interview”).
54 In GGM Stephens and Sprinkle thematize how cruelly technology is put to use in the area in which Stephens grew up, where mountaintop removal is being pursued for the sake of profit regardless of the long-term negative social and environmental impacts. They also place in the spotlight the problem of ordinary (often poor) people’s reliance on such invasive technologies for their continued livelihood. For instance, they include in their film scenes of protest carried out by coalmining employees against increased environmental regulation. In this way, Stephens and Sprinkle show how the capitalist system positions individuals in such a way that to survive or do well they need to be complicit with it and its resource-extractive orientation.
55 Stephens, “When I Knew” 8.
56 Reed.
57 Ibid.
58 Morris 187.
59 Mellor 255.
60 Miljkovic.
61 GreenRevolutionWV, Goodbye Gauley Mountain.
62 Kellner 24.
63 Salleh, “Nature” 22.
64 Marcuse, Eros 201.
65 Stephens qtd in Augsburg 22; Stephens and Sprinkle, “Dirty Sexecology.”
66 Marcuse, Eros 201.
67 When positioning ecosexuality, Stephens criticizes not only heteronormative society but the gay and lesbian community too. She argues, for example, that unlike ecosexuality, this community has remained rather ignorant of very serious, fundamental environmental problems, focusing as it does, in anthropocentric fashion, almost exclusively on the issue of rights (see GreenRevolutionWV, Filmmaker).
68 Stephens and Sprinkle, “Ecosex.”
69 Foucault, “Discourse” 234.
70 Idem, Discipline 27.
71 Idem, “Truth” 121.
72 Ibid. 125.
73 Idem, Discipline 3–6.
74 Ibid. 10–11, 58–60.
75 Ibid. 7.
76 Ibid. 137.
77 Ibid.
78 Ibid. 141–56, 192–93.
79 Ibid. 201.
80 Ibid. 191.
81 Ibid. 194.
82 Ibid. 191.
83 Ibid. 211.
84 Ibid. 136.
85 Ibid. 209.
86 Idem, “History” 186.
87 Idem, Will 106.
88 Ibid.
89 Ibid. 106–07.
90 Idem, “Subject” 334.
91 Idem, Will 104–05.
92 Ibid. 65.
93 Ibid. 66–67.
94 Ibid. 155–56.
95 Ibid. 159.
96 Idem, “History” 186.
97 Idem, Discipline 251–53.
98 Idem, Will 43.
99 Morris, Material Entanglements 10, 187; Reed; Weadick 99–100.
100 Stephens and Sprinkle, “Sprinkle/Stephens Scale” 26.
101 Foucault, Will 43.
102 McArthur.
103 Weadick 90.
104 Stephens and Sprinkle, “Ecosex.”
105 Ibid.
106 Foucault, Will 65.
107 Ibid.
108 Stephens and Sprinkle, “Ecosex.”
109 Foucault, Will 65.
110 Stephens and Sprinkle, “Ecosex.”
111 “Podcast Interview.”
112 Foucault, Will 66.
113 Stephens, “When I Knew” 8–14.
114 Sprinkle 16.
115 Foucault, Will 66.
116 “Podcast Interview.”
117 Foucault, Will 67.
118 “Podcast Interview.”
119 Miljkovic.
120 Foucault, Will 159.
121 Sachs 3.
122 Ibid.