We all care about the environment, one way or another. The news in recent decades about the state of the Planet has probably made us more careful about our actions, because we care about nature and what we pass on to future generations. Also, in addition to the general public, specialists in the natural sciences initiate numerous environmental protection programs. All these efforts and good intentions can sometimes be misdirected in the absence of a deep understanding of the situation on the ground. Environmental anthropology deals with the way human communities relate to the environment and use the natural resources. For environmental protection programs to become a success story, it is crucial that environmental anthropologists contribute to these programs alongside biologists, geographers or ecologists, because the human communities they study are located in protected areas and have been part of that ecosystem for hundreds of years. Offering examples from different areas in Romania, this short essay presents how environmental anthropology effectively makes a contribution. The debate on “ecological traditional knowledge,” local communities in protected areas, or “natural disasters” emphasizes the need to understand ecology from a human perspective. An absolutely must for us and our future.

A text by Oana Ivan illustrated by Loreta Isac-Cojocaru and read by actress Katia Pascariu.

https://theanthro.art/environmental-anthropology-on-nature-human-communities-and-the-little-known-reality-oana-ivan-illustration-by-loreta-isac/

Political ecology examines the relations between communities and the environment, with a focus on the postcolonial world. Reports about human-nature interactions in geographically exotic contexts have fascinated western audiences from the very beginning. Political ecology brings an important critical dimension connected to how postcolonial politics generates social and ecological crises. Extrapolating and adapting political ecology outside the Global South is particularly challenging. The ways in which political power, economic interests, social hierarchies, as well as culture or ideologies contribute to the construction of the environment remain less discussed in Eastern Europe. The political ecology of the European periphery points to multiple violations of environmental rights, as well as the environmental victimization of individuals and communities, especially marginalized ones. The political ecology of the European periphery is an alternative discourse that mobilizes the imagination of researchers and activists to find ways of organizing nature-society relations that are both more socially just and ecologically sustainable. Read by actor Daniel Popa, with an illustration by Andreea Chirică https://theanthro.art/the-political-ecology-of-the-european-periphery-lucian-vesalon/