Nature Study, An Ambivalent Guide by Jeremy Beaudry

NATURE STUDY AN AMBIVALENT GUIDE

NATURE STUDY AN AMBIVALENT GUIDE Jeremy Beaudry

This project is produced in conjunction with the exhibition Facts and Fables: Stories of the Natural World at The Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education in Philadelphia, PA (June 18 - October 29, 2011). Produced with generous support from The Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education 8480 Hagy’s Mill Road Philadelphia, PA 19128 USA

Printed in Long Island City, New York at Linco Printing.

Special thanks to Meredith Warner, Dashiell P. & Esme, Jeanne Jaffe, Susan Hagen, Brian Collier, Jenny Laden, Rachel Dobkin, Gin Ranly, Joanne Donohue, and the other staff at the Schuylkill Center, Tammy Lin, Jaimie Fortin, Sandra Skinner, Frog, Robin, Worm, and Caterpillar. Jeremy Beaudry is an artist, designer, and educator from Philadelphia, USA. http://meaning.boxwith.com/

NATURE STUDY TRAIL MAP

Use this map to find markers along the trail that refer to specific content within this guide.

1 “Nature is the very definition of that which is authentic…” p. 8 2 “Awakening from the stupefying effects of the vice of over-industry…” p. 16 3 “I think when people think of nature, they think of 'pure' and 'clean'…” p. 10 4 “Florence Kluckhohn, an anthropologist, described three general orientations…” p. 26 5 “Being human, we interpret nature in human terms…” p. 1 6 “Nature was always 'over yonder,' alien and alienated…” p. 34 7 “The idea that we're apart from it [nature], and our ambivalence toward it…” p. 38 8 “I'm not nostalgic towards nature, because we've done the same things to each other…” p. 51 9 “Indeed, what we need is ecology without nature…” p. 49 10 “If nature as an idea allows for a greater degree of ambivalence…” p. 46

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Look

Nature lies at the intersection of the worm and the pavement. Watch your step.

THE PROBLEM OF ATTAINING AUTHENTIC EXPERIENCE IN A MASS SOCIETY IS ESPECIALLY IMPORTANT WHEN CONSIDERING THE CULTURAL MEANING ATTACHED TO NATURE. NATURE IS THE VERY DEFINITION OF THAT WHICH IS AUTHENTIC AND REAL, THE STUFF FROM WHICH IMITATION ARISES, YET AT THE SAME TIME, NATURE IS A CONCEPT OPEN TO ENDLESS ABSTRACTION, THE ESSENTIAL CHARACTER OF ANY SPECIFIC THING. EVEN IN THE CONVENTIONAL SENSE OF NATURE AS THAT WHICH HUMANS HAVE NOT MADE, DISTINCTIONS BETWEEN IMITATION AND AUTHENTICITY BREAK DOWN. FOR EXAMPLE, LANDSCAPES CLEARLY ALTERED BY HUMAN INTERVENTION WILL LIKELY BE THOUGHT OF AS NATURAL IF THE HUMAN INTERFERENCE TOOK PLACE FAR ENOUGH IN THE PAST.

窶適EVIN C. ARMITAGE, THE NATURE

a conversation with

Gin Ranly

Director of Education, The Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education

Jeremy Beaudry – How do you define nature?

Gin Ranly – I define nature as that which is produced by the Earth. Anything that comes from the Earth, as opposed to something human created.

JB – Did it take you a long time to come to that definition? Or were you pretty certain of that early on, being someone who was interested in the environment and environmental education?

GR – I guess I didn’t start thinking about what nature is until I started educating about it because I’ve always been very comfortable in nature. I never tried to define it, or even recognize it as something different or separate. But when I started working, and I asked people, or people would ask me what I do, I would say, “I work at a nature center.” I think of what I do as not just working at a nature center because we do all types of environmental education, but it’s really easy to explain that I work at a nature center. People get that. They get this picture of woods and green and the outdoors. When I started using the word “nature” more—this is something that is familiar to people. So, even if folks don’t feel really comfortable with the outdoors, or even comfortable in their knowledge of the environment, nature is a word that has, I think, a really positive connotation. And so it’s something that people can feel comfortable with.

JB – In your experience, what do people think about nature? I mean, how do they understand nature? And I think you have a very unique position being an environmental educator.

GR – I think when people think of nature, they think of “pure” and “clean.” So, if you just said “environment,” people might think of pollution, or if you said “outdoors” or “outside,” people might think of a wild place, or a really pristine place, but they might also think of Philadelphia as the outdoors. They might not like to be outdoors when it’s buggy, or they might not like to be outside when it’s really hot. For some reason, they picture a beautiful place when they think of nature, something really wholesome. When we think of nature, we think of a natural state or how it should be. JB – That’s very interesting to me. It sounds like you think a lot about your audience and how to get them into a conversation. Do you feel like part of your work is to move people into another understanding of nature, or maybe a more complicated one? 10

GR – Yes, I think what I try to do when I’m with people outside or explaining nature is to fascinate them with something. I try to give them some interesting facts or some interesting phenomenon that makes people wonder, to ask more questions. If I can get people to ask more questions about nature, then I think I’ve done a good job of piquing their interest. That might be telling them something: the way the Indians used the tree, or the way this flower specifically attracts a certain colony, or the really cool thing about this frog is the way it does whatever. Getting people to realize that if you don’t scratch the surface, you don’t realize how deep your understanding can be. As an interpreter and an educator, my job is to get people to ask more questions because then there is more to learn. JB – In leading people to observe things in a more sustained way, and somehow bringing them closer to the environment, what do you feel are some of the outcomes of that, or the goal of that?

