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SOCL521: Environment and Culture: Issues, Politics and Institutions

Module convenors: Claire Waterton

Module Aims

• Examine the role that sociology and social theory can play in understanding the relationship between society and the environment
• Examine the range of different approaches that have been developed in environmental sociology, and clarify what is at stake in the differences of approach
• Apply different sociological approaches to the task of understanding contemporary environmental problems
• Explore how study of environmental problems and crises can help to illuminate fundamental constitutive tensions in modern society

Course Approach

The growing interest in the environment in the social sciences sociological thought is not just because of the urgency and significance of the environmental problems faced by modern society. The relationship between culture and nature also remains an enduring puzzle that can trouble the way we think about a range of issues including knowledge, freedom, security, justice and gender. 
Using lectures and seminar discussion, we will draw on the resources of environmental sociology, science studies, cultural studies, political economy and social theory to address key questions concerning the relationship between society, technology and the environment.  The final two weeks of the course will be led by groups of students who will apply the ideas we have looked at in the rest of the course to specific case studies or issues of their choice (for example, agricultural biotechnology, nuclear power, shale gas, protest movements, climate justice etc.)

Topics Covered

• The history of environmentalism
• What makes an environmental issue an environmental issue?
• Whose knowledge should define environmental issues?
• Do we live in an age of risk?
• Are women closer to nature?
• Is environmentalism a politics of affluence?
• Can there be a green capitalism?
• Is this the end of nature?

Assessment

One 5,000 word essay.

Indicative Readings

• Michael Bell (1998) An Invitation to Environmental Sociology, Thousand Oaks: Pine Forge Press. (DUHN)
• Noel Castree (2005) Nature, London: Routledge. (DUHN)
• Riley E. Dunlap, Frederick H. Buttel, Peter Dickens and August Gijswijt (eds.). (2002) Sociological Theory and the Environment: Classical Foundations, Contemporary Insights.  Boulder, CO: Rowman & Littlefield. (DUHN)
• Adrian Franklin (2002) Nature and Social Theory. London: Sage (DUHN)
• Hannigan, John A. (1995) Environmental Sociology: A Social Constructionist Perspective, London: Routledge
• Hinchliffe, Steve (2007) Geographies of Nature: Societies, Environments, Ecologies, Sage, London.
• Alan Irwin (2001) Sociology and the Environment. Cambridge: Polity. (DUHN)
• Phil Macnaghten and John Urry (1998) Contested Natures, London: Sage. (DUHN)
• John McNeil (2001) Something New Under the Sun. An Environmental History of the 20th Century. Penguin
• Scott Lash, Bronislaw Szerszynski and Brian Wynne, eds (1996) Risk, Environment and Modernity: Towards a New Ecology, London: Sage. (KDW)
• Michael Redclift and Graham Woodgate (eds) (1997) International Handbook of Environmental Sociology. Cheltenham, UK; Northampton, MA, USA. (DUHN)

Student Comments

SOCL521 Environment and Culture triggers us to ask questions we tend not to think about, such as what makes a given topic an environmental issue or whose knowledge counts when making decisions. I took the course as a guest student and loved the approach. Discussing various perspectives and attempting to understand different sides of the ‘environmental’ story, analysing our risk perceptions, debating potential alternative solutions, and learning about a number of scholars whom I was not familiar with, made this course one of the most inspiring courses I have experienced at the university. SOCL521 Environment and Culture is the type of a course I wish was mandatory in all higher education, but it is particularly valuable for anyone engaged in topics related to environmental issues, not just for students in sociology but from public health and policy development to engineering and business." - Paivi Abernethy, MSc MRes PhD student

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