The Environmental Humanities

This book is the best introduction to a dynamic field. It is perfect for fomenting lively classroom discussion of so many of this era's essential issues: climate change, animal sentience, environmental justice, digital and analog forms of representing the environment, the Anthropocene, food and water security, urban futures, and sustainable energy. The writing is conceptually informed, yet lucid and grounded throughout by international and interdisciplinary examples. A tour de force.

Rob Nixon, Barron Family Professor in Humanities and Environment, Princeton University; author of Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor

Just as Emma Marris synthesized the recent work of conservation biologists in their search for novel solutions to life in the Anthropocene, so too have Emmett and Nye given us an elegant meditation on two decades of work by environmental scholars of the humanities. More than a literature review, the book makes a convincing case, for all those who need it, that our futures are contingent on the non-perfunctory understanding and appreciation for the social and cultural values that undergird our environmental problems as well as the solutions.

Gary Kroll, Professor of History at SUNY Plattsburgh; author of America's Ocean Wilderness

In this neat, compact, yet very rich volume Robert Emmett and David Nye demonstrate that the environmental humanities is a cross-cutting intellectual adventure that will not only stimulate knowledge and catalyze the humanities but will also affect the transition to sustainable societies. It is an excellent introduction to a vibrant field which is too vast for anyone to fully fathom. They have selected well, they write accessibly, their judgment is sound.

Sverker Sörlin, Professor of Environmental History, Division of History of Science, Technology and Environment, KTH Royal Institute of Technology