Bron Taylor
Encyclopedia
Bron Raymond Taylor is an American scholar and conservationist. He is Professor of Religion and Nature at the University of Florida
and has also been an Affiliated Scholar with the Center for Environment and Development at the University of Oslo
. Taylor works principally in the areas of religion and ecology
, environmental ethics
and environmental philosophy
. He is also a prominent historian and ethnographer of environmentalism and especially radical environmentalist movements
, surfing culture and nature-based spiritualities
. Taylor is also Editor-in-Chief of the Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature and subsequently founded the International Society for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, serving as its President from 2006-2009. He also founded the Society’s affiliated Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, serving as its editor since 2007.
, for example), prophets (writers and activists such as Henry David Thoreau
, John Muir
and Rachael Carson
), rituals ("soul surfers"
meeting the ocean at dawn) and elements some consider dangerous (radical "eco-terrorists"
). Dark green religion also has an inherently political component with regards to environmentalism
; the idea that nature is sacred comes with an ethical responsibility to treat it as such.
As outlined in Dark Green Religion: Nature Spirituality and the Planetary Future, Taylor asserts that belief in the sacrality of nature may or may not involve a belief in supernatural beings or forces. An atheist who reads evolution as an epic narrative
of spiritual significance may be engaging in dark green religion, as would a pantheist who is humbled by the structure of the cosmos. Those who perceive the Earth to be like an organism if not also a sentient being (Gaianism
), or intuit that animals and trees possess spiritual intelligences (animism
), may also be viewed as engaging in dark green religion, according to Taylor. Dark green religion often finds common ground with religious traditions such as paganism
and shamanism
, as well as philosophical belief systems such as deep ecology
, Aldo Leopold
's theory of land ethic
, and James Lovelock
's Gaia hypothesis
.
Taylor's conviction that "religion" is a paradigm that can be understood to include entirely naturalistic
worldviews puts him at odds with many of the new atheist thinkers such as Christopher Hitchens
and especially Richard Dawkins
, whom he discusses directly in his book.
Taylor contends that dark green religiosity has deep roots and has manifested itself in a diversity of ways throughout human history. He finds eco-spiritual synchronicity, for example, in phenomena as seemingly disparate as surfing magazines and the writings of Edmund Burke
. Other cultural actors and elements explored by Taylor include Charles Darwin
, Jane Goodall
, Edward Abbey
, Alice Walker
, tree-sitting activists
, the Earth Liberation Front
, the Animal Liberation Front
, Al Gore
, Orion magazine
and Disney films such as The Lion King
and Pocahontas
.
Taylor has also written about James Cameron
's film Avatar and its relevance to dark green religion. He argues that the widespread popularity of the film, in which nature is regarded as sentient and sacred, is a testament to the growing appeal of dark green spirituality around the world.
Taylor also finds an emerging global receptivity to dark green religious sentiment in political institutions such as the United Nations
. He has observed that, as concerns over the state of the environment intensify, global summits aimed at addressing the ecological crisis
have assumed a decidedly spiritual tenor. He points to the opening ceremony of the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development as one example of this trend. He argues that current trends in earthen spirituality might even presage the emergence of a “civil earth religion” that promotes loyalty to the biosphere rather than to nation states.
, which, dark green religionists allege, as Lynn Townsend White, Jr.
did in a famous Science
essay in 1968, is deeply linked to an anthropocentric worldview that sees human beings as above nature and divinely endowed with the right to dominion over the biosphere
. Those aligned in the dark green religion camp have alleged that this cosmogony
has played a major role in the desecration and exploitation of the natural world.
