A cultural ecological reading of human-nature interconnectivity in Mahmoud Darwish's “The Second Olive Tree”

Abstract EN

The aesthetic is considered in modern ecocriticism.

this article reads the olive tree metaphor in Mahmoud Darwish's “the Second Olive tree” to argue that neither the anthropocentric approach of human-centeredness nor the biocentric one of nature-centeredness is proper to depicting the indissoluble interconnectedness between binaries such as nature / culture, matter / mind, and human / non-human worlds.

so, in light of the cultural ecology of Hubert Zapf, this paper proposes ecocultural reading as a solution to the dualistic views of these binaries.

such a reading acknowledges the mutual relationship between nature and culture, mind and matter, and human and non-human worlds as well as their dynamic and evolutionary interrelationships.

at the same time, this reading does not cross the boundaries between them.

it is also a way of cultural self-renewal when empowering marginalized or excluded interconnected patterns and of imaginative counter-discourses of this dualistic approach.

furthermore, the cultural ecology paradigm, as a transdisciplinary undertaking, contributes to ecocriticism and environmental humanities.