How to Queer Ecology, One Goose at a Time – Alex Carr Johnson
In order to help break the dualism that is human to nature, Johnson uses geese and his own homosexuality to provide a narrative that “queers” nature. He argues that while it is our historical belief that all things in nature act in a particular and “natural” way, there is another reality that is just as natural. He explains how animals, such as geese, can be found in nature violating ecological mandates, which should allow us to expand our pre-determined mentality of what we allow to be natural. By imposing a certain standard of what nature is and allows, we have made barriers between possible truths and the truths we tolerate as a society. Johnson states, “Queer ecology is the study of dynamics across all phenomena, all behavior, all possibility. It is the relation between past, present, and future.” Although this truth may be all talk and no action, Johnson encourages discussion to further this ideology, otherwise we will always silently conform to these standards. If we apply this mentality to the case study in Japan, we can observe the phenomena already taking place. From women taking the initiative to seek jobs instead of husbands, they are taking a route other than the traditional role of the household wife. This is been widely frowned upon and women in the workplace were deemed as unnatural for decades. Additionally, the increasing use of robotics in daily life is another form of queering ecology, as robots are replacing humans in order to become a more efficient society. I found Johnson’s narrative to provide a placeholder for what I would like to believe women think.
From Orion Magazine, March/April 2011. Used by permission of author.
