How do you understand ‘nature’? Your part in it? and your relationships with non-human nature?

Different disciplinary terms

• Nature-society
• Nature-culture
• Socio-natural relations
• Socionatures
• Environment-society
• Biocultural (landscapes/diversity/heritage)
• Human-environment
• Human-more-than-human
• Human-nature
• Dichotomies/binaries/dualisms
• Naturecultures

certain guiding questions include: Do you have a more ‘ecocentric’ or ‘anthropocentric’ worldview?
• How do you understand ‘nature’? Your part in it? and your
relationships with non-human nature?
• Are these shaped by specific cultural knowledges, languages or
understandings?
• Can you see and know the world, think & act in ways beyond the
dominant social paradigm? Or are you constrained by it. Or both?
• What theories help you make sense of your position in the world

I can upload more documents and reading materials also.

An interdisciplinary and critical review
There is a large amount of literature available online, especially when it concerns broad, interdisciplinary topics under similar terms such as ‘relationships between humans and more-than human’, ‘nature/culture’ relationships ‘socio-natural relations’ etc. – each relevant to different disciplinary perspectives. You will need to define the ‘scope’ of your essay as an interdisciplinary critical review.
• We are particularly interested in this course on ‘critical’ debates from a social and political perspective. Focus on literature from key fields such as environmental sociology, political ecology, human geography, critical heritage studies, anthropology, science and technology studies and which uses a critical theoretical lens (such as those on the reading list). Field specific e.g. Environmental science/sustainability disciplines may be appropriate but it depends on the journal, and the paper as many of these may not adopt a critical approach.

• Exclude literature from disciplines such as natural sciences e.g. biology/soil science etc., technology/computing, health science, psychology, journalism, business or marketing studies. Whilst they may engage with the topics we’re interested in, they are less likely to use theories and concepts relevant to this course.
• Use specific keywords when you search for literature and use filters. Consider where the paper has been published, when, and by whom.
• Use the critical reading forms to help you work with key sources you find.
Find a balance of breadth-depth:
A key skill for most essays and research is finding a balance between breadth and depth. In this essay, you should aim to show breadth of knowledge through the critical review of literature, but also highlight specific key concepts from the literature in greater depth.
Consider identifying ‘classic’ or ‘seminal’ texts, as well as the most up to date publications.
Be organised
A core skill that may be useful for you in relation to this and future work (especially your dissertation) is creating a system for managing and reviewing literature.
Different possibilities include:
• Storing literature in a reference manager
• Separating downloaded sources into themed folders
• Creating a spreadsheet with details of the readings
• Highlighting pdfs to identify key ideas
• Compiling abstracts of papers in a structured way
• Using critical reading forms
I use and recommend Zotero as a reference manager – which is free and open source and easy to use.
Writing the essay
You will deploy both critical writing skills and reflective writing in this essay.
Being critical
Going beyond ‘descriiptive’ writing is often a key challenge. Being ‘critical’ is partly about building your own argument, fully engaging with, and evaluating literature, rather than simply presenting information without analysis.
There are different ways to write critically about literature.
Make sure that you think about how you’ll develop an ‘argument’ in the review.

In any piece of writing you should ask yourself of any claims you make, or content you discuss ‘so what’? Why is this important or significant? Do not let content speak for itself or simply describe it, analyse it and convey this to the reader. This should help you to build and argument and reach a conclusion.
Use signalling – signal to the marker that you have engaged in independent critical reasoning – e.g., ‘Consideration of these sources, leads to the conclusion that’, ‘This example suggests that’.
Being reflective
By showing that you understand who you are, how you see the world and how your view might be different from others, you have an opportunity to show a deep critical understanding.
The key part of essay that requires reflection is when you try to apply the concept(s) from the literature to your everyday life and understanding of the world. You need to think here about your own ‘ontology’ and ‘epistemology’: how do you see and know the world.
You can reflect critically not only by using the concepts in the literature but thinking about your understanding in relation to: specific domains of sustainability, culturally specific knowledge/interactions you may have, your social, cultural background, the social practices that make up your daily life, wider structures in society.
Although this is a reflective essay – it should be written as you would any other academic piece of work. However, when you engage in reflection, you may use the first person ‘I’.
You should consider your reflections as a form of evidence to help you build an argument and reach a conclusion as to the usefulness of the concepts you used and the wider literature on this topic.

Essay Structure :

1500 words not including references
Introduction (150 words):
What is the scope of your review, what is the order of arguments, and what key concept will you be using.
Main body: review (850 words):
Series of paragraphs offering a critical review of selected literatures and explaining a key concept
Main body: reflection (350 words):
Your reflections on the concept as it relates to your understanding of the world (ontology) and your part/practices within it.
Conclusion (150):
Brief summary of arguments made in the essay, with stated conclusions of the review/reflection

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