1b. Consider one particular religious or Indigenous worldview (indicate clearly which one you have chosen – if choosing an Indigenous worldview, choose a specific Indigenous culture). What are some of the key ecological insights or ideas found in this worldview? How do these ideas compare with insights from deep ecology, ecofeminism, social ecology, or an ecological justice perspective (choose one and indicate it clearly)? In what ways are they similar or different? Are there particular insights or ideas from this religious or Indigenous worldview that could be problematic from an ecological perspective? Are there other ideas or resources found within this religious or Indigenous tradition that could help to counter these or to shift it towards …show more content…
a more ecological worldview? Environmental ethics is a discipline in philosophy that studies the moral relationship of human beings to the value of environment and its non-human contents. Currently planet Earth is in an environmental crisis, the concern of many people has caused many debates and the initiations of many ecological movements and philosophies, one of which being Deep ecology. Deep ecology initiated and coined by philosopher Arnie Naess, in 1972. Environmental ethics challenges ideologies like anthropocentrism, currently practiced and embedded in traditional western thinking. In this essay I will be comparing and contrasting Deep ecology to beliefs and rituals of Indigenous cultures of Inuit people, as ecosophies of the Inuit peoples values and practices can be closely related to Deep ecology philosophies. I would like to emphasize that Canadians currently hold an average ecological footprint of 7.7 ha Per capita. Placing Canada as the second largest Eco footprint emitters after United States, as a result to capitalistic and anthropocentric worldviews. What are some of the key ecological insights or ideas found in this worldview? The North American native tribe of Eskimo-Aleut or Eskaleut is a language family native spread to Alaska, the Canadian Artic, Nunavik, Nunatsivut, and Greenland. These communities are of hunters and fishermen, who have been part of the last large-scale migration from Asia across the Bering Strait, around 5,000 years ago. Eskimo-Aleut languages have a rich morphology and are strongly polysynthetic. Traditional Inuit beliefs are a form of animism, according to which all objects; living things and beings have a spirit. The world is considered a spiritual place, while some spiritual forces were more important than others, successful living required for one to live in harmony with their spiritually based environment. Spirits can affect people’s lives and can be controlled by magical charms and talismans. Various taboos were practiced to make sure that animal spirits were not offended, and when animals were killed for food, it was done according to certain rituals. These rituals pay deep respect to the spirit of the animals that they hunted, so that the spirit reappeared in another animal, as animist believed spirits continued to live on in another body. How do these ideas compare with insights from deep ecology? In what ways are they similar or different? Deep ecology is a philosophy initiated by Naess and his colleagues in Scandinavia, in 1972.
“On a visit to the Himalayas, they became impressed with aspects of “Sherpa culture” particularly when they found that their Sherpa guides regarded certain mountains as sacred and accordingly would not venture onto them.” Deep ecology movement endorses “biospheric egalitarianism”, the view that all living things are alike in having value in their own right, independent of their usefulness to others. The deep ecologist respects this intrinsic value, taking care, to not cause unnecessary damage to nature. Naess argues, that humanity and the natural world could not be separated because it will cause selfishness on humanity toward nature. According to relationalism, organisms are understood as knots in the biospherical net. Deep ecology focuses also on the identification of the human ego with nature. That by identifying with nature one can enlarge the boundaries of the self, beyond skin, emphasizing being something larger then the body and consciousness. To respect and care for oneself is also do so with the natural environment, this is called, in other words self-realization. These are concepts are similarly practiced by animistic views, as the Inuit people respect nature and its spirit, as well as the understanding of ones self spirit in the natural world. And their respect for the spirit of the animals they hunt, an ideology that considers humanity in connection and in balance with …show more content…
nature. Are there particular insights or ideas from this religious or Indigenous worldview that could be problematic from an ecological perspective? The Indigenous worldviews of Inuit’s people are problematic as the rituals of annual seal hunt, which occurs during March and April. Currently seal hunt is practiced in eight countries: Greenland, Iceland, Norway, Russia, Finland, Sweden, Namibia and Canada where the worlds most seal hunting takes place. In 2008, 217,800 seals had been killed just in Canada. It is extremely tragic in the sense that the populations of Harp seals in northwest Atlantic have declined approximately 2 million in the late 1960s as a result of Canada’s annual rate. Baby seals are the targets of this hunt because of their white fur. The incentive for killing such young seals is the sum of money that hunters earn for their fur, as the young white seal fur is strongly prized in the fashion industry. Although the Inuit people use the seal as a source of clothing and food and merchandise, many non-indigenous people take part in the hunt just for the benefit of the fur and leave the seal to waste. Unfortunately the Canadian government has no plan to make seal hunting illegal in the near future as it is a large export for their country. Are there other ideas or resources found within this religious or Indigenous tradition that could help to counter these or to shift it towards a more ecological worldview? In an interview with Tanya Tagaq, a punk singer of Inuit region, says “Seal-hunting, she explains, allowed communities in remote areas to at least feed themselves and use the money from selling pelts to pay their rent.” While seal hunting is legal in Canada, one has to recognize that indigenous hunting and commercial hinting are two largely different forms of hunting.
