Thinking ecologically with Judith Butler |
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| Authors: | Joshua Trey Barnett |
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| Institution: | Department of Communication, University of Minnesota Duluth, Duluth, USA |
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| Abstract: | This essay traces several productive points of overlap and departure between the recent philosophical work of Judith Butler and ecological thinking. While ecological philosophers and theorists have often dismissed Butler's treatment of politics and ethics as narrowly anthropocentric, this essay charges that there are considerable conceptual resources within Butler's oeuvre that are not only in accord with much recent ecological theorising but which also stand to enrich our approaches to ecological thinking and politics. Focusing specifically on three conceptual clusters – exposure and precarity; infrastructure and coexistence; and assemblies and assemblages – this essay demonstrates how Butler's work can be leveraged to augment the ways we approach both ecosystems and our more-than-human cohabitants as elements of and actors within the dynamic play of forces that make coexistence more or less possible. |
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