GR – I think the ultimate objective is to reflect on how humans impact the environment. So learning about a natural resource and how something from nature benefits us, or how we use something in nature. Take the example of toads (because right now the toad detour has been in the news)—we block off the traffic so that the toads can migrate. And 99% of the population gives zero thought to toads during their lifetime or during a typical year. And a detour is both real and metaphorical, right? So the real detour is that you have to take another route home, but there’s also this detour in our thoughts, which is “wow, this neighborhood, and this road that I travel every single day is home to hundreds, thousands of toads.” It’s fascinating. So, my job as an educator is to teach people about toads, and why they would migrate, and what it is about being an amphibian that causes toads to have this life cycle. And then once people know a little bit of information, it’s like, “Wow, I had no idea that toads are moving in the environment. They don’t stay in one place. I had no idea that toads go from egg to adult in three months.” Then the challenge is to reflect on how we’re living this life without necessarily paying any attention to the seasons or the outdoors or the part of nature that can really fascinate us. If I teach people about a certain kind of tree and their interest is piqued and they start asking questions about why this tree grows here, or what impact it has on the surrounding environment, then the next time people use a product from a tree they’ll think, “Huh, so this comes from something in nature, and I’m using it in my life. Is there a way I could live my life with less negative impact on the tree, or the toad, or the water, or whatever it is?”

JB – Could you talk a little bit about why you do the work that you do? Why do you value the natural environment? What experiences did you have that led you to this concern for the environment and also educating others about these issues? 11

GR – I wish I could tell you I knew why I do what I do. I don’t really know except that I grew up in a setting where I spent most of my time outside. So I felt very comfortable in the outdoors, and not in a “nature-y” way, in that I knew the names of anything, or that I was a naturalist kind of kid. I wasn’t. But I just spent a lot of time in the outdoors, and I really appreciate science. So, I was really into the sciences. My professional life led me into the sciences, but then I think my personality and my enjoyment of working with other people and explaining things led me to the educational piece. Now I have this wonderful melding between the two, which is that I get to do science and learn more about natural sciences everyday and I also get to communicate that to other people as well as get them excited about the environment and science. JB – Since you’re bringing up science as an entry point for you, I’m going to ask you a bit of a provocative question. I think one thing you could say is that science, which has produced a kind of technological advancement in human society, has had many different effects or impacts on the environment. So, on the one hand, it’s science that enabled rapid industrialization and the negative impacts of that. But on the other hand, science leads us toward more understanding of ecological and environmental issues and possible solutions. Maybe that’s a simplistic view, but how do you think of science in that context?

GR – I think of science as answering questions. The natural sciences are where we just try to understand how things happen and why things happen. The technology piece that you are talking about, which is using science to create new things or to solve challenges in the human context, I look at differently. I think it’s interesting that when we’re creating something new, it’s technology and we’re manipulating things. Then, when we go and try to fix it, and we often have to go back to learning more from nature. We have to go to learning more from basic science principles in order to fix the things that we screwed up in the first place. My husband is an engineer and he uses science in a way that creates new products and manipulates things in the environment. I observe and learn science in order to better help people understand the things around them. So, two different ways, but both driven by that want to understand how and why things happen.

JB – You said earlier that you talk to visitors at the environmental center about using the lens of “nature” and the assumptions that people have about that term, and that maybe they feel more comfortable with it. Apart from that, how do you characterize in a more general sense humanity’s relationship to nature or the environment? If one part of us thinks that nature is friendly and we can understand it, I think that there are many other ways, like you started to allude to, that we relate to the natural environment.

GR – That’s a tough question. No, I don’t think it is cohesive, and that it’s 12

one thing for every person. But I do think for a large number of people that nature and the environment has this restorative effect on the spirit, which is that being outside and getting fresh air and daylight has really calming effects on people. I think there’s research on how kids learn better and how people think better when they have natural sunlight to work in. And certainly there are studies out that show that kids learn better after spending time outside. I think for humanity in general, there is a positive effect on our brains and on our emotions from spending time in the outdoors, whether that outdoors is a blacktop in North Philly or whether it’s in the middle of the woods in the Schuylkill Center. I know that, for me, I get the joy of walking through the woods every single day, and my mind is a little bit clearer after spending time outdoors. There’s just a natural reaction that relaxes me and allows my brain to process a little bit better after being in nature. And I think that’s not unique to me, I think that is a fact of humans.

JB – I think that does seem to be the case for a number of people, this idea of nature as a sanctuary, or a refuge, or a restorative kind of place. Given that, I wonder if you might speculate on why many of us—and I’ll include myself—often compartmentalize that experience to the point where we don’t understand how the things we do in our daily lives impact the environment in many negative ways? Why do you think that is the case? On one hand, nature is so restorative and important to us. On the other hand, we don’t think so much about…

GR – Yes, we don’t think about it when it’s not convenient. I’m not sure. I mean, I think it’s the world that we live in. And, we’re introduced to that connection much later, right? When I’m working with preschool kids or kindergarten age kids, we want them to enjoy and appreciate the world before we tell them that it’s dying before we introduce to them this idea that we are hurting the environment, or that the environment is polluted. So these things are happening separately. By that time, so many patterns and habits have already been established. You know, we buy everything in plastic containers and we’re using energy at a rate that is unsustainable. And so we all have to make trade-offs in our lives, and I guess it goes back to education—it’s not until you even have all the information that you can begin making educated choices. So, I think it’s not one or the other. As long as there are still these restorative places—and even taking a walk outside in the middle of Center City—we still have this opportunity to benefit from the environment and the earth, even within this context where we are destroying it. That’s a tough question. I can’t give you a good answer. (laughs)

JB – No, it’s a question that I don’t expect an answer to. (laughs) But hopefully shed a little light on the issues. Do you have anything to say about whether or not humans do have an ambivalent attitude about nature? 13

GR – I’d hate to label us as ambivalent because I feel like I have a lot of information and I try to make good choices. Sometimes I don’t make good choices, and it’s not because I don’t care. It’s because it’s a really hard decision, and I think that a lot of people are like that. If we label all Americans as ambivalent because we’re driving cars and consuming too many resources, then you know, maybe it is ambivalent. I feel like that’s a harsh term for a very complicated topic.

JB – Where I agree with you on that point is that many of these things are so systematic and structural in the ways that our lives are programmed for us. Not that we don’t have individual choice in many ways, but there are these larger structures in place, that have been in place for a very long time, that are very difficult to work around or against. So, to put it solely on the level of the individual is too simplistic. I think you’re right.

