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Chicana Environmentalisms: Deterritorialization As a Practice Of Chicana Environmentalisms: Deterritorialization as a Practice of Decolonization Dissertation Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By Christina M. Holmes Graduate Program in the Department of Women’s Studies The Ohio State University 2010 Committee: Cathy Rakowski, Advisor Christine Keating Guisela Latorre Copyright by Christina M. Holmes 2010 Abstract This dissertation considers the state of environmentalism in feminist studies in the American academy. I propose that ecofeminism, the branch of feminist philosophy that concerns itself with environmentalism, is limited by disciplinary divides and geographical exclusions that appear in its historiography—these limit what counts as ecofeminism as well as what it could be. “Ecofeminism” describes many things, including how the domination of women may be linked to the domination of nature and an examination of women’s environmental activism. While ecofeminist theories criticize the historically negative image of women and nature that exists in patriarchal cultures that measure nature by its market value, ecofeminism also posits a positive identification of women with nature. Some point to women’s greater contact with the environment through farming and conservation, reproduction and care work, or a spiritual connection with “mother nature” to describe woman-nature identifications and argue that women are well-positioned to protect nature. Though ecofeminist theory is useful for understanding the nature of oppression and strategies for resistance, it has also been marginalized in feminist studies due to criticisms of gender essentialism. It has also been marginalized because of its exclusions, including what appears to be a white, middle-class bias. My dissertation revisits these criticisms by reframing ecofeminism through the lens of Chicana studies. In bringing these two fields together, I aim to revise and revitalize ii environmentalist feminist theory to make it more inclusive and relevant to academics and activists. Revision is a multi-part process. First, I map ecofeminism in Western feminist studies through a genealogy that follows the master narratives that govern the field as well as their exclusions, such as the absence of Chicana environmentalisms. Second, I identify ecological narratives in the work of Chicana and Mexican-American women to revise and expand feminist environmental philosophy with the perspectives of a population that is underrepresented in the literature. I chose Chicana studies not just for the lack of attention it receives, but because the most problematic areas in ecofeminist theory can be re-evaluated in light of how such relationships are articulated in complex, non-essentialist ways by Chicana and Mexican-American writers, artists and activists. My conclusions find that Chicana environmentalisms rewrite the essentialist themes in ecofeminism that have drawn criticism, including the link between women and nature, the role of embodiment and of spirituality in environmental literature and movements. At the heart of Chicana environmental practices is an effort to construct open and performative intersubjective identities that create new kinds of politicized human/nature /spirit relations. Ultimately, what can be seen in these efforts is the deterritorialization, or de-sedimenting and pushing into new directions, of identities and movements in ways that invigorate activism for social and ecological justice. Moreover, in bringing together ecofeminist and Chicana studies, I aim to disrupt each of those fields, deterritorializing them in productive ways. Together, then, this project reflects work to decolonize subjectivity, movement politics, and disciplinarity in the academy. iii Acknowledgments First, I would like to acknowledge my advisor, Dr. Cathy Rakowski, who has helped me throughout my doctoral career. She has provided me with professional and intellectual food for thought, emotional support, and the space to stumble through my own ideas and projects so that my curiosity could flourish and I could find my own way. I am grateful to have had such a supportive mentor. I am also thankful for my dissertation committee members. Dr. Guisela Latorre provided detailed and insightful feedback not only on the dissertation, but on many other papers as well. She also introduced me to the Chicana art that has furthered my thought and become so central to this dissertation. Dr. Cricket Keating has been a supportive academic and teaching mentor; her work on popular education, coalition, and democracy has been a crucial link that helped me draw together insights from my Master’s research on coalitional theories and practices and my emerging interests in Chicana environmentalisms to inform this dissertation. I would also like to thank my friends and family for helping me in a number of ways as I made my way through graduate school. My family has been a tremendous help when I needed it and my friends came along for numerous study dates, edits sessions, and cheer-me-up phone calls that made this dissertation (on ocassion) a joy to work on. Last, I would like to thank Mary Carter and the women of the Women’s Intercultural Center for sharing their work with me. The work they do is inspiring and I hope this dissertation can call much deserved attention to their organization. iv Vita June 1998.......................................................Lawrence High School (Lawrence, NJ) October 2002 .................................................M.St. (Master of Studies), Women’s Studies, Oxford University 2005-2010......................................................Graduate Teaching Associate, Department of Women’s Studies, The Ohio State University 2010…………………………………………Research Associate, University Center for the Advancement of Teaching Fields of Study Major Field: Women’s Studies Specializations: Global and Transnational Feminisms; Visual and Narrative Cultures; and States, Economies, and Social Action v Table of Contents Abstract .........................................................…………………………………………… ii Acknowledgments...…………………………………………………………………….. iv Vita …………………………………………………………………………………….... v List of Abbreviations …………………………………………………………………... vii List of Images ……………………………………………………………………..…... viii Introduction: Deterritorialization as Grounds for a Decolonizing Politics? …………….. 1 Chapter 1: A Stuttering within Ecofeminism ………………………………………..…. 38 Chapter 2: Ecological Narratives in Chicana Cultural Production …………………….. 79 Chapter 3: Technologies for the Ecological Self: Cinematic Deterritorializations…… 119 Chapter 4: Activist Histories of Chicana/o Environmentalism ……………………….. 151 Chapter 5: Technologies for the Ecological Self: Practices of the Women’s Intercultural Center ……………………………………….. 202 Conclusion: Deterritorializing Movements and the Ecological Self-in-Community…. 264 Notes ………………………………………………………………………………….. 280 Bibliography ………………………………………………………………………….. 286 vi List of Abbreviations NIMBY ………………………………… “Not in my back yard” environmental mentality SNEEJ …………………… Southwest Network for Environmental and Economic Justice WED ………………………………………. Women, the Environment, and Development WIC ……………………………………………………….. Women’s Intercultural Center WID …………………………………………………………..… Women in Development vii INTRODUCTION DETERRITORIALIZATION AS GROUNDS FOR A DECOLONIZING POLITICS? Outlining the Research Question The question that sits at the heart of this dissertation concerns the state of feminist environmentalism in the American academy. Ecofeminist philosophy has fallen out of favor with feminists writing through the poststructural turn due to its perceived history of essentialism, including its reification of “woman” and “nature.” This too easy dismissal forecloses important questions ecofeminism raises regarding women’s environmental activism and the gendered effects of environmental degradation. In light of the recent disaster from the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and a general trend toward embracing “green culture,” particularly through the consumption of green washed products that include everything from hybrid cars to household cleansers, it is becoming vitally important that feminists take up questions regarding how our relationships with each other and with the environment shape efforts toward justice. Feminist scholars must turn their attention back to the environment despite the marginalization of ecofeminism within the discipline. The resurgence of ecological awareness in feminist theory need not necessarily be rooted in ecofeminist philosophy though in following Niamh Moore’s suggestion to rethink the value in ecofeminism, I advocate revisiting several key debates that 1 characterize the field in order to learn more about those tensions in feminist praxis that are abjected from the master narratives of Western feminism (2008, 320). In revisiting ecofeminism, however, I also note that while there are useful ideas that can be reclaimed and reworked, ecofeminist theory maintains its own exclusions; Chicana and Mexican- American environmental activists are chief among those that remain absent from the canon yet a survey of the strategies employed by Chicana writers, artists, and activists shows that their struggles for ecological and social justice suggest they have much to offer ecofeminism and feminist theory more broadly. Thus, the research questions that drove this project initially are as follows: What are the key debates in ecofeminism that
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