It Connects Me to the Earth: Marginalized Environmentalism, Ecological Embeddedness and Resistance to Capitalist Logic

• In Event: 2483 - Section on Collective Behavior and Social Movements Refereed Roundtable Session
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 14. Tactics of Everyday Life

Abstract

I have found that subsistence food producers are practicing innovative pro-environmental behaviors despite not holding very strong environmental identities. Some of these practices include: composting, water saving/reduction, food localization, closed-loop nutrient cycling, soil remediation, and promoting biological diversity. This finding can be explained through the theoretical lens of ecological embeddedness. Being close to the source of their food by self-producing, SFPs are directly confronted with the natural environment from which they produce food. This finding is significant because environmental sociologists have typically focused mainly on environmental attitudes, which are generally held by those that identify as environmentalists. Because my population doesn’t typically identify as environmentalists, yet are practicing pro-environmental behaviors, my research suggests that those seeking to study human-environment interaction should look beyond those that simply identify as environmentalists for ecological innovation. In other words, it’s the hunters and fishermen, backyard gardeners, and urban chicken keepers that may be at the forefront of pro-environmental innovation, and the implication is that we must begin to look at these populations that are marginalized by environmental sociologists in order to learn about exciting directions in environmental research.

Author

• Ashley Colby Fitzgerald, Washington State University