The question is not: What is nature? but Where is nature? How is nature? Why is nature? or If not nature, what then?

a conversation with

Susan Hagen Participating Artist, “Facts & Fables: Stories of the Natural World”

Jeremy Beaudry – Have you often dealt with environmental topics in your work?

Susan Hagen – Well, yes. I have for several years. I’ve worked on a couple other projects that dealt with endangered species and extinct species. One is a project called “Animalia Rarissima” that is a series of small carved and painted monuments of wooden animals from the official list of endangered species of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. I’ve been interested in this for a while; I’ve come back to it. It’s not the only work I do, but it’s a continuing theme that I’ve come back to a number of times. JB – I’m curious how you got interested in endangered species and in particular perhaps how you were thinking about the oil spill in the gulf as something to make work about for this show.

SH – Well, I guess I’ve been shocked by the statistics on the number of animals that have become extinct or endangered at this point, and as an artist I’ve also been really interested in the way—just from the formal point of view—just how animals look, the beauty of the animals, so through the sculptures I can celebrate the beauty of the animals, but also try to examine the role that threatened species have in the contemporary human world that’s not really connected with daily interaction with wildlife in nature. So, it’s a combination of my artistic and my political concerns. JB – How do you think these kinds of ecological disasters like the oil spill in the gulf impact our general attitudes toward nature and wildlife. Does it change how we think about nature in any way?

SH – Well, it’s strange. It seemed to change public outlook at least temporarily, and that’s one of my concerns—that it’s a temporary change and then people go back to just going about their business, their daily life. I wish that it would have a greater impact on the way we develop alternative sources of energy, the way we regulate fishing and oil industries. I think that it’s a really serious issue and that our whole culture and our whole way of life is based on fossil fuel dependency. Mine too—I’m not saying I’m any different. It’s troubling to think that we’re going down this path that is somewhat irreversible with some of the changes that are taking place. And I think that one of our jobs as humans is to think about the negative effects now and to try to be responsible toward the earth, and I’m not sure that we’re doing that. 20

JB – So the ecological disaster brings certain issues to the surface for a period of time and then we revert to what we would call normalcy and don’t consider those things too much anymore.

SH – Complacency, maybe. When I started this project last summer I realized that by the time I installed it, it was going to be a year after the oil spill began and maybe it wouldn’t be in the news anymore, and, sure enough, it’s very difficult to find current information now about it. So it actually has receded from public consciousness and concern. So, I’m kind of glad that I did choose to work with that topic and have a delay so that it wouldn’t be in the excitement of the media frenzy around it. It would be after people had started to forget about it. JB – Let me jump to another question, which perhaps is a very difficult question to answer (and I’m not looking for the right answer). How do you start to describe what nature is?

SH – Well, I think it’s really pretty simple: it’s all the objects, materials, living things that are not man-made—and actually you could even say that man-made things are included in a certain respect—but it’s really the whole universe in its entirety. And I think the way we think about it as a culture is not the same thing as what nature is. I think we turn it into a symbol, which is another matter entirely. JB – And what kinds of things do you feel nature is a symbol of?

SH – I think it’s romanticized. It can be a symbol—I need to use the word nature again—of a natural state, an uncontaminated state of human existence in relation to the world. It can be a symbol for emotional things, for psychological things that people experience, for feelings, good and bad, freedom and torture, and the weather; all the things you see around you that are symbolic for some interior phenomenon. And I think that it’s also this force outside of us that we try to control, that we struggle to control and even get rid of it, like in South Philly here—and actually many other parts of the city—where people cut down trees, beautiful urban trees, because they don’t like what they call “fall out”: the leaves. Leaves come down in the fall, and that’s an inconvenient thing to have nature dropping leaves on you, so people cut them down. They don’t really think about the big picture. We’re exploiting forests, or not maintaining fisheries... all the things we do that are short term to control or even destroy nature are part of that.

JB – Do you think that this issue of control and domination in some ways has to do with people not understanding themselves as a part of nature?

SH – Oh yes, exactly right. Yes. We humans put ourselves on a pedestal really, above nature, and feel like we have a right to it and everything it offers, and we’re not part of it, and actually we are! We’re animals too, 21

so I think that’s a problem and it’s a huge issue that has many other repercussions.

JB – For you personally—what I’m gathering is you do have a sense of yourself as being a part of nature in a more integrated way. Was there a particular experience that led you to that feeling, or was it perhaps the influence of parents or other mentors? How do you think you came to this place of a more connected sense with nature?

SH – It’s probably like that somehow. I live in a city now, but I still have an experience of nature being all around me and feeling a part of it: animals, insects, weather, seasons, the sun, the moon, you know, even the city. I can experience all that now, and I also like to go places where I feel closer to nature, like Arizona, North Carolina, and Wisconsin in particular, and hiking and paddling and so forth. And I grew up in Wisconsin, and traveling in the West into national parks with my family—so I guess that made me who I am now, and even though I don’t do that often, it’s still really important to me to go to those places and it’s important to me that they’re available. JB – When you talk about going to certain places to feel closer to nature, what does that mean? How do you get closer to nature? What are some of the conditions that make that possible?

SH – Well, I guess just having less man-made things around me, you know? Being able to witness the weather, the environment, the landscape, the seasons more directly. One of my favorite things that I actually did last year (last summer, for the first time in a few years) was hike down into the Grand Canyon, and—I don’t know if you’ve ever done that—it’s just this really incredibly beautiful place and it’s just... it’s profoundly spiritual for me and I guess for many other people, and it’s got something to do with—oh God, who knows? It’s a place that is completely natural, but also it’s definitely well-used by people, and there are people there and you don’t really walk down it without running into people. But it’s a profound experience of the environment, and the fact that it’s preserved to a certain extent is part of that, realizing that it’s got this power that’s just invested in the place that’s just... I think I’m not saying what I want to say, but I think that it’s the experience of the sublime in the romantic sense, really. Caspar David Friedrich. You feel like you’re part of something and yet so insignificant... like that dichotomy, that experience of those two things simultaneously. I don’t have that typically walking down the streets in Philadelphia, sitting in a park. It’s just so much more profound in a place like that. JB – Do you think that if more people had the kind of experience that you’re talking about that would necessarily lead people to a sense of connection with nature and perhaps lessen some of the ecological carelessness and disasters that occur? 22

SH – Yes, I do. I think that it probably would. I think going to the Grand Canyon again is an example. It’s interesting because so many people visit the Grand Canyon and go to the edge and look over and they don’t go into it. Even looking at it is profound, but when you go into it, I think you really become a part of it. If everyone that visited went into the rim, it would be a really different experience. It seems like going into it and being involved in it, really personally, for a long period of time like that—not just looking over the edge—is really transformative and I think it could help people to understand their place in nature better.