For this reason, those engaged in dark green religion are often skeptical that conventional religions can play a constructive role in halting and reversing ecological degradation. While the environmentalist efficacy of the stewardship model
, which some think is mandated by Judaism, Christianity and Islam alike, remains a hotly disputed issue, many dark green thinkers believe that efforts to preserve the ecosystem will not succeed unless underlying spiritual attitudes are shifted towards a more biocentric perspective
. To this point, in a 2010 interview with the online magazine Religion Dispatches
, Taylor stated, "Although it is not my intent to annoy those with conventional religious understandings, few such religionists will welcome the evidence assembled in Dark Green Religion, or my supposition based on this evidence, that eventually their religions are likely to be supplanted by naturalistic forms of nature spirituality." Taylor has thus drawn criticism from those who believe that conventional religious ethics and infrastructure can be effective agents of environmental preservation.
University of Florida
The University of Florida is an American public land-grant, sea-grant, and space-grant research university located on a campus in Gainesville, Florida. The university traces its historical origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its present Gainesville campus since September 1906...
and has also been an Affiliated Scholar with the Center for Environment and Development at the University of Oslo
University of Oslo
The University of Oslo , formerly The Royal Frederick University , is the oldest and largest university in Norway, situated in the Norwegian capital of Oslo. The university was founded in 1811 and was modelled after the recently established University of Berlin...
. Taylor works principally in the areas of religion and ecology
Religion and ecology
Religion and environmentalism is an emerging subfield in the academic discipline of religious studies.-Crisis of values:This subfield is founded on the understanding that, in the words of Iranian-American philosopher Seyyed Hossein Nasr, "the environmental crisis is fundamentally a crisis of...
, environmental ethics
Environmental ethics
Environmental ethics is the part of environmental philosophy which considers extending the traditional boundaries of ethics from solely including humans to including the non-human world...
and environmental philosophy
Environmental philosophy
Environmental philosophy is a branch of philosophy that is concerned with the natural environment and humans' place within it. Environmental philosophy includes environmental ethics, environmental aesthetics, ecofeminism and environmental theology...
. He is also a prominent historian and ethnographer of environmentalism and especially radical environmentalist movements
Radical environmentalism
Radical environmentalism, is a grassroots branch of the larger environmental movement that emerged out of an ecocentrism-based frustration with the co-option of mainstream environmentalism...
, surfing culture and nature-based spiritualities
Nature worship
Nature worship describes a variety of religious, spiritual and devotional practices that focus on natural phenomenon. A nature deity can be in charge of nature, the biosphere, the cosmos or the universe. Nature worship can be found in panentheism, pantheism, deism, polytheism, animism, totemism,...
. Taylor is also Editor-in-Chief of the Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature and subsequently founded the International Society for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, serving as its President from 2006-2009. He also founded the Society’s affiliated Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, serving as its editor since 2007.
Dark green religion
Taylor is credited with coining the term "dark green religion" or "dark green spirituality", which he broadly defines as a religion, or a "religion-resembling" set of beliefs and practices, characterized by a central conviction that "nature is sacred, has intrinsic value, and is therefore due reverent care." Tied in with this belief is a felt kinship with non-human entities and a conscious awareness of the interconnected and interdependent nature of life on the planet. Taylor argues that dark green religion possesses many of the characteristics of established religions, such as sacred texts (a book such as WaldenWalden
Walden is an American book written by noted Transcendentalist Henry David Thoreau...
, for example), prophets (writers and activists such as Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau was an American author, poet, philosopher, abolitionist, naturalist, tax resister, development critic, surveyor, historian, and leading transcendentalist...
, John Muir
John Muir
John Muir was a Scottish-born American naturalist, author, and early advocate of preservation of wilderness in the United States. His letters, essays, and books telling of his adventures in nature, especially in the Sierra Nevada mountains of California, have been read by millions...
and Rachael Carson
Rachel Carson
Rachel Louise Carson was an American marine biologist and conservationist whose writings are credited with advancing the global environmental movement....
