Overview

"The ecocide and domination of nature that is the Anthropocene does not represent the actions of all humans, but that of Man, the Western and masculine identified corporate, military, intellectual, and political class that long has masked itself as the civilized and the human. In this book, Jane Caputi looks at two major ""myths"" of the Earth, one ancient and one contemporary, and uses them to devise a manifesto for the survival of nature--which includes human beings--in our current ecological crisis. These are the myths of Mother Earth and the Anthropocene. The former personifies nature as a figure with the power to give life or death, and one who shares a communal destiny with all other living things. The latter myth sees humans as exceptional for exerting an implicitly sexual domination of Mother Earth through technological achievement, from the plow to synthetic biology and artificial intelligence. Much that we take for granted as inferior or taboo is based in a splitting apart of inherent unities: culture-nature; up-down, male-female; spirit-matter; mind-body; life-death; sacred-profane; reason-madness; human-beast; light-dark. The first is valued and the second reviled. This provides the framework for any number of related injustices--sexual, racial, and ecological.This book resists this pattern, in part, by deliberately putting the dirty back into the mind, the obscene back into the sacred, and vice versa. Ecofeminism and Environmental Justice argue for the significance and reality of the Earth Mother. Caputi engages specifically with the powers of that Mother, ones made taboo and even obscene throughout heteropatriarchal traditions. Jane Caputi rejects misogynist and colonialist stereotypes, and examines the potency of the Earth Mother in order to deepen awareness of how our relationship to the Earth went astray and what might be done to address this. Drawing upon Indigenous and African American, ecofeminism, ecowomanism, green activism, femme, queer and gender non-binary philosophies, literature and arts, Afrofuturism, and popular culture images, Call Your ""Mutha"" contends that the Anthropocene is not evidence so much of Man's supremacy, but instead a sign that Mother Nature-Earth, faced with disrespect, is turning away, withdrawing the support systems necessary for life and continuance. Caputi looks at contemporary narratives and artwork to consider the ways in which respect for the autonomous and potent Earth Mother and a call for their return has already reasserted itself into our political and popular culture."

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9780190902711

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Reviews

[A] dynamic work of scholarship that seeks nothing less than to reverse ecocide and halt the death march of the Anthropocene by gathering a chorus of diverse voices to speak on behalf of Mother Nature-Earth. -- Anne Bergeron, Dark Matter: Women Witnessing Jane Caputi looks at two major myths of the Earth, one ancient and one contemporary, and uses them to devise a manifesto for the survival of nature--which includes human beings--in our current ecological crisis. These are the myths of Mother Earth and the Anthropocene....Caputi rejects misogynist and colonialist stereotypes, and examines the potency of the Earth Mother in order to deepen awareness of how our relationship to the Earth went astray and what might be done to address this. Drawing upon Indigenous and African American, ecofeminism, ecowomanism, green activism, femme, queer and gender non-binary philosophies, literature and arts, Afrofuturism, and popular culture images, it contends that the Anthropocene is not evidence so much of Man's supremacy, but instead a sign that Mother Nature-Earth, faced with disrespect, is turning away, withdrawing the support systems necessary for life and continuance. -- Marshal Zeringue , The Page 99 Test: Call Your Mutha' This book is nothing short of a total reimagining and upending of how we relate to the earth and to each other. Caputi artfully and radically envisions a world where we replace hierarchies, dominance, and binaries with messiness, interconnectedness, and collective renewal. We have a choice: one path leads to the intensifying and catastrophic consequences of misogyny and plundering of the planet, while the other offers a world of fanciful dreams, delightful collisions, and irrepressible world-building. -- Breanne Fahs, Professor of Women and Gender Studies, Arizona State University Jane Caputi's Call Your Mutha' could not have arrived at a better time than now when we are feeling the detrimental effects of a global pandemic that climate change helped to foster. Caputi's urgent call to resist our Anthropocene age and return to our earliest worldview of Earth-Mother is a bold challenge to the postmodern feminists reducing this cosmology to gender essentialism. Of particular value is her generous citations of feminists of color who laid the blueprint for an inclusive, sustainable earth consciousness that we all now need to embrace. -- Janell Hobson, Professor of Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies, University at Albany, SUNY This book offers an original contribution to the literature on the Anthropocene. It is compelling and ambitious, foregrounds black feminist and indigenous thought, and focuses on the role racialized and sexualized violence has played in creating this moment we are in; and how to move forward we must address that. -- Melissa A. Johnson, Professor of Anthropology, Southwestern University Beautifully ambitious. Caputi draws from and builds on a wide range of scholarship and produces an original contribution to the literature. A must-read for scholars of gender studies, environmental studies, Native American studies, religious studies, and African American studies. -- AnaLouise Keating, Professor of Multicultural Women's & Gender Studies, Texas Woman's University Caputi demonstrates that the metaphor of 'mother' dominates many indigenous and minority cultures, and provides a sustainable and desirable hope for our relationship with land, planet, earth, territory. With the rise of capitalism and patriarchy, Caputi argues that when power is taken from women, the earth is damaged; and, as the planet dies, toxicity is moved into minority lands, slums, ghettos, barrios, and reservations, i.e., the very sites where hope dwells. Under Caputi's impressive and wide-ranging research of popular culture, we are brought, once again, to the central question of the relationship between earth and women. -- Kathy Rudy, Professor of Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies, Duke University This is a unique and compelling book that will make a significant contribution to the increasingly difficult and yet imperative public debate on humans' roles in environmental degradations and climate change. Caputi's book will transform the public discourse about humans' place in the planetary, challenging the patriarchal and utilitarian ways of seeing and talking about Earth/Nature/Mother. -- Wenying Xu, Professor of English, Jacksonville University

