Environmentalism and Cultural Theory: Exploring the Anthropology in Environmental Discourse

The excerpts from Kay Milton’s “Environmentalism and Cultural Theory: Exploring the Anthropology in Environmental Discourse” attempts to give context to the broad ideas of culture and anthropology, and analyze the role that these two concepts have in exploring human-environment relations. This reading establishes a framework: culture as a medium through which people connect with their environment, thusly relating the two concepts under the terminology of “cultural ecology” and giving context for anthropology as the tool to study that relationship. Milton remains purposefully vague in this piece, as she tries to show the reader different understandings of how these concepts fit together in a puzzle-like format. Most striking was Milton’s idea of “biosphere people” versus “ecosystem people” and the myths and truths surrounding these concepts. Who are the more environmentally aware groups? Is utilizing a single ecosystem more sustainable than those who utilize more than one, and do societies even exist today that can still claim the use of only one ecosystem? Milton goes on to examine the notion of “primitive ecological wisdom” and how this is in fact a myth. While this helps for the reader to analyze preconceived notions about human-environment relations more critically, it is an interesting concept in opposition to other authors we’ve read (Nazarea/Netting) who comment on Western societies dismissal of indigenous groups and their relationships and knowledge of the environment. Milton’s piece displays the complicated relationship between culture and nature, and addresses how the key link between these two concepts is adaptation.