Environmental Narratives in the Huainanzi and the Anthropocene
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€102.99
A01=Matthew James Hamm
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anthropogenic climate change
Asian studies
Author_Matthew James Hamm
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Category1=Non-Fiction
Category=HBAH
Category=HBJF
Category=NHAH
Category=NHF
Chinese philosophy
climate change
COP=United States
Delivery_Delivery within 10-20 working days
Domestication
early China
environmental philosophy
Environmental studies
environmental theory
eq_bestseller
eq_history
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
global environmental crisis
Han Empire
historiography
Language_English
mass extinction
Neo-liberal narratives
PA=Available
Periodization
Price_€50 to €100
PS=Active
sinology
softlaunch
Product details
- ISBN 9781666914351
- Weight: 494g
- Dimensions: 157 x 238mm
- Publication Date: 31 Jul 2024
- Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Hardback
- Language: English
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Environmental Narratives in the Huainanzi and the Anthropocene analyzes the contemporary discourse of the Anthropocene using the Huainanzi ???, an eastern Eurasian text from the second century BCE. Written to preserve and strengthen the Han Empire (202 BCE–220 CE), the Huainanzi describes a mode of rulership premised on periodizing the present as the end of history that domesticates humans and non-humans. Matthew James Hamm provides a contextualized reading of the Huainanzi’s argument and uses it as a theoretical lens to read Anthropocene scholarship in the sciences, social sciences, and humanities. Hamm argues that—irrespective of the name or historical narrative used to describe it—the idea of the Anthropocene as a new epoch not only lacks empirical evidence, but also empowers the existing periodization of modernity to provide ideological support for environmentally destructive neoliberal structures rooted in Western European imperial orders. By doing so, the Anthropocene framework actively inhibits the transformative social change needed to address global environmental crises such as climate change and mass extinction. Consequently, this book rejects periodization as a conceptual framework for addressing those issues and advocates for greater scholarly engagement with environmental theories outside the European and Anglo-American traditions, such as the Huainanzi.
Matthew Hamm is research associate for the Database of Religious History at the University of British Columbia.
