What should the new language of Environmentalism be?
In the third article for today, Conservation is Good Work, Wendell Berry spends several pages expounding on what I dub the Language of Environmentalism. He makes such claims as the current term to describe our world and our relationship to it, the environment, is lacking in enough cultural relevance to invoke emotional responses or ethical responsibilities. Saying, “This world, this Creations belongs in limited sense to us, for we may rightfully require certain things of it… but we also belong to it, and it makes Certain rightful claims on us.” Furthermore, “None of this intimacy and responsibility is conveyed by the world environment.”
Later Berry introduces his substitution for this term, “good work,” however I feel that this too lacks the bite that he so desires. His words resonated within me and I agree that we need a new language of environmentalism so that the general populace will be emotionally and ethically drawn in. Going so far as to say that the current vernacular is “culturally sterile” and “enacts no affection ad gives no honor,” Berry posits that the solution would be good work on a communal scale. And it is this term that I feel should be used. When talking about “economic geography” Berry says that the standard by which we choose must be the health of the community. Truly what better term evokes both and emotional and ethical connection that Community Health. I feel that this is the term that should define how we look at our world and how we relate to it.