The Inuit use hinting to sustain themselves in their harsh environment, while commercial hunting is for the profiting of fur export. If the government was to place laws against commercial seal hunting and allow indigenous people who sustainably hunt adult seals for survival, the numbers will decline. However if the government was to place more jobs, fewer aboriginals might continue the ritual of seal hunting as their sustaining income, and their tradition might decline extremely, as well as other social problems that intuit people are currently
overcoming. In conclusion deep ecology as a movement is helpful in directing western ideology and capitalistic mindset to a more primitive and spiritual understanding of Earth. As Aboriginals have been in sync with similar ideologies for thousands of years, it is well proven that capitalism and the religion of the market has alienated our understanding of the world we live in, and has caused Canadians and Americans to consume selfishly. Words:1110
The wild is a place to push yourself to the limit and take a look at who you truly are inside. “Wilderness areas have value as symbols of unselfishness” (Nash). Roderick Nash’s philosophy states that the wilderness gives people an opportunity to learn humility but they fight this because they do not have a true desire to be humble. Human-kind wants to give out the illusion that they are nature lovers when in reality, they are far from it. “When we go to designated wilderness we are, as the 1964 act says, "visitors" in someone else's home” (Nash). People do not like what they cannot control and nature is uncontrollable. Ecocentrism, the belief that nature is the most important element of life, is not widely accepted. The novel Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer depicts a young boy who goes on an exploration to teach himself the true concept of humility. Chris McCandless, the protagonist, does not place confidence in the universal ideology that human beings are the most significant species on the planet, anthropocentrism.
The Native American’s way of living was different from the Europeans. They believed that man is ruled by respect and reverence for nature and that nature is an ancestor or relative. The Native American’s strongly belie...
Throughout ancient history, many indigenous tribes and cultures have shown a common trait of being hunter/gatherer societies, relying solely on what nature had to offer. The geographical location influenced all aspects of tribal life including, spirituality, healing philosophy and healing practices. Despite vast differences in the geographical location, reports show various similarities relating to the spirituality, healing philosophy and healing practices of indigenous tribal cultures.
The term sovereignty is a broad topic that has many different definitions. The most common definition is a nation or groups ability or right to govern themselves. Sovereignty is a term and idea that goes hand in hand with Native Americans throughout history. Native American tribes were once considered sovereign nation until shortly after the arrival of European settlers. Native Americans lost their sovereignty due to the forceful assimilation into white culture by European settlers. The problem with this is that Native Americans have been in North American, acting as self-governing groups, since the beginning days. What sets Native Americans apart from other “minority groups” is that they have existed as self-governing peoples and are more than a group
From the lone hiker on the Appalachian Trail to the environmental lobby groups in Washington D.C., nature evokes strong feelings in each and every one of us. We often struggle with and are ultimately shaped by our relationship with nature. The relationship we forge with nature reflects our fundamental beliefs about ourselves and the world around us. The works of timeless authors, including Henry David Thoreau and Annie Dillard, are centered around their relationship to nature.
Richard Nelson highly praises the Eskimo for their knowledge and adaptation. They are known to be living in the harshest environment, yet they brilliantly adjust their lifestyle to survive it. Nelson describes many events he has encountered during his time in Alaska to demonstrate how deeply the Eskimos are bonded with the nature. His main argument is simply stating their interaction with nature and an affinity with the non-human life. He wants to use the relationship between Koyukon Indians and the nature to show what we once had that was forgotten and ignored.
The religion of the Ojibwe is centered on a belief of a single creating force but according the Minnesota Historical Society the religion also, “Incorporated a wide pantheon of spirits that played specific roles in the universe.” These different spirits took on different roles, some to protect the Ojibwe hunters, protection from illness and while in battle. Each person had a personal guardian spirit which was one of their most important. Their guardian spirit would come to them in a dream or vision and could be called on for protection and guidance. The tribe also had spiritual leaders, which were feared and respected because of their supernatural powers that could be used for good, or evil. Dreams were related to religion and spirit guides. Natives believed dreams carried great significance and that they would provide visions of their future and how to live their lives. The Ojibwe would go on annual fasts to renew the vision of their lives and reflect.