), rituals ("soul surfers"
Soul Surfer
Soul Surfer is a term coined in the 1960s, used to describe a surfer who surfs for the sheer pleasure of surfing. Although they may still enter in competitions, winning is not the soul surfer's main motive, since they scorn the commercialization of surfing. The term denotes a spirituality of surfing...
meeting the ocean at dawn) and elements some consider dangerous (radical "eco-terrorists"
Eco-terrorism
Eco-terrorism usually refers to acts of violence or sabotage committed in support of ecological, environmental, or animal rights causes against persons or their property....
). Dark green religion also has an inherently political component with regards to environmentalism
Environmentalism
Environmentalism is a broad philosophy, ideology and social movement regarding concerns for environmental conservation and improvement of the health of the environment, particularly as the measure for this health seeks to incorporate the concerns of non-human elements...
; the idea that nature is sacred comes with an ethical responsibility to treat it as such.
As outlined in Dark Green Religion: Nature Spirituality and the Planetary Future, Taylor asserts that belief in the sacrality of nature may or may not involve a belief in supernatural beings or forces. An atheist who reads evolution as an epic narrative
Epic of Evolution
The phrase Epic of Evolution represents an attempt to create a mythic narrative aimed at reconciling religious and scientific views of cosmic evolution, biological evolution, and sociocultural evolution. According to Taylor's Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature, it is…-History:The term "Epic of...
of spiritual significance may be engaging in dark green religion, as would a pantheist who is humbled by the structure of the cosmos. Those who perceive the Earth to be like an organism if not also a sentient being (Gaianism
Gaianism
Gaianism is a very broad and inclusive philosophy and emerging spirituality with various religious expressions. The term describes a philosophy and ethical worldview which, though not itself religious, implies a transrational devotion to Planet Earth as a superorganism...
), or intuit that animals and trees possess spiritual intelligences (animism
Animism
Animism refers to the belief that non-human entities are spiritual beings, or at least embody some kind of life-principle....
), may also be viewed as engaging in dark green religion, according to Taylor. Dark green religion often finds common ground with religious traditions such as paganism
Paganism
Paganism is a blanket term, typically used to refer to non-Abrahamic, indigenous polytheistic religious traditions....
and shamanism
Shamanism
Shamanism is an anthropological term referencing a range of beliefs and practices regarding communication with the spiritual world. To quote Eliade: "A first definition of this complex phenomenon, and perhaps the least hazardous, will be: shamanism = technique of ecstasy." Shamanism encompasses the...
, as well as philosophical belief systems such as deep ecology
Deep ecology
Deep ecology is a contemporary ecological philosophy that recognizes an inherent worth of all living beings, regardless of their instrumental utility to human needs. The philosophy emphasizes the interdependence of organisms within ecosystems and that of ecosystems with each other within the...
, Aldo Leopold
Aldo Leopold
Aldo Leopold was an American author, scientist, ecologist, forester, and environmentalist. He was a professor at the University of Wisconsin and is best known for his book A Sand County Almanac , which has sold over two million copies...
's theory of land ethic
Land ethic
A Land Ethic is a philosophy that guides your actions when you utilize or make changes to the land. This specific term was first coined by Aldo Leopold in his book A Sand County Almanac . Within this work, he wrote that there is a need for a "new ethic", an "ethic dealing with man's relation to...
, and James Lovelock
James Lovelock
James Lovelock, CH, CBE, FRS is an independent scientist, environmentalist and futurologist who lives in Devon, England. He is best known for proposing the Gaia hypothesis, which postulates that the biosphere is a self-regulating entity with the capacity to keep our planet healthy by controlling...
's Gaia hypothesis
Gaia hypothesis
The Gaia hypothesis, also known as Gaia theory or Gaia principle, proposes that all organisms and their inorganic surroundings on Earth are closely integrated to form a single and self-regulating complex system, maintaining the conditions for life on the planet.The scientific investigation of the...
.
