Rock Water Life: Ecology and Humanities for a Decolonial South Africa - Paperback

by Lesley Green (Author)

In Rock Water Life Lesley Green examines the interwoven realities of inequality, racism, colonialism, and environmental destruction in South Africa, calling for environmental research and governance to transition to an ecopolitical approach that could address South Africa's history of racial oppression and environmental exploitation. Green analyzes conflicting accounts of nature in environmental sciences that claim neutrality amid ongoing struggles for land restitution and environmental justice. Offering in-depth studies of environmental conflict in contemporary South Africa, Green addresses the history of contested water access in Cape Town; struggles over natural gas fracking in the Karoo; debates about decolonizing science; the potential for a politics of soil in the call for land restitution; urban baboon management; and the consequences of sending sewage to urban oceans.

Author Biography

Lesley Green is founding director of Environmental Humanities South at the University of Cape Town, editor of Contested Ecologies: Dialogues in the South on Nature and Knowledge, and coauthor of Knowing the Day, Knowing the World: Engaging Amerindian Thought in Public Archaeology.