Landscapes: Nature of Wilderness

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While talking about landscapes, people often consider the physical appearance of the countryside or whichever place they could be. However, Greider and Garkovich (1994) offer an interesting yet informative account of what landscapes are. The two go a step further to explain how a landscape could be a representation of people’s beliefs and norms. As per their explication, landscapes are simply “symbolic environments created by human acts of conferring meaning to culture and the environment, of giving the environment definition and form from a particular angle of vision and through a special filter of values and beliefs.” So, a landscape mainly comes or develops from how people see a particular area. Whichever definition is conferred to it stems from people’s cultural inclinations which is an amalgam of their norms, beliefs, and values. This article is quite interesting as it helps to paint a clear picture of the fact that landscapes offer the first resource with regard to studying and understanding people and communities. For example, it is possible to study and understand a people’s way of life, the meanings conferred to different physical objects and conditions by simply listening to their definitions of landscapes.
In his article, Jonathan Gray presents a read that is not only thought-provoking but also one that forces one to question their understanding and perception of the world as they know it. In tackling heteronormativity, he seeks to showcase how a justification of the same is premeditated through nature. He goes a step further in showing that heteronormativity does not simply lead to heterosexism but also greatly impacts the world as it is today. Apparently, what heteronormativity does is “assume its privilege by exerting what is and is not natural.” With such, the concept helps to build or predict a world that is skewed to its dominance. The queer is not gifted room to sprout and this spreads to other aspects of life. Gray appears to be putting forth the idea that heteronormativity is partly to blame for today’s environmental degradation. However, his claim is founded on the belief or fact that straight privilege shares “the justification for the persecution of nonnormative (a.k.a. “unnatural”).” Gray’s ideas appear to question the very state of society today, and this draws one to him and his way of thinking.
McDonald’s article Considering the Nature of Wilderness is one that makes one think of the term wilderness with an understanding that was lacking before. His article is a reflection of Roderick Nash’s Wilderness and the American Mind, and he not only dissects the ideas put forth by Nash but also goes ahead to offer his two cents on the nature of wilderness. As the world has grown from civilization to civilization, the earth has been turned into a production machine and one that keeps on giving. Since the industrial revolution or era, man has found ways to get the most out of land. However, environmentalists have gained in prominence as they seek to secure certain landscapes, for example, wilderness. But, the understanding of the term wilderness has...