JB – It’s interesting just to hear you describe it in this way because one of the things I’m researching is an educational movement connected to the Progressive Era called the Nature Study Movement. Essentially it was a philosophy of education, particularly for young people, with the intention of getting them to have direct, first-hand experiences with the environment, with different ecological systems, and the idea was that this would produce moral, whole human beings. Also, of course, it was connected in some ways to the Conservation Movement, which would instill in young people early on a sense of responsibility for the natural environment. So I think your thinking certainly connects in many ways to an understanding of how an experience with nature could actually help counteract a lot of the harm that’s done to nature.

One of the things I’m interested in exploring is how ambivalent we often tend to be toward the environment and the natural world, and I guess I would use the Grand Canyon example again to help explain what I mean. The Grand Canyon—and I did visit it when I was much younger—allows a profound experience. It certainly speaks to the sublime, and there’s a real power there, and I think it affects people in very specific ways. But you could also look at how people relate to something like the Grand Canyon. It’s this place you go to, you drive a car to—and there’s a whole set of impacts around the automobile—and it’s not something you live with, it’s an experience you go to have and then plug back into your daily routine, which may be quite insensitive to environmental issues and sustainability. So I think we contradict ourselves and shift how we think about nature, and I wonder if you agree with that, and if you’ve seen evidence of that as well maybe in your own personal experience?

SH – Oh boy, yeah. I think that as a species, we’re all centered on our own needs and comforts and ambitions, and we don’t prioritize the health of the planet and other species and ecosystems even if it’s in our own long-term interests. I think that that’s a difficult question for that reason, because I think you can be profoundly affected on a spiritual level by it, and you can still go back to your car-centered life and commute to work. I mean, hopefully you’ll be changed in some way that’s important and you’ll make decisions that will positively affect the environment, but having the experience doesn’t guarantee it, so yeah, it’s a difficult thing. 23

Nothing was planted within this fence. What is growing here is natural.

FLORENCE KLUCKHOHN, AN ANTHROPOLOGIST, DESCRIBED THREE GENERAL ORIENTATIONS TO NATURE HELD BY PEOPLE IN DIFFERENT CULTURES AND AT DIFFERENT TIMES IN HISTORY: (1) PEOPLE AS SUBJUGATED TO NATURE, LIVING AT THE MERCY OF A POWERFUL AND UNCOMPROMISING NATURE; (2) PEOPLE AS OVER NATURE, DOMINATING, EXPLOITING, AND CONTROLLING THE ENVIRONMENT; AND (3) PEOPLE AS AN INHERENT PART OF NATURE, LIKE ANIMALS, TREES, AND RIVERS, TRYING TO LIVE IN HARMONY WITH THE ENVIRONMENT. ﾂｶ NATURALLY, CULTURES ARE NOT SINGULAR IN THEIR ORIENTATION TO NATURE, AND IT IS LIKELY THAT, ALTHOUGH ONE OF THESE VIEWS MAY PREDOMINATE IN A GIVEN SOCIETY, ANY ORIENTATION MAY HAVE ELEMENTS OF THE OTHER TWO. THUS, IT IS POSSIBLE THAT SOCIETIES HOLD ASPECTS OF ALL THESE ORIENTATIONS TO ONE DEGREE OR ANOTHER, ALTHOUGH ONE MAY BE A MORE SALIENT FORCE. 窶的RWIN ALTMAN & MARTIN M.

Natural? Useful? Wanted? Native? Rational? Human? Beautiful?

Unnatural? Harmful? Unwanted? Invasive? Irrational? Nonhuman? Ugly?

ONE OF THE IDEAS INHIBITING GENUINELY ECOLOGICAL POLITICS, ETHICS, PHILOSOPHY, AND ART IS THE IDEA OF NATURE ITSELF. NATURE, A TRANSCENDENTAL TERM IN A MATERIAL MASK, STANDS AT THE END OF A POTENTIALLY INFINITE SERIES OF OTHER TERMS THAT COLLAPSE INTO IT, OTHERWISE KNOWN AS A METONYMIC LIST: FISH, GRASS, MOUNTAIN AIR, CHIMPANZEES, LOVE, SODA WATER, FREEDOM OF CHOICE, HETEROSEXUALITY, FREE MARKETS... NATURE. A METONYMIC SERIES BECOMES A METAPHOR. WRITING CONJURES THIS NOTORIOUSLY SLIPPERY TERM, USEFUL TO IDEOLOGIES OF ALL KINDS IN ITS VERY SLIPPERINESS, IN ITS REFUSAL TO MAINTAIN ANY CONSISTENCY.

MODERN THINKERS HAD TAKEN IT FOR GRANTED THAT THE GHOST OF NATURE, RATTLING ITS CHAINS, WOULD REMIND THEM OF A TIME WITHOUT INDUSTRY, A TIME WITHOUT “TECHNOLOGY,” AS IF WE HAD NEVER USED FLINT OR WHEAT. BUT IN LOOKING AT THE GHOST OF NATURE, MODERN HUMANS WERE LOOKING IN A MIRROR. IN NATURE, THEY SAW THE REFLECTED, INVERTED IMAGE OF THEIR OWN AGE—AND THE GRASS IS ALWAYS GREENER ON THE OTHER SIDE. NATURE WAS ALWAYS “OVER YONDER,” ALIEN AND ALIENATED. NATURE WAS AN IDEAL IMAGE, A SELFCONTAINED FORM SUSPENDED AFAR, SHIMMERING AND NAKED BEHIND THE GLASS LIKE AN EXPENSIVE PAINTING.