Many years ago, people saw the wilderness as a savage wasteland, but today, it is viewed as “the last remaining place where civilization, that all too human disease, has not fully infected the earth.” (Cronon) He discusses this changed point of view by stating the difficulties that society will have rectifying environmental ailments if it stops viewing wilderness as “a dualistic picture in which the human is completely outside the nature.” (Cronon) This is understandable because humans rely on others to create opinions, and they do not know how to form their own thoughts and solutions to issues such as environmental ones. Therefore, it is with great importance that humans begin to learn how to formulate their own thoughts and share those personal thoughts with others, such as sharing solutions about environmental
The positivist-post-positivist paradigm is the most appropriate paradigm for research regarding the subject matter of Northern Frontier, Northern Homeland by Thomas Berger (1988). This paradigm states that social science research pushes towards western cultures causing other regions to adapt to western ideas. According to Travers (2010), “[t]he physical and the social sciences are products of western culture in a specific historical moment. [s]cience is a modern phenomenon, emerging in step with capitalism, industrialism, global expansion, and a liberal philosophy” (p. 9). Ingenious people living in the North are being forced to change the way they live if the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline were to be built. According to Berger (1988), “[i]n developing institutions of government in the North, we sought to impose our own system, to persuade the native people to conform to our political models (p. 236). The indigenous people have their way of living, they hint their food, and they live in a quite and peaceful land where they live off their own economy. The pipeline would destroy the Northern Homeland. In an interview with the President of the National Indian Brotherhood told Berger (1988) in the Inquiry, “[s]uch projects have occurred time and time again in our history. They were, and are, the beginnings of the type of developments which destroy the way of life of aboriginal peoples and rob us of our economic, cultural and political independence” (p. 229). The pipeline would cause high amounts of traffic, and drilling. The noise that would be created due to the pipeline would cause the animals to migrate elsewhere, causing fewer animals to be hunted. The information obtained from scientific research can be used to predict and control nat...
Australia’s Indigenous people are thought to have reached the continent between 60 000 and 80 000 years ago. Over the thousands of years since then, a complex customary legal system have developed, strongly linked to the notion of kinship and based on oral tradition. The indigenous people were not seen as have a political culture or system for law. They were denied the access to basic human right e.g., the right to land ownership. Their cultural values of indigenous people became lost. They lost their traditional lifestyle and became disconnected socially. This means that they were unable to pass down their heritage and also were disconnected from the new occupants of the land.
Hawken writes that the movement, a collective gathering of nonconformists, is focused on three basic ambitions: environmental activism, social justice initiatives, and indigenous culture’s resistance to globalization. The principles of environmental activism being closely intertwined with social justice rallies. Hawken states how the fate of each individual on this planet depends on how we understand and treat what is left of the planet’s lands, oceans, species diversity, and people; and that the reason that there is a split between people and nature is because the social justice and environmental arms of the movement hav...
“Ecology and spirituality are fundamentally connected, because deep ecological awareness, ultimately, is spiritual awareness” - Fritjof Capra
During the country’s colonial period, the indigenous people in Australia were subjected to mass killings because of European interests. This account of genocide is clearly identifiable by the immense number of casualties, yet other instances of genocide occur under the public radar. According to the 1948 definition of genocide, which includes other elements beyond mass murder, it is accurate to support the idea that genocide against Aboriginal Australians has continued into the 20th and 21st centuries.
The IK embedded in the stories reveal how such knowledge is instrumental in ushering in and mitigating ecological catastrophe (Woollett, 2007). Cajete (2000) observes that “ultimately, the goal of Indigenous education is to perpetuate a way of life through the generations and through time. The purpose of all education is to instruct the next generation about what is valued and important to a society” (p. 184). In Canada, Native schools have begun to emerge where Native people (of particular tribal groups) conduct education for children in their own languages and develop a curriculum which is based on reclaiming traditional knowledges and worldviews, for example, the importance of land and environment and what land and environment means to Aboriginal
To understand the nature-society relationship means that humans must also understand the benefits as well as problems that arise within the formation of this relationship. Nature as an essence and natural limits are just two of the ways in which this relationship can be broken down in order to further get an understanding of the ways nature and society both shape one another. These concepts provide useful approaches in defining what nature is and how individuals perceive and treat