Taylor's conviction that "religion" is a paradigm that can be understood to include entirely naturalistic
Naturalism (philosophy)
Naturalism commonly refers to the philosophical viewpoint that the natural universe and its natural laws and forces operate in the universe, and that nothing exists beyond the natural universe or, if it does, it does not affect the natural universe that we know...
worldviews puts him at odds with many of the new atheist thinkers such as Christopher Hitchens
Christopher Hitchens
Christopher Eric Hitchens is an Anglo-American author and journalist whose books, essays, and journalistic career span more than four decades. He has been a columnist and literary critic at The Atlantic, Vanity Fair, Slate, World Affairs, The Nation, Free Inquiry, and became a media fellow at the...
and especially Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins
Clinton Richard Dawkins, FRS, FRSL , known as Richard Dawkins, is a British ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author...
, whom he discusses directly in his book.
Taylor contends that dark green religiosity has deep roots and has manifested itself in a diversity of ways throughout human history. He finds eco-spiritual synchronicity, for example, in phenomena as seemingly disparate as surfing magazines and the writings of Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke
Edmund Burke PC was an Irish statesman, author, orator, political theorist and philosopher who, after moving to England, served for many years in the House of Commons of Great Britain as a member of the Whig party....
. Other cultural actors and elements explored by Taylor include Charles Darwin
Charles Darwin
Charles Robert Darwin FRS was an English naturalist. He established that all species of life have descended over time from common ancestry, and proposed the scientific theory that this branching pattern of evolution resulted from a process that he called natural selection.He published his theory...
, Jane Goodall
Jane Goodall
Dame Jane Morris Goodall, DBE , is a British primatologist, ethologist, anthropologist, and UN Messenger of Peace. Considered to be the world's foremost expert on chimpanzees, Goodall is best known for her 45-year study of social and family interactions of wild chimpanzees in Gombe Stream National...
, Edward Abbey
Edward Abbey
Edward Paul Abbey was an American author and essayist noted for his advocacy of environmental issues, criticism of public land policies, and anarchist political views. His best-known works include the novel The Monkey Wrench Gang, which has been cited as an inspiration by radical environmental...
, Alice Walker
Alice Walker
Alice Malsenior Walker is an American author, poet, and activist. She has written both fiction and essays about race and gender...
, tree-sitting activists
Tree sitting
Tree sitting is a form of environmentalist civil disobedience in which a protester sits in a tree, usually on a small platform built for the purpose, to protect it from being cut down...
, the Earth Liberation Front
Earth Liberation Front
The Earth Liberation Front , also known as "Elves" or "The Elves", is the collective name for autonomous individuals or covert cells who, according to the ELF Press Office, use "economic sabotage and guerrilla warfare to stop the exploitation and destruction of the environment".The ELF was founded...
, the Animal Liberation Front
Animal Liberation Front
The Animal Liberation Front is an international, underground leaderless resistance that engages in illegal direct action in pursuit of animal liberation...
, Al Gore
Al Gore
Albert Arnold "Al" Gore, Jr. served as the 45th Vice President of the United States , under President Bill Clinton. He was the Democratic Party's nominee for President in the 2000 U.S. presidential election....
, Orion magazine
Orion (magazine)
Orion is a bimonthly, advertisement-free, magazine focused on nature, the environment, and culture, addressing environmental and societal issues....
and Disney films such as The Lion King
The Lion King
The Lion King is a 1994 American animated film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation and released by Walt Disney Pictures. It is the 32nd feature in the Walt Disney Animated Classics series...
and Pocahontas
Pocahontas (1995 film)
Pocahontas is the 33rd animated feature in the Walt Disney Animated Classics series. It was produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation and was originally released to selected theaters on June 16, 1995 by Walt Disney Pictures...
.
Taylor has also written about James Cameron
James Cameron
James Francis Cameron is a Canadian-American film director, film producer, screenwriter, editor, environmentalist and inventor...
's film Avatar and its relevance to dark green religion. He argues that the widespread popularity of the film, in which nature is regarded as sentient and sacred, is a testament to the growing appeal of dark green spirituality around the world.