–TIMOTHY MORTON, THE

a conversation with

Brian Collier Participating Artist, “Facts & Fables: Stories of the Natural World”

Jeremy Beaudry – I think you share my understanding that the idea of nature is something we construct, and construct according to many different criteria and contexts. But, how do you define nature? What does that mean?

Brian Collier – It’s a huge, huge question. It’s one that actually I think about a lot. I don’t know how familiar you are with what I’ve been doing work-wise, but I have this Society for a Re-natural Environment. I developed this idea of the re-natural world and the re-natural environment because of all the problems with the term “nature” and the sort of polarity that it really creates. You know, nature for most people is something other than human, right? And of course this is really problematic for a lot of different reasons—because it’s not true, for starters. There are a lot of different definitions when I think of the term “nature” and the context is huge, but a lot of times I think of nature as a friendly version, an accessible version, of what we might call “wilderness.” Nature is this encounter with the nonhuman world that we can look at and we can enter. And then I think it gets more complicated from there, of course. I strongly believe that humans are not separate. I mean, we’re just animals, and the real big difference between us and the other animals is through technology. We have the ability to profoundly impact all the other species on the planet, and I think there’s no other species that you can really say that about, so that complicates it even further. JB – Can you talk a little bit more about this idea of “re-nature”?

BC – The “re-natural environment” is a term that I came up with. It’s the nonhuman elements of the nonhuman environment that exist or have reinserted themselves into severely human-dominated landscapes—and these really human-transformed landscapes are the only ones that I really interact with a lot through my work, which are urban, suburban, industrial, and large-scale agricultural landscapes. I’m looking at how really the unmediated or not directly mediated elements of the nonhuman environment exist in those spaces. All these components of the nonhuman environment are always reacting and responding to what we’re doing, and there’s this real flow back and forth as we are integrally tied to this and we’re part of this. They’re always pushing back and forth against whatever it is that we do, and those interfaces are what I’m really interested in, and that reintegration and re-understanding of those relationships is what I’m calling the “re-natural environment.” 36

JB – I know your focus has been on birds, but within this idea of the renatural, how much attention do you pay toward plants and vegetation?

BC – A lot. I don’t only work with birds. I do work with plants, and I do these performative presentations. I have this one called “Exploiting Unintentional Greening: Action Enabled by Inaction,” and it’s all about encouraging people to stop mowing and spraying and just start letting weeds grow where they grow. And I talk about all the environmental benefits of that. I do a seed ball dispersal project—I know seed balls have become really popular lately—and I do ones that are impregnated with locally (as best as I can determine) native species, not to replace the species that we’ve introduced, but just to increase overall diversity, and if you’re going to increase diversity, why not use plants that have evolved in that habitat? I look at a lot of different animals that live in these places, but I’ve focused on birds because they’re usually the most visible element of the nonhuman environment in these kind of spaces that I’m working in. And also, they’re pretty easy. Even species like pigeons and starlings that people think of as dirty and sort of pest species—they’re pretty easy to, without a tremendous amount of work, frame as charismatic and something that people would actually want to engage with on some level. There’s a lot going for them, which you can’t say about some of the other species that live in these environments, like cockroaches and rats and mice and weeds. I mean, it’s hard to get people on board, and my audience for this work is all the people who are not really thinking about it. It’s not the people who are environmentally-minded; it’s everybody else that I’m trying to at least, at the lowest level, get engaged in a conversation about what all this stuff means.

JB – One question that just occurred to me, hearing you describe the re-natural environment, has to do with the Schuylkill Center land and this issue of land management and native vs. invasive species, and I wonder if you have a more nuanced or complicated view of that? So, the Schuylkill Center is overpopulated with deer because of the surrounding development, and there are invasive species: the earthworms in the ground that produce too much nutrients in the soil which produces this abundance of invasive vegetation that of course deer feed on. They’re trying to restore aspects of the land to a time before, so to speak. What is your perspective is on that?

BC – Well, it’s a noble effort, but I think in a lot of these kinds of spaces that have been so changed there’s just no going back to that. What I look at—what I’m really interested in thinking about—is where do we go from where we are, instead of trying to go backwards. Why don’t we go forwards and make the environment healthier without necessarily trying to make it something that’s an unrealistic goal. I mean, in order to reestablish a balance with the deer in particular, you would have to reintroduce predators. That’s never going to happen there. Ever. The earthworm thing is pretty interesting, too. There’s a lot of debate over whether there 37

were worms in that region before we introduced the species that we did, and there’s still some people that believe who there were, but of course there’s all these other species that have come in and are changing the environment. I think there are better places to focus our efforts, just creating a diverse and healthy environment. We do need to address, obviously, the severely invasive species that by their presence are reducing overall diversity. I mean, those are obviously a problem, but there are a lot of species that are not native, a lot of introduced species that are actually not harmful invasives, and a lot of times in these restoration programs all species that are introduced as non-native are considered bad—and that conversation is interesting. I’ve talked to scientists a lot, and that conversation is really starting to change, which I’ve been fascinated by.

I’m doing this project in Boulder. I’m working with this Valmont CoalFired Power Plant, which has been listed by the Audobon Society as an important bird area, which is weird, right? I mean, that’s such a contradiction. So I called up the people who determine this categorization I was asking about, and they said, “Well, there are a lot of species that the cooling ponds support and, even though the coal fire is bad all these species have a habitat there, so that’s good.” So how do we think about this really artificial space? And a lot of the birds that are there that caused them to list it were never there before it existed. So in some ways we’ve completely changed this, and now we’ve gotten to the point that Audobon, who’s really environmentally-minded and would be on board with these kind of restoration activities, are now putting energies toward the space. I found out that they’re going to close the power plant, and now Audobon is looking into the possibility of maintaining it as an artificially made pond in order to support these species that never were there historically in the first place. JB – Now there’s a very interesting reversal. Maybe I’ll jump to this idea of our ambivalence toward the environment and toward nature, which seemed to resonate with you on some level. We can hold nature in such contradictory ways that really span a whole range of attitudes. What are your thoughts about that?

