The Metaphysics of Ecofeminist Essayism Intra-acting with the Essays of Rebecca Solnit & Terry Tempest Williams Audrey Jean Camp Det humanistiske fakultet UNIVERSITETET I OSLO May 2017 I II III The Metaphysics of Ecofeminist Essayism: Intra-acting with the Essays of Rebecca Solnit & Terry Tempest Williams IV Copyright Audrey Jean Camp 2017 The Metaphysics of Ecofeminist Essayism: Intra-acting with the Essays of Rebecca Solnit & Terry Tempest Williams Audrey Jean Camp http://www.duo.uio.no Trykk: Reprosentralen, Universitetet i Oslo V VI VII Abstract In this thesis, I draw parallels between ecofeminist philosophy and Karen Barad’s proposal for a new, performative and posthumanist metaphysics in order to analyse the capacity of ecofeminist essayism to enact change in the world. The ecofeminist essayist chooses to place herself in situations where she will encounter difference, as a by-product of her activism, for example, or through her research. This is the foundation of innovation, creativity, and invention. Of becoming and change. I explore the ways in which activist-writers Rebecca Solnit and Terry Tempest Williams engage the space between philosophy and activism—an extension of the Cartesian Mind-Body problem—and how their personal, politically-situated essays can embody that elusive connection. VIII IX Acknowledgements And it is said that it is impossible to picture the subatomic world, and that the electron cannot be described. (It is said that women show a bias for the mysterious.) Discontinuity is discovered and it is said that light moves in particles. And yet it is said light also moves in waves. And the electron, too, is discovered to be both a wave and a particle. A duality pervades nature, it is decided. (As to how much space an electron takes up, or where it is at any given time, it is said, those questions are ‘as meaningless as… how much room a fear, an anxiety, or an uncertainty take up.’) And it is written that psychology is unable to solve ‘the riddle of femininity.’ – Susan Griffin, Woman and Nature I came to this thesis the way I have come to most creative projects in my life: by luck and chance and personal attention to similar glimmers in unexpected times and places. It is possible that the first spark—the terminus ad quem—came four years ago, as I backpacked through Norway’s Lofoten region. A ragged copy of Woman and Nature had accompanied me on the trip, and the text—with its revolutionary content and form—provoked me to the point that I felt compelled to read it aloud as I walked, stomping my way across those spongey, emerald meadows. The passage above embedded itself somewhere in my subconscious, and I knew just where to look when, suddenly and unexpectedly earlier this year, I discovered myself immersed in physics, metaphysics, and feminist science studies. I wasn’t alone on those far northern trails. My husband Jonathan was splashing through the mud and stalking through the tall grass beside me, listening to my voice echo against the high, stony cliffs around us. He asked questions, and when there was a reference to a scientific subject with which I was unfamiliar, he was willing and able to explain. This is our relationship. I am tremendously grateful for the role he played in the delivery of this thesis: as a sounding board, an advocate, a co-parent, and as a husband. I’m also thankful to my daughter, Petrikke, born during my time as a master’s student at UiO. She inspires me to set an example of curiosity and studiousness, and I’ll never forget her incredible patience on the days I had to pick work over play. Nor the solid, joyful way she would hug and kiss me when I found time to leke again! Of course, I must thank my thesis advisor, Bruce Barnhart, for his flexibility and trust as my project morphed toward this surprising point. I am also grateful for my MA cohort, X whose participation in the English Masters Society at UiO enriched my thesis semesters. I especially couldn’t have finished writing without the wisdom and solidarity of Marianne Svarstad, who put me into the path of Karen Barad and helped me get a grip on agential realism, or without Kevin Steinman, who inspired me to apply to the MA program in the first place. Finally, I’m proud to submit this thesis as an example of its contention. It is one of innumerable phenomena resulting from my agential intra-action with the work of two contemporary ecofeminist essayists. In it, I hope the reader will find, along with new ideas and strong research, some essence of the living, breathing, sweating ecofeminist essays that first inspired me. I have included several of the voices that rang out right when I needed them in the process, as well as a couple that have stuck with me over the years. The pattern I didn’t see until I neared the end of the writing was this: Women standing up to speak. An actress, a poet, a politician, and a feminist icon, two writers, and a theoretical physicist stepping up behind their podiums, each telling an audience something it didn’t necessarily expect to hear. My antenna on this project was serendipitously attuned to these moments, both recent and long past. I must thank Rebecca Solnit and Terry Tempest Williams for their writing. Not only the books I deal with in this thesis, but the sound, rebellious, lyrical essays they continue to write. Since I began my thesis year, the American presidency has fallen into the hands of a man and a party with an utter disregard for the sovereignty of the natural world. Solnit, Williams and their contemporaries must work harder than ever to advocate for public lands, indigenous people, women, and other vulnerable groups. I hope to join them in that good work, both as a writer, and as a standard bearer for progressivism within the Democratic Party. It was Solnit, in particular, whose explanation of the notion of a politics of prefiguration, “the idea that if you embody what you aspire to, you have already succeeded,” pushed me to run for (and win) an election for Chair of Democrats Abroad Norway in February 2017 (Hope in the Dark 80). And so her words moved me to action. These are the poetic crossings that ecofeminist essays can accomplish. XI XII Table of Contents 1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 1 1.1 Discarding Descartes: The Metaphysics of Essayism ..................................................... 3 1.2 Chapter One: The Personal ...................................................................................................... 8 1.2.1 Virginia Woolf’s Radical Subjectivity ............................................................................................. 9 1.2.2 Polyphonic Performativity in the Work of Rebecca Solnit ................................................. 12 1.3 Chapter Two: The Political ..................................................................................................... 14 1.3.1 Definition and Redefinition in Feminism: A Brief History ................................................. 16 1.3.2 Invitational Rhetoric in Ecofeminist Essayism ....................................................................... 17 1.3.3 Rewilding in the Work of Terry Tempest Williams .............................................................. 18 1.4 The Powerful: Where Meaning Comes From ................................................................... 19 2 The Personal .......................................................................................................................... 20 2.1 Skin in the Game: Scholarly Memoirs ................................................................................. 22 2.2 Radical Subjectivity .................................................................................................................. 23 2.3 Unplanned Encounters and Necessary Detours ............................................................. 27 2.4 The Power of Presence ............................................................................................................ 31 2.5 Solnit’s “Across the Great Divide” ........................................................................................ 33 2.6 Solnit’s “Open Door” ................................................................................................................. 39 3 The Political ............................................................................................................................ 47 3.1 Redefinition in Feminism’s First & Second Wave .......................................................... 48 3.2 Invitational Rhetoric: Empowering the Dyad.................................................................. 55 3.3 Williams’s “The Open Space of Democracy” .................................................................... 57 3.4 Williams’s “Grand Teton National Park: Keep Memory” ............................................. 62 4 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................... 73 4.1 Objectivity as Responsibility ................................................................................................. 74 4.2 Insightful Intelligence and the Imagination .................................................................... 77 4.3 The Agential Presence of the Essayist ................................................................................ 79 Works Cited ....................................................................................................................................