What do we mean when we speak about and advocate for nature? Do inanimate beings possess agency, and if so what is its structure? What role does metaphor play in our understanding of and relation to the environment? How does nature contribute to human well-being?

By bringing the concerns and methods of phenomenology to bear on questions such as these, this book seeks to redefine how environmental issues are perceived and discussed and demonstrates the relevance of phenomenological inquiry to a broader audience in environmental studies. The book examines what phenomenology must be like to address the practical and philosophical issues that emerge within environmental philosophy, what practical contributions phenomenology might make to environmental studies and policy making more generally, and the nature of our human relationship with the environment and the best way for us to engage with it.

Bryan E. Bannon isAssociate Professor of Philosophy and Director of the Environmental Studies and Sustainability programme at Merrimack College. He is the author ofFrom Mastery to Mystery: A Phenomenological Foundation for an Environmental Ethic (2014).

Contributors: David E. Cooper, Professor of Philosophy Emeritus, Durham University, UK; Janet Donohoe, Professor of Philosophy, University of West Georgia, USA; Thomas Greaves, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy, University of East Anglia, UK; Simon P. James, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy, Durham University, UK; Guobjörg Rannveig Jóhannesdóttir, Graduate Student, University of Iceland; Irene Klaver, Professor of Philosophy, University of North Texas, USA; Scott Marratto, Assistant Professor of Philosophy, Michigan Technological University, USA; Barbara Muraca, Assistant Professor of Philosophy, Oregon State University, USA; Tim Christian Myers, Graduate Student, University of Oregon, USA; Bryan Smith, Associate Professor of Philosophy, University of Mississippi, USA; Elise Springer, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Wesleyan University, USA; Ingrid Leman Stefanovic, Dean, Faculty of Environment, Simon Fraser University, Canada; Mark Thorsby, Professor of Philosophy, Lone Star College, USA

Nature and Experience, an Introduction, Bryan E. Bannon /Part I: Phenomenology of Nature / 1. Mythic Enlightenment: Phenomenology and the Question Concerning Nature, Bryan Smyth / 2. Towards a Phenomenology of Nature, Janet Donohoe / 3. Natural Phenomena: The Birth and Growth of Experience, Thomas Greaves / 4. Phenomenology and the Charge of Anthropocentrism, Simon James / 5. Nature, Meaning, and Value, Bryan E. Bannon /Part II: Metaphor, Agency, and the Human relation to Nature / 6. Intersubjectivity, the Environment, and Moral Failure, Mark Thorsby / 7. Metaphor and Weather: Thinking Ecologically about Metaphor, Experience, and Climate, Elise Springer / 8. Ecofeminism, Ecophenomenology, and the Metaphorics of Natures Agency, Tim Christion Myers / 9. Re-Rivering Environmental Imagination: Meander Movement and Merleau-Ponty, Irene J. Klaver /Part III: Practicing Phenomenology / 10. Paradigms, Praxis and Environmental Phenomenology, Ingrid Leman Stefanovic, Zachary Shefman and Kristina Welch / 11. Re-appropriating the Ecosystem Services Concept for a Decolonization of 'Nature', Barbara Muraca / 12. Indigenous Experience, Environmental Justice and Settler Colonialism, Kyle Powys Whyte / 13. Music and the Presence of Nature, David E. Cooper / 14. Phenomenological Aesthetics of Landscape and Beauty, Guðbjörg Rannveig Jóhannesdóttir / Bibliography / Index / Notes on Contributors