BC – I completely agree with that. One of the reasons I do the work that I do is to try to shake people out of that ambivalence and try to provide examples and opportunities of connection. What most people would probably call nature is just everywhere all around us. And just helping people get to a place where they can understand and connect to that, and not think that this human/nature divide really exists, at all. It’s just a silly polarity. And it’s caused a lot of problems we’re facing now. You know, the idea that we’re apart from it, and our ambivalence toward it, is why we are able to destroy it. We’ve turned it into such an “other” that it doesn’t matter if we do damage to it. And also, it’s like the “othering” of anything—we “other” things as humans so we can conquer them or do harm to them ,or purge them, or just bulldoze over them. 38

JB – I think what’s fascinating is to get at the ambivalence that individuals have and the contradictions that many of us possess. On the one hand, we use nature for recreation, for leisure, and it has a more spiritual connotation of “refreshing” the spirit or “recharging” ourselves in some way—we seek out these experiences within nature. On the other hand, it’s possible we’re traveling to those natural experiences in gasguzzling automobiles. In our daily lives, we don’t give a second thought to the environmental impacts of the decisions we make. How have we arrived at this way of being in the world?

BC – Well, I think it gets right to the point of what you just said: we go to nature. We go to nature to experience this thing that’s not part of our daily lives. I mean, it’s ridiculous. When you walk into your house, if nature comes into your house, what do you do? You stomp on it or spray it with poison. Still, the spider in the corner is no less nature than a spider out in the middle of a beautiful, pristine park.

JB – And no less is nature—I mean, in a radical sense—the house that we live in and the driveway in front of that house.

BC – Exactly. I mean it gets really complicated very quickly and problematically so when we start to frame the argument, “Well, humans are just part of nature, so everything that we do is natural.” Right. So, you know, driving my gas-guzzling SUV is just as natural as setting aside a thousand acres of this pristine habitat. That’s a deeply problematic thing because the people that just want to continue to do what they want to do, regardless of anything else, are going to continue with that argument so really it’s dangerous territory to drift into when you’re trying to make these kind of human/nonhuman connections. That’s where I am. I’m constantly running up against that, and I don’t know how to maintain that distinction without making a division.

JB – I was just thinking about the early Conservationist Movement and John Muir. Nature is this thing that we have to protect, and therefore we designate these certain areas, for example the U.S. National Parks. Of course, the intention was incredibly noble and environmentally-minded in that we’re decimating the natural environment and we have to protect it. But that very act reinforces the division, and so we’ve come to this point where nature is the thing in the national park, and I can go to it.

BC – It also reinforces the paternalistic dominance over it, which is necessary to a certain degree, but, again, it continues to exist as this other thing away from us that we have to protect. We don’t think about protecting it because of how it’s going to notably impact us; we’re protecting it as this child that’s getting harmed. Then you get into the whole moral conversation of that, the Judeo-Christian kind—us as the protector of nature and dominant over nature. It’s a huge, huge topic. 39

Home sweet home No sparros Keep out!

Why should we be so critical about the idea of nature, especially since there is an experience of nature that is quite direct and immediate and enjoyable, and we seek it out? Why should we care whether that is called nature or something else? It is not so important in terms of being in nature but being outside of nature. The ways in which we compartmentalize it frustrate a total way of being in the world. If nature as an idea allows for a greater degree of ambivalence about the

environment, about the universal ecosystem, then that is something to be questioned and explored. And so the proposition that nature is deadâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;or in fact should beâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;and that we should be thinking of an ecology without nature, is to propose that of course the experience of nature, of what we have called nature, is incredibly meaningful and valuable, but we have to think of it in more comprehensive terms to integrate it into our everyday experiences, habits, practices and consciousness.

THE LESSON TO BE FULLY ENDORSED IS THUS THAT OF ANOTHER ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENTIST WHO CAME TO THE RESULT THAT, WHILE ONE CANNOT BE SURE WHAT THE ULTIMATE RESULT OF HUMANITY’S INTERVENTIONS INTO GEO-SPHERE WILL BE, ONE THING IS SURE: IF HUMANITY WERE TO STOP ABRUPTLY ITS IMMENSE INDUSTRIAL ACTIVITY AND LET NATURE ON EARTH TAKE ITS BALANCED COURSE, THE RESULT WOULD HAVE BEEN A TOTAL BREAKDOWN, AN IMAGINABLE CATASTROPHE. “NATURE” ON EARTH IS ALREADY TO SUCH AN EXTENT “ADAPTED” TO HUMAN INTERVENTIONS, THE HUMAN “POLLUTIONS” ARE ALREADY TO SUCH AN EXTENT INCLUDED INTO THE SHAKY AND FRAGILE BALANCE OF THE “NATURAL” REPRODUCTION ON EARTH, THAT ITS CESSATION WOULD CAUSE A CATASTROPHIC IMBALANCE. THIS IS WHAT IT MEANS THAT HUMANITY HAS NOWHERE TO RETREAT: NOT ONLY “THERE IS NO BIG OTHER” (SELF-CONTAINED SYMBOLIC ORDER AS THE ULTIMATE GUARANTEE OF MEANING); THERE IS ALSO NO NATURE QUA BALANCED ORDER OF SELF-REPRODUCTION WHOSE HOMEOSTASIS IS DISTURBED, THROWN OFF THE RAILS, BY THE IMBALANCED HUMAN INTERVENTIONS. INDEED, WHAT WE NEED IS ECOLOGY WITHOUT NATURE: THE ULTIMATE OBSTACLE TO PROTECTING NATURE IS THE VERY NOTION OF NATURE WE RELY ON. –SLAVOJ

a conversation with

Jeanne Jaffe Participating Artist, “Facts & Fables: Stories of the Natural World”

Jeremy Beaudry – Your project for “Facts and Fables” uses Little Red Riding Hood as a point of departure. How did you come to deal with this fairy tale?

