Integrating sense of place and traditional ecological knowledge into environmental aesthetics

Abstract

Environmental aesthetics concerns how environments are best appreciated. While many environmental aesthetic experiences occur at national parks, the latter face two problems that affect the former: a history of colonialization and disrespectful attitudes and actions by ecotourists. These problems are shown to be connected when seen as expressions of dualistic, anthropocentric and instrumentalist treatments of nature. Such treatments are widely critiqued as false and harmful in environmental ethics, but persist in some environmental aesthetic theories, even those that attempt to avoid them and ground appreciation in seemingly objective natural science. Indigenous perspectives have received scant attention in the discourse, but offer two beneficial concepts to avoid contemporary false and harmful treatments of nature: place and traditional ecological knowledge (TEK). In native concepts of place, humans are seen as a part of nature, which is valued intrinsically and approached from an orientation of respect. Traditional ecological knowledge refers to the body of indigenous approaches to science, which produces place-based knowledge and unifies ecological, ethical and aesthetic values. Integrating sense of place and TEK in environmental aesthetics invites non-natives to consider different treatments that lead to more accurate understandings of and more just relationships with nature. These concepts can also be integrated at parklands with the help of native peoples acting as park stewards. Doing so provides benefits to environmental aesthetic appreciation and supports environmental justice for natives and ecological justice for non-natives.