Wow! eBook
Restored to Earth: Christianity, Environmental Ethics, and Ecological Restoration
Author(s): Gretel Van Wieren (Author, Contributor)
- Publisher: Georgetown University Press
- Publication Date: 9 July 2013
- Language: English
- Print length: 208 pages
- ISBN-10: 1589019970
- ISBN-13: 9781589019973
Book Description
Ecological restoration integrates the science and art of repairing ecosystems damaged by human activities. Despite relatively little attention from environmental ethicists, restoration projects continue to gain significance, drawing on citizen volunteers and large amounts of public funds, providing an important model of responding to ecological crisis. Projects range from the massive, multi-billion dollar Kissimmee River project; restoring 25,000 acres of Everglades’ wetlands; to the $30 million effort to restore selected wetlands in industrial Brownfield sites in Chicago’s south side Lake Calumet area; to the reintroduction of tall grass prairie ecosystems in various communities in the Midwest.
Restored to Earth provides the first comprehensive examination of the religious and ethical dimensions and significance of contemporary restoration practice, an ethical framework that advances the field of environmental ethics in a more positive, action-oriented, experience-based direction. Van Wieren brings together insights and examples from restoration ecology, environmental ethics, religious studies, and conservation and Christian thought, as well as her own personal experiences in ecological restoration, to propose a new restoration ethic grounded in the concrete, hands-on experience of humans working as partners with the land.
Editorial Reviews
Review
Begins to construct . . . new narratives and provides hope for nature, human and nonhuman alike.
For people familiar with debates about restoration, the book’s most important contribution is to emphasize the religious and spiritual dimensions of restoration and. in particular, the ways restoration is a collective activity that creates and strengthens human communities at the same time it can contributes to ecological health.
Restored to Earth, is a helpful overview of contemporary approaches to ecological restoration. To date it is the best book on religious approaches to ecological restoration and can be commended on that basis.
This is a thoughtful and balanced book, with great value to scholars from a variety of fields. . . . The great strength of Van Wieren’s book is that she recognizes both the connection and the independence, balancing constructionist and ‘essentialist’ views of nature. . . . An excellent introduction to the debates about restoration within environmental ethics. For people familiar with debates about restoration, the book’s most important contribution is to emphasize the religious and spiritual dimensions of restoration and, in particular, the ways restoration is a collective activity that creates and strengthens human communities at the same time it can contribute to ecological health.