Jeanne Jaffe – I was interested in Bruno Bettelheim’s book on the uses of enchantment, and he looks at a lot of the early fairy tales, so I just started thinking about ones that I could twist, and the shift from the fear of being consumed... Little Red Riding Hood has so many psycho-sexual things, and has so many things from objects to relations theory, and Melanie Klein, and Freudian things, but it also is about greed, oral greed. And so I started just thinking about what’s going on. Greed really bothers me, and I don’t know what to do about it, and it operates on so many levels, including artists— artists buy into all the same things that our culture does, and as an artist I don’t know what to do about it so it’s just one way I can deal with it.

JB – It’s interesting. I wonder if you’ve thought about—I’m sure you have—the story of Little Red Riding Hood and its ecological implications. I mean, the fact that it’s the Woodsman who comes to the aid of Little Red Riding Hood and—

JJ – And guts the wolf! And pulls her out!

JB – Right, this person’s livelihood is built around extracting natural resources from the earth and—

JJ – I thought more about how things have shifted, that at one time, historically, when technology was less developed, we were at nature’s mercy, so animal life and all that was more of a threat. That was the threat to us and now we’re the threat. We’ve really reversed roles. So, that’s why she’s huge, and the wolf is normal size [in the sculpture]. And when you really think about the lines from that—“And what big eyes you have!” and “What a big mouth you have!”—it’s all about greed. I mean it could be, if you reverse it. And you know, our culture, and its attitude toward nature and toward ecology and toward resources is just one of complete consumption, greedy consumption. JB – Well, also, it’s not that Little Red Riding Hood is the victim at all. It’s rather that there’s a conflict or a competitive aspect, and describing the grandmother and the wolf in this way, your greed is personified or made visible in some way, and she’s reading that as if to say, “I need to overcome it.” 50

JJ – Right, or you’re projecting the greed onto the wolf.

JB – So, a question I want to ask you is how do you define nature? What does it mean?

JJ – That’s a good question. Well, I guess it’s that which develops outside of culture, outside of convention—it’s instinctual. It’s outside of the deceit that culture has developed. In other words, it’s something where instinct and natural development play more of a part.

JB – Does it represent a kind of truth? Is that what you mean, as opposed to deceit?

JJ – Not truth, but something more primary, that’s not as conditioned, not as mediated by conventions, by rules, by laws, by even what we do with intelligence, and a big part of what we do with intelligence I think is to pretend. Ethno-biologists say it’s really the compulsion to deceive and lie, and to pretend that differentiates us. And so I’d say nature doesn’t have as much of that, so it’s less mediated. Does that make sense? JB – Yes, it’s a very different answer than I’ve gotten until now. I mean, it’s much more… philosophical and ontological. You’ve made this observation, in forming a definition of nature, that’s much more from a cultural perspective. Does that mean that you advocate for a return in some way to a different kind of relationship with nature?

JJ – I guess one thing I’d advocate is respect in general, and that goes to anything and anybody. Not use value, to get rid of use value. But that’s across the board, that’s toward nature, that’s toward other people, it’s toward everything. Our system’s all about use value, where we’re objectified, where we become objects of use and then we stop being beings. JB – Yeah, I’m glad you brought that word up, actually, because it reminds me of something that I haven’t thought about so much recently, that has to do with an implicit critique that is built into an ecological or environmentalist perspective, and that critique is really about identifying the inherent destructiveness of the Capitalist system because everything is reduced to a use value.

JJ – Absolutely, use value.

JB – And we seek to maximize a surplus.

JJ – Absolutely. I’m not nostalgic toward nature in any way because we’ve done the same things to each other as we’ve done to nature. So it’s a world view. Matter of fact, why I’m not and would not consider myself an ecologist, an ecological artist, is because I don’t think that’s the solution. I think the solution is much more spiritual than that. It’s gotta be a whole 51

revamping of our psyche. I think it’s a mistake to only focus on ecology, because that misses the point of our own need to transform ourselves, and if we don’t do that, then nothing’s gonna change. JB – Or, it’s a different way of thinking of the term “ecology.”

JJ – It’s a different way. I don’t think about it in terms of nature. I think about ecology in terms of psyche. It’s really the whole psychological system and the economic system. But the economic system really is predicated on a psychological system—it’s a psychological attitude towards each other. It's sick, it's truly sick as far as I’m concerned. It’s anti-life completely. JB – One of the things I’m really trying to get at in my project is some understanding of how it is that we humans can be so ambivalent toward nature. On the one hand, we can have these really deep experiences, like walking the trails of the Schuylkill Center, or descending into some pristine valley. But at the same time, perhaps in our daily lives, we make certain choices that don’t necessarily have that same sensitivity to the same ecological perspective. Do think that’s the case—this ambivalence—and how is it possible?

JJ – Ambivalence... that’s a good question. I’m gonna just talk about it off the top of my head. I keep going back to the psyche—and it’s forgetting. We forget. We forget what’s most important, we forget what deep pleasure is, because we get caught up in getting through the day, we get caught up in expediency. So in a sense, it’s kind of like living in two worlds—I don’t know the resolution to that, I’m constantly dealing with that, it’s kind of like living in a world. The real question is: what would it be like to have an integrated psyche? That’s my question. Very few people manage that, but those are people like—and I don’t even know if they managed it— Gandhi or Buddha—people that have managed, somehow, to prioritize or integrate, or do something that allows them to keep a perspective in the midst of everything, and not get caught up. Or maybe it has something to do with perspective, like learning, recognizing and remembering your small relative place in everything, which is, again, against this whole system, the Western idea of the ego and this idea of dominance. How do you feel about all these things?

JB – Well... this project has been very interesting for me just to be able to think about the idea of nature in a more sustained way.

JJ – In what way? How do you mean?

JB – I mean, I’ve been reading about what people thought about it… what is nature? How do we use nature? What are the ways in which we exploit it, but also have attempted to protect it? So I started doing research around what’s called the Nature Study Movement. I might have 52

mentioned it—

JJ – No, you didn’t!

JB – It’s really connected to the Progressive Era, to the reform movement, and essentially it was a philosophy, particularly of education for young people that advocated for direct, unmediated experiences in the natural environment.

JJ – Oh. That’s interesting. Where was this and when was this?

JB – It began to gain momentum in the 1860s and 1870s, but it coalesced into something more substantial after 1890—

JJ – I wonder if Rudolf Steiner was part of that at all?

