Timely Ecocriticism: On the Importance of Time to Environmental Criticism and Practice (original) (raw)

Abstract

Along with its recognition of racism, sexism, and speciesism, I would like to suggest that cultural theory in general, and ecocriticism in particular, would benefit from a more concentrated focus on another category of hierarchization: temporal discrimination, or the belief that certain times are more deserving of agency, empowerment, and resource exploitation than other times. Building on studies that link cultural models of temporality with ecological degradation (Barbara Adam, Stewart Brand, Georges Sioui), I seek to develop a vocabulary of temporal criticism to help us identify the influence of temporal privilege and the assumed categories upon which temporal discrimination relies. Drawing from Canada’s five- and ten-year forestry management plans, Haida descriptions of 800-year forestry practices, Di Brandt’s ironic ten-million-year perspective in her so-called “Optimistic thoughts,” and other examples, I demonstrate how cultural and literary texts can work to challenge, or reinforce, the dominant hierarchies of temporality that legitimize unsustainable social practices.

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