Birdsong and the Diseased Gaia in the Anthropocene: An Ecofeminist Reading of Terry Tempest Williams' Memoirs – Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place and When Women Were Birds: Fifty-Four Variations on Voice

Abstract

Purpose of the Research Paper

The chapter tries to understand how nuclear tests and the radiation fallouts in their aftermath can lead to cancer. It seeks to explore how our diseased ecological systems have resulted in silencing the birdsong and the spreading of cancer in the Anthropocene with reference to Terry Tempest Williams' (An environmentalist and Utah naturalist) two memoirs – “‘Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place” and “When Women Were Birds: Fifty-Four Variations on Voice.” It would also try to factor in connections between climate change, pandemics like the COVID-19, and the onslaught of other terminal illnesses like cancer, all a result of mankind's anthropocentric hubris and domination of nature.

Methodology/Approach

Mine would be a qualitative approach wherein I will refer to the original two texts mentioned for primary material and other sources for secondary references and analyze them from an ecofeminist perspective.

Findings and Conclusion

We need to establish the health of the Environment through reduced usage of nuclear weapons and by developing a language and an environmental praxis that doesn't separate the subject and the object and only then we can usher in biological egalitarianism, and restore the song of the whistling thrush again. We also need to revere our Mother Earth and see to it that she maintains her ecological balance through homeostasis.

Citation

Upadhyaya, J. (2022), "Birdsong and the Diseased Gaia in the Anthropocene: An Ecofeminist Reading of Terry Tempest Williams' Memoirs – Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place and When Women Were Birds: Fifty-Four Variations on Voice ", Aladuwaka, S., Wejnert, B. and Alagan, R. (Ed.) Systemic Inequality, Sustainability and COVID-19 (Research in Political Sociology, Vol. 29), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 253-268. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0895-993520220000029019