Short description:

This book investigates African philosophical contributions to the concept of deep ecology. This book is an important read for researchers, advocates and other stakeholders working in the fields of environmental philosophy, climate change, indigenous studies, and African Studies.

Long description:

This book investigates African philosophical contributions to the concept of deep ecology, which advocates for rethinking human and non-human relationships within our ecosystems, by promoting the inherent and earned worth of all beings.

With ecological crises impacting lives around the world, this book interrogates deep ecology thinking from African philosophical perspectives, highlighting the continent?s important ontological, epistemological, ethical, aesthetic, and broad philosophical contributions. The book investigates issues such as the eco-phenomenology of human / non-human animals? relations, Ubuntu and the environment, the superiorist fallacy, environmental belongingness, the impact of colonization and modernity on non-human trauma, the politics of ecological narrative about African places, the question of moral status, African socialist perspectives, the question of degrowth, selective subordination, biodiversity loss, land ethics, the ontology of waste, and the concept of personhood in relation to global climate and ecological justice.

Providing a significant intervention in our understanding of the ecological crises and our duties toward ecosystems and the non-human other in the twenty-first century, this book is an important read for researchers, advocates and other stakeholders working in the fields of environmental philosophy, climate change, indigenous studies, and African Studies.

Table of Contents:

Introduction Kenneth Uyi Abudu, Kevin Behrens and Elvis Imafidon  1. From intrinsic value to ontological reality ? the philosophy of ?life energy? or ?vital force? in Bantu Philosophy Angela Roothaan  2. The Environment in Yoruba Collaborative Ontology Abidemi Israel Ogunyomi  3. Radicalizing Ubu-ntu: Some Critical Thoughts on Mogobe Ramose?s Philosophy of Ubu-ntu and a Proposal for its Desuperiorization Björn Freter  4. Interrogating Deep Ecology within the framework of Ubuntu Philosophy Dennis Masaka  5. An African Theory of Moral Status: A Relational Alternative to Individualism and Holism Thaddeus Metz  6. African Ecological Ethics and Moral Status of Non-human Nature Kai Horsthemke  7. An African Relational Environmentalism and Moral Considerability Kevin Gary Behrens 8. Deep Ecology, Ontic Relationality and Positionality: Exploring the Ontology of Anthropogenic Waste Elvis Imafidon  9. Peripherality, Non-philosophy and Ecology in African Philosophy Bruce Janz  10. Selective Subordination for harmony and holistic balance from an African perspective Emmanuel Ofuasia  11. Biodiversity Conservation in Nigeria: Contrasting an Anthropocentric and a Deep Ecology Perspective Olajide Akinleye-Martins, Naziru Zakari Muhammad, Helen Kopnina, and Mike Russell  12. Eco-Phenomenology and Deep Ecology: Towards an African Lived-Ecology of the Human ? Non-human Relationship Kenneth Uyi Abudu  13. Deep Ecology, Irreducibility, and African Relational Thinking Mitchell Black and Juan Oeschger  14. Integrating Deep Ecology, Degrowth, and Ubuntu: Foundations for an Ecosophy A?da C. Terblanché-Greeff (Botha)  15. Colonisation, Modernity and Trauma: Beyond the Human in African Places Augustine E. Iyare  Conclusion Kenneth Uyi Abudu, Kevin Behrens and Elvis Imafidon