Department of English

"Global Perspectives on Eco-Aesthetics and Eco-Ethics: A Green Critique" focuses on the interface of the Anthropocene, sustainability, ecological aesthetics, multispecies relationality, and the environment as reflected in literature and culture. The work examines how writers have addressed ecological crises and environmental challenges that transcend national, cultural, political, social, and linguistic borders. The volume demonstrates how, as the environmental humanities developed and emerged as a critical discipline, it generated a diverse range of interdisciplinary fields of study, such as ecographics, ecodesign, ecocinema, ecotheology, ecofeminism, ethnobotany, ecolinguistics and bioregionalism, and formed valuable, interdisciplinary networks of critique and advocacy—and its contemporary expansion is exceptionally salient to social, political, and public issues today.

While theorizing veganism, Lori Gruen and Robert C. Jones in “Veganism as an Aspiration,” speak of two distinct ways of being vegan: one is a way of life that becomes an integral part of one’s identity, and the other is directly related to the question of aspiration. The ethical vegans adopt veganism as a lifestyle and are often dedicated to their struggle against all forms of cruelty and violence. But there is another form of veganism, called “Aspirational Veganism,” that views veganism not as a lifestyle or identity, but rather as a type of practice/process of eliminating or minimizing violence against and domination over the nonhuman other. There is, however, no rigid line of demarcation between these two forms of veganism; rather they intersect at a significant angle where both of them “oppose the systematic cruelty” to animals. This is precisely where the Buddhist ideas of dhamma (the path of spiritual awakening) and metta (loving-kindness) become relevant to Vegan Studies. Compassion and ahimsa (non-violence) are at the heart of Buddhist philosophy. The teachings of Buddha often categorically speak against animal-slaughter and critique all sorts of exploitation of sentient beings and even raise questions relating to animal welfare. In our present study of the Buddhist teachings available in The Dhammapada, Mahayana Sutras including Lankavatara Sutra, Mahaparinirvana Sutra, and Surangama Sutra, and the tales from Jataka, we explore that these teachings anticipate the essentialist notions of both “Identity” and “Aspiration” which are central to the thesis of Gruen and Jones.

This book offers Posthumanist readings of animal-centric literary and cultural texts. The contributors put the precepts and premises of humanism into question by seriously considering the animal presence in texts. The essays collected here focus primarily on literary and cultural texts from varied theoretically informed interdisciplinary perspectives advanced by critical approaches such as Critical Animal Studies and Posthumanism. Contributors select texts that cut across geographical and period boundaries and demonstrate how practices of close reading give rise to new ways of thinking about animals. By implicating the “animal turn” in the field of literary and cultural studies, this book urges us to problematize the separation of the human from other animals and rethink the hierarchical order of beings through close readings of select texts. It offers fresh perspectives on Posthumanist theory, inviting readers to revisit those criteria that created species’ difference from the early ages of human civilization. This book constitutes a rich and thorough scholarly resource on the politics of representation of animals in literature and culture. The essays in this book are empirically and theoretically informed and explore a range of dynamic, captivating, and highly relevant topics.

This book brings together well-researched essays by established scholars as well as forward-thinking aspiring researchers to study how literary and non-literary texts highlight 'animal presence' and explore non-anthropocentric relationships between human and animals. To be precise, it offers Posthumanist readings of animal-centric Literary and Cultural texts. The contributors take positions that put the precepts and premises of humanism into question by considering the animal presence in texts seriously. The essays collected here focus primarily on literary and cultural texts from varied interdisciplinary and theoretically-informed perspectives advanced by critical approaches such as Critical Animal Studies and Posthumanism. Contributors select texts beyond geographical and period boundaries, and demonstrate how practices of close reading give rise to new ways of thinking about animals. By implicating the "Animal turn" for the field of literary and cultural studies, this book urges us to problematize the separation of the human from other animals and rethink the hierarchical order of beings through close readings of select texts. It offers some fresh perspectives of Posthumanist theory, so that we can revisit those criteria that created species' difference from the early ages of human civilization. This book will constitute a rich and thorough scholarly resource on the politics of representation of animals in literature and culture. The essays in this book are empirically and theoretically informed; and they explore a range of dynamic, captivating and highly relevant topics. This book does more than simply decentering the 'human' by bringing animals onto the center of critical discourse and challenging the anthropocentric hierarchical relationship, which are the basis of Posthumanist readings. It also highlights the theoretical intersections between Animal Theory and other relevant cultural theories, that is the latest advancement in this field. The volume is divided into four main sections

This paper aims to discuss the deconstructionist Jacques Derrida’s contribution to the contemporary critical animal studies. Derrida is concerned with a critical thinking that starts with a dismantling of straightforward distinction between the human and the animal and he questions the hierarchical position of nature that bedevils the human-animal relationship. By concentrating on his own theory of animal-subjectivity and animal-gaze Derrida puts the homogenizing concept of animal (popular throughout the philosophical history of animal) into a big question. And by referring to the politics of speciesism he points to the big issue of contemporary problem of marginalization that covers all other fields of critical theory. My intention is to deal with all these issues by emphasizing on Derrida’s animal based theoretical essays specially The Animal That Therefore I Am. [