The nature within. Issue 4 (1st October 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Hoggett, Paul
• Is Part Of: Journal of social work practice. Volume 34:Issue 4(2020)
• Page Start: 367
• Page End: 376
• Publication Date: 2020-10-01
• Subjects: Modernity -- creatureliness -- care -- fate -- transience; Social service -- Case studies -- Periodicals; Social service -- Psychological aspects -- Periodicals; Social service -- Book reviews -- Periodicals; 361.32
• DOI: 10.1080/02650533.2020.1771689
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0265-0533

Abstract

ABSTRACT: Are we capable of developing a different way of being with nature, different to the disassociated and parasitic relationship which has come to define modern civilization? In answering this question it is usual to focus on our relationship with nature 'out there' but this article suggests the problem lies equally in our relation with nature 'in here', that is, in the problematic relationship we have to our own creatureliness - to our physical being, to our frailty, and to our mortality. It is as if we are in flight from the nature within us, indeed some entrepreneurs now dream of leaving their bodies behind to preserve themselves for the future. This hatred of our dependency on our own creaturely nature surely mirrors our relationship to nature 'without'. It undermines our capacity for care, both for vulnerable humans and for nature.