This is a unique and compelling book that will make a significant contribution to the increasingly difficult and yet imperative public debate on humans' roles in environmental degradations and climate change. Caputi's book will transform the public discourse about humans' place in the planetary, challenging the patriarchal and utilitarian ways of seeing and talking about Earth/Nature/Mother. * Wenying Xu, Professor of English, Jacksonville University * Caputi demonstrates that the metaphor of 'mother' dominates many indigenous and minority cultures, and provides a sustainable and desirable hope for our relationship with land, planet, earth, territory. With the rise of capitalism and patriarchy, Caputi argues that when power is taken from women, the earth is damaged; and, as the planet dies, toxicity is moved into minority lands, slums, ghettos, barrios, and reservations, i.e., the very sites where hope dwells. Under Caputi's impressive and wide-ranging research of popular culture, we are brought, once again, to the central question of the relationship between earth and women. * Kathy Rudy, Professor of Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies, Duke University * Beautifully ambitious. Caputi draws from and builds on a wide range of scholarship and produces an original contribution to the literature. A must-read for scholars of gender studies, environmental studies, Native American studies, religious studies, and African American studies. * AnaLouise Keating, Professor of Multicultural Women's & Gender Studies, Texas Woman's University * This book offers an original contribution to the literature on the Anthropocene. It is compelling and ambitious, foregrounds black feminist and indigenous thought, and focuses on the role racialized and sexualized violence has played in creating this moment we are in; and how to move forward we must address that. * Melissa A. Johnson, Professor of Anthropology, Southwestern University * Jane Caputi's Call Your Mutha' could not have arrived at a better time than now when we are feeling the detrimental effects of a global pandemic that climate change helped to foster. Caputi's urgent call to resist our Anthropocene age and return to our earliest worldview of Earth-Mother is a bold challenge to the postmodern feminists reducing this cosmology to gender essentialism. Of particular value is her generous citations of feminists of color who laid the blueprint for an inclusive, sustainable earth consciousness that we all now need to embrace. * Janell Hobson, Professor of Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies, University at Albany, SUNY * This book is nothing short of a total reimagining and upending of how we relate to the earth and to each other. Caputi artfully and radically envisions a world where we replace hierarchies, dominance, and binaries with messiness, interconnectedness, and collective renewal. We have a choice: one path leads to the intensifying and catastrophic consequences of misogyny and plundering of the planet, while the other offers a world of fanciful dreams, delightful collisions, and irrepressible world-building. * Breanne Fahs, Professor of Women and Gender Studies, Arizona State University *

Author Information

Jane Caputi is Professor of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Florida Atlantic University. She is the author of The Age of Sex Crime; Gossips, Gorgons and Crones; and Goddesses and Monsters: Women, Myth, Power and Popular Culture. She has also made two educational documentaries: The Pornography of Everyday Life and Feed the Green: Feminist Voices for the Earth.

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