JB – I don’t know. But it was quite interesting because… I guess I got to that because I was interested in the persona of the naturalist, particularly the amateur naturalist.

JJ – Right. What were you interested in about that?

JB – Well, I think with respect to this invitation to do a project at the Schuylkill Center, it was something I could begin with and identify, because I’m not an environmentalist. I mean I have an awareness of things, of course, but—

JJ – Same way I’m not an ecologist.

JB – Right. It’s just not where my passion has been. I certainly have had those kind of profound experiences in nature, like everyone else, but it’s not…

JJ – It’s not where your focus is, either.

JB – Right, I mean, I found this project was really difficult, because my interest is in the urban environment, cities.

JJ – And my interest is in the psyche.

JB – So, the amateur naturalist was a very curious figure to me, someone who’s very passionate about the natural environment, and being in nature, and understanding it, but understanding it from a very experiential way. And the Nature Study Movement was really instrumental in instilling that as value, certainly in education, but also in our culture in general. And it had a very interesting and tenuous relationship to the scientific community, because it was not so much about necessarily understanding nature in the way that natural science 53

might do. It was much more about developing personhood, citizenship, ethics, and morality.

JJ – Was it like identifying with nature? In other words, seeing yourself in nature?

JB – Yeah, although I don’t think it was ever articulated in that way, but it was also tied to the Conservation Movement, and there was a stated value that to have more experiences in nature, to understand it on that level, is to, particularly with children, instill in them a sense of stewardship, which of course dovetailed quite well with the Conservation Movement. You must protect and preserve the natural environment, and so those things ran simultaneously. The other thing I came to the project with was an understanding that nature at the very least is a construction.

JJ – Right. Can I say something? Nature isn’t a construction, our idea of nature is a construction.

JB – Right, right. And that, of course, started me thinking about this idea of our ambivalence toward nature. Because it is a construction, the idea of nature, we use it for all sorts for different things.

JJ – Absolutely.

JB – And that’s what’s interesting about this moment around the turn of the century, which coincides with the Nature Study Movement, which coincides with the establishment of the national parks service. There’s this real battle between—well, one, within conservation itself, like land management vs. land preservation, but also between those folks and the kind of raw, industrialists who claim that nature is ours to use, and we do what we want with it. And all that is possible because people have different ideas about what nature is.

JJ – And about who they are. But, see the thing that’s interesting is that those things aren’t disconnected. In other words, our definitions of what nature is actually simultaneously define what it is to be human, and it’s just like art, you know? That whole debate about are we just reflecting and creating what is already there, or are we creating ourselves by what we create? It’s the same thing, that our ideas of nature actually create us, simultaneously. You can’t have one without the other, so it really defines us. That’s where that psyche comes in. Whatever our attitude is toward that by definition defines what our attitude is of what it means to be human, and then creates what culture is. JB – Yeah, I mean that resonates with one of the early nature study proponents, a guy named Liberty Hyde Bailey. He writes about the idea that you just mentioned, that we interpret nature based on what we 54

need to believe and need to understand ourselves. It’s totally connected. He uses the terms “extrinsic” and “intrinsic” views of nature.

JJ – Yeah, and they coexist. They’re completely interdependent.

JB – Yeah, and for me, the larger context of this project just has to do with a few years of trying to understand the idea of complexity—

JJ – In what way?

JB – Well, it’s not pluralism, it’s not postmodernism, it’s an acceptance that the world is just full of multiple perspectives, ideas, sometimes they conflict, sometimes they negate each other. So I’ve been thinking about complexity in a lot of different contexts, whether it’s design, socially engaged design, or institutions. It came up in Manifesta, the biennial project I was co-curating last year. I think, for me, of course we can be ambivalent toward nature because we’re so incredibly complex!

JJ – Right, and we’re also ambivalent toward our own existence.

JB – And so I wonder what the conclusions are? Maybe it’s that we have to understand and accept that complexity in how we perceive or construct the idea of nature, and find a way around it. I think, as you suggested, I think we really want to get to a more integrated way of living in the world.

JJ – Right.

JB – So, it’s not just about environmental issues, ecology issues. It’s about all these other connected things.

JJ – Right. They can’t be disconnected. And that’s the problem, because what really happens when you disconnect them, you’re projecting the problem out, rather than recognizing that the problem is internal as well as external. So if you always project it out, it never gets resolved, because it’s always disowned.

XOXO

FURTHER READING Altman, Irwin, and Martin M. Chemers. Culture and Environment. Monterey, Calif: Brooks/Cole Pub. Co, 1980. Armitage, Kevin C. The Nature Study Movement: The Forgotten Popularizer of America’s Conservation Ethic. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2009. Bailey, Liberty H. The Nature-Study Idea: An Interpretation of the New SchoolMovement to Put the Young into Relation and Sympathy with Nature. New York: The Macmillan Co, 1909. Burns, Ken, Dayton Duncan, Buddy Squires, Allen Moore, Lincoln Else, Paul Barnes, Craig Mellish, Erik Ewers, and Peter Coyote. The National Parks: America’s Best Idea. United States: PBS Distribution, 2009. Comstock, Anna B. Handbook of Nature Study: For Teachers and Parents. Ithaca, Ny: Comstock Pub. Co, 1911. Muir, John. Our National Parks: By John Muir. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1901. Luke, Timothy W. Ecocritique: Contesting the Politics of Nature, Economy, and Culture. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997. Morton, Timothy. The Ecological Thought. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 2010. Morton, Timothy. Ecology Without Nature: Rethinking Environmental Aesthetics. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 2007. Scott, Charles B. Nature Study and the Child. Boston: D.C. Heath & Co, 1900. Talbott, Steve. “Toward an Ecological Conversation.” Ed. William Vitek and Wes Jackson. The Virtues of Ignorance: Complexity, Sustainability, and the Limits of Knowledge. Lexington, Ky: University Press of Kentucky, 2008. Thoreau, Henry D. Walden, Or, Life in the Woods. New York: Dover Publications, 1995. Zizek, Slavoj. “Censorship Today: Violence, or Ecology as a New Opium for the Masses.” Lacan.com. 2007.

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