Taylor also finds an emerging global receptivity to dark green religious sentiment in political institutions such as the United Nations
United Nations
The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...
. He has observed that, as concerns over the state of the environment intensify, global summits aimed at addressing the ecological crisis
Ecological crisis
An ecological crisis occurs when the environment of a species or a population changes in a way that destabilizes its continued survival. There are many possible causes of such crises:...
have assumed a decidedly spiritual tenor. He points to the opening ceremony of the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development as one example of this trend. He argues that current trends in earthen spirituality might even presage the emergence of a “civil earth religion” that promotes loyalty to the biosphere rather than to nation states.
Dark green versus green religion
Taylor makes a distinction between dark green religious phenomena (which emanate from a belief that nature is sacred), and the relatively recent "greening" of certain sectors of established religious traditions (which see eco-friendly activities as a religious obligation). Many of the central figures and seminal texts of dark green religion, as curated by Taylor, express a strong condemnation of Abrahamic theismAbrahamic religions
Abrahamic religions are the monotheistic faiths emphasizing and tracing their common origin to Abraham or recognizing a spiritual tradition identified with him...
, which, dark green religionists allege, as Lynn Townsend White, Jr.
Lynn Townsend White, Jr.
Lynn Townsend White, Jr. was a professor of medieval history at Princeton, Stanford and, for many years, University of California, Los Angeles. He was president of Mills College, Oakland from 1943 to 1958....
did in a famous Science
Science (journal)
Science is the academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and is one of the world's top scientific journals....
essay in 1968, is deeply linked to an anthropocentric worldview that sees human beings as above nature and divinely endowed with the right to dominion over the biosphere
Biosphere
The biosphere is the global sum of all ecosystems. It can also be called the zone of life on Earth, a closed and self-regulating system...
. Those aligned in the dark green religion camp have alleged that this cosmogony
Cosmogony
Cosmogony, or cosmogeny, is any scientific theory concerning the coming into existence or origin of the universe, or about how reality came to be. The word comes from the Greek κοσμογονία , from κόσμος "cosmos, the world", and the root of γίνομαι / γέγονα "to be born, come about"...
has played a major role in the desecration and exploitation of the natural world.
For this reason, those engaged in dark green religion are often skeptical that conventional religions can play a constructive role in halting and reversing ecological degradation. While the environmentalist efficacy of the stewardship model
Stewardship (theology)
Stewardship is a theological belief that humans are responsible for the world, and should take care of it. It can have political implications, such as in Christian Democracy.-Implications:...
, which some think is mandated by Judaism, Christianity and Islam alike, remains a hotly disputed issue, many dark green thinkers believe that efforts to preserve the ecosystem will not succeed unless underlying spiritual attitudes are shifted towards a more biocentric perspective
Biocentrism (ethics)
Biocentrism , in a political and ecological sense, is an ethical point of view which extends inherent value to non-human species, ecosystems, and processes in nature - regardless of their sentience...
. To this point, in a 2010 interview with the online magazine Religion Dispatches
Religion Dispatches
Religion Dispatches is a daily online magazine covering religion and culture from a progressive point of view....
, Taylor stated, "Although it is not my intent to annoy those with conventional religious understandings, few such religionists will welcome the evidence assembled in Dark Green Religion, or my supposition based on this evidence, that eventually their religions are likely to be supplanted by naturalistic forms of nature spirituality." Taylor has thus drawn criticism from those who believe that conventional religious ethics and infrastructure can be effective agents of environmental preservation.
Selected publications
- "Surfing into Spirituality and a New, Aquatic Nature Religion". Journal of the American Academy of ReligionAmerican Academy of ReligionThe American Academy of Religion is the world's largest association of scholars in the field of religious studies and related topics. It is a nonprofit member association,...
