African Ecological Spirituality


Book Description

In the face of the emerging consequences of anthropogenic activities in relation to the environment, Africa is today united by the consciousness that individual destinies are caught up with the health of natural systems at the national, regional and continental levels. This Book of Readings on African Ecological Spirituality: Perspectives in Anthroposophy and Environmentalism focuses on scholarly and indigenous perspectives regarding the evolution of eco-spirituality in Africa. It provides answers to fundamental questions that have been looming at the horizon of thought for years on the contribution of African spirituality to ecological discourse.




African Perspectives on Religion and Climate Change


Book Description

This book interrogates the contributions that religious traditions have made to climate change discussions within Africa, whether positive or negative. Drawing on a range of African contexts and religious traditions, the book provides concrete suggestions on how individuals and communities of faith must act in order to address the challenge of climate change. Despite the fact that Africa has contributed relatively little to historic carbon emissions, the continent will be affected disproportionally by the increasing impact of anthropogenic climate change. Contributors to this book provide a range of rich case studies to investigate how religious traditions such as Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, and indigenous faiths influence the worldviews and actions of their adherents. The chapters also interrogate how the moral authority and leadership provided by religion can be used to respond and adapt to the challenges posed by climate change. Topics covered include risk reduction and resilience, youth movements, indigenous knowledge systems, environmental degradation, gender perspectives, ecological theories, and climate change financing. This book will be of interest to scholars in diverse fields, including religious studies, sociology, political science, climate change and environmental humanities. It may also benefit practitioners involved in solving community challenges related to climate change. The Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license




Ecowomanism


Book Description

Melanie Harris argues that African American women make unique contributions to the environmental justice movement in the ways that they theologize, theorize, practice spiritual activism, and come into religious understandings about their relationship with the earth. This unique text stands at the intersection of several academic disciplines: womanist theology, eco-theology, spirituality, and theological aesthetics.




African Ecological Ethics and Spirituality for Cosmic Flourishing


Book Description

This is the definitive African text on ecological ethics, African environmental spirituality, a theology of creation, and climate justice. The contributors to this important volume explore the common threats facing this earth our common home and the particular threats facing Africa because of our sick environment, unsustainable development practices, and the false narratives and programs of modernity in the African Motherland. Here, African environmentalists, theologians, and peace advocates in conversation with Pope Francis’s Laudato Si’, develop a roadmap for pastoral, local, and global education on ecological consciousness in order to bring about ecological conversion. African ecological wisdom is also offered as indispensable resources for recovering the intimate connection of all creatures and all peoples and as a praxis of solidarity for the poor, and our fragile earth.




The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Ecology


Book Description

Ecologically oriented visions of God, the Sacred, the Earth, and human beings. The proposed handbook will serve as the definitive overview of these exciting new developments. Divided into three main sections, the books essays will reflect the three dominant dimensions of the field. Part I will explore




Rethinking Nature


Book Description

Contemporary ideas of nature were largely shaped by schools of thought from Western cultural history and philosophy until the present-day concerns with environmental change and biodiversity conservation. There are many different ways of conceptualising nature in epistemological terms, reflecting the tensions between the polarities of humans as masters or protectors of nature and as part of or outside of nature. The book shows how nature is today the focus of numerous debates, calling for an approach which goes beyond the merely technical or scientific. It adopts a threefold – critical, historical and cross-disciplinary – approach in order to summarise the current state of knowledge. It includes contributions informed by the humanities (especially history, literature and philosophy) and social sciences, concerned with the production and circulation of knowledge about "nature" across disciplines and across national and cultural spaces. The volume also demonstrates the ongoing reconfiguration of subject disciplines, as seen in the recent emergence of new interdisciplinary approaches and the popularity of the prefix "eco-" (e.g. ecocriticism, ecospirituality, ecosophy and ecofeminism, as well as subdivisions of ecology, including urban ecology, industrial ecology and ecosystem services). Each chapter provides a concise overview of its topic which will serve as a helpful introduction to students and a source of easy reference. This text is also valuable reading for researchers interested in philosophy, sociology, anthropology, geography, ecology, politics and all their respective environmentalist strands.




African Literature, Mother Earth and Religion


Book Description

This book is a collection of essays that explore the intersection of Earth, Gender and Religion in African literary texts. It examines cultural, religious, theological and philosophical traditions, and their construction of perspectives and attitudes about Earth-keeping and gender. This publication is critical given the current global environmental crisis and its impact on African and global communities. The book is multidisciplinary in approach (literary, environmental, theological and sociological), exploring the intersection of African creative work, religion and the environment in their construction of Earth and gender. It presents how the gendered interconnectedness of the natural environment, with its broad spirituality and deep identification with the woman, features prominently in the myths, folklores, legends, rituals, sacred songs and incantations that are explored in this collection. Both male and female writers in the collection laud and accept woman’s enduring motif as worker, symbol and guardian of the environment. This interconnectedness mirrors the importance of the environment for the survival of both human and non-human components of Mother Earth. The ideology of women’s agency is emphasised and reinforced by ecofeminist theologians; namely those viewing African women as active agents working closely with the environment and not as subordinates. In the context of the environmental crisis the nurturing role of women should be bolstered and the rich African traditions that conserved the environment preserved. The book advocates the re-engagement of women, particularly their knowledge and conservation techniques and how these can become reservoirs of dying traditions. This volume offers recorded traditions in African literary texts, thereby connecting gender, religion and the environment and helpful perspectives in Earth-keeping.




Faith in African Lived Christianity


Book Description

Faith in African Lived Christianity – Bridging Anthropological and Theological Perspectives offers a comprehensive, empirically rich and interdisciplinary approach to the study of faith in African Christianity. The book brings together anthropology and theology in the study of how faith and religious experiences shape the understanding of social life in Africa. The volume is a collection of chapters by prominent Africanist theologians, anthropologists and social scientists, who take people’s faith as their starting point and analyze it in a contextually sensitive way. It covers discussions of positionality in the study of African Christianity, interdisciplinary methods and approaches and a number of case studies on political, social and ecological aspects of African Christian spirituality.




A Political Theology of Climate Change


Book Description

Cover -- Dedication -- Contents -- Acknowledgements -- 1. The Geopolitics of a Slow Catastrophe -- 2. Coal, Cosmos, and Creation -- 3. Engineering the Air -- 4. Carbon Indulgences, Ecological Debt, and Metabolic Rift -- 5. The Crisis of Cosmopolitan Reason -- 6. The Nomos of the Earth and Governing the Anthropocene -- 7. Revolutionary Messianism and the End of Empire -- Index




Religion and Human Security in Africa


Book Description

Across diverse countries and contexts in Africa, religion has direct implications for human security. While some individuals and groups seek to manipulate and control through the deployment of religion, religious belief is also a common facet of those working towards peace and reconciliation. Despite the strategic importance of religion to human security in Africa, there are few contemporary publications that explore this issue on an international scale. This volume redresses that imbalance by examining religion’s impact on human security across Africa. Written by an international team of contributors, this book looks in detail at the intersection of religion and security in a variety of African contexts. Case studies from a diverse set of countries including Nigeria, Ghana, South Africa, Burkina Faso, and more, are used to illustrate wider trends across the continent. Acknowledging that religion can be used to incite violence as well as encourage peace, the chapters employ an interdisciplinary exploration of the ethics, sociology, and politics around these issues. This is much needed volume on religion’s capacity to effect human security. It will, therefore, be of significant interest to any scholar of religious studies, African studies, political science, the sociology of religion, and anthropology, as well as peace, conflict, and reconciliation studies.