, 75(4):-951, 2007. - "The Religion and Politics of Earth First!". The EcologistThe EcologistThe Ecologist is a British environmental publication founded in 1970 by Edward Goldsmith. It addresses a wide range of environmental subjects and promotes an ecological systems thinking approach through its news stories, investigations and opinion articles. The Ecologist encourages its readers to...
, 21(6):258-266, November/December, 1991. - "Bioregionalism: An Ethics of Loyalty to Place". Landscape Journal, 19(1&2):50-72, 2000.
- "Earthen Spirituality or Cultural Genocide?: Radical Environmentalism's Appropriation of Native American Spirituality". ReligionReligion (journal)Religion is a peer-reviewed academic journal in the field of Religious Studies. It was founded in 1971, with close ties to the Religious Studies program at the University of Lancaster. That program was founded and chaired by Ninian Smart, and he served as the Chairman of the first editorial board...
, 27(2):183-215, April 1997. - "Green Apocalypticism: Understanding Disaster in the Radical Environmental Worldview". Society and Natural Resources, 12(4):377-386, June 1999.
- "Religion, Violence, and Radical Environmentalism: from Earth First! to the Unabomber to the Earth Liberation Front". Terrorism and Political Violence, 10(4):1-42, Winter 1998.
- "Earth and Nature-Based Spirituality: From Earth First! and Bioregionalism to Scientific Paganism and the New Age". ReligionReligion (journal)Religion is a peer-reviewed academic journal in the field of Religious Studies. It was founded in 1971, with close ties to the Religious Studies program at the University of Lancaster. That program was founded and chaired by Ninian Smart, and he served as the Chairman of the first editorial board...
, 31(3):225-245, July 2001. - "Earth and Nature-Based Spirituality: From Deep Ecology to Radical Environmentalism", ReligionReligion (journal)Religion is a peer-reviewed academic journal in the field of Religious Studies. It was founded in 1971, with close ties to the Religious Studies program at the University of Lancaster. That program was founded and chaired by Ninian Smart, and he served as the Chairman of the first editorial board...
, 31(2):175-193, April 2001. - "Diggers, Wolves, Ents, Elves and Expanding Universes: Bricolage, Religion, and Violence from Earth First! and the Earth Liberation Front to the Anti-Globalization Resistance". Chapter 3 in The Cultic Milieu: Oppositional Subcultures in an Age of Globalization, Eds. Jeffrey Kaplan and Heléne Lööw, Altimura, 26-74, 2002. ISBN 0-7591-0203-1
- "Resacralizing Earth: Environmental Paganism and the Restoration of Turtle Island". Chapter 3 in American Sacred Space, Eds. D. Chidester and E.T. Linenthal, Indiana University Press, Religion in America Series, 97-151, 1995. ISBN 978-0-253-21006-7
- "Deep Ecology and its Social Philosophy: A Critique", Chapter 14 in Beneath the Surface: Critical Essays on Deep Ecology. Eds. E. Katz. A. Light, D. Rothenberg, Boston, MIT Press, 269-299, 2000. ISBN 978-0-262-61149-7
- Dark Green Religion: Nature Spirituality and the Planetary Future. University of California Press, Berkeley, 2010. ISBN 978-0-520-26100-6
See also
- Religious NaturalismReligious naturalismReligious naturalism is an approach to spirituality that is devoid of supernaturalism. The focus is on the religious attributes of the universe/Nature, the understanding of it and our response to it . These provide for the development of an eco-morality...
- Religion and environmentalism
- List of environmental philosophers
- Spiritual ecologySpiritual ecologySpiritual ecology is a recent term that refers to the intersection between religion and spirituality and environment . Practitioners of spiritual ecology fall into three categories: the scientific and academic, spiritual or religious environmentalism, and religious or spiritual individuals who...
- EcotheologyEcotheologyEcotheology is a form of constructive theology that focuses on the interrelationships of religion and nature, particularly in the light of environmental concerns. Ecotheology generally starts from the premise that a relationship exists between human religious/spiritual worldviews and the...