Stephanie Rutherford
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780816674404
- eISBN:
- 9781452946740
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Minnesota Press
- DOI:
- 10.5749/minnesota/9780816674404.003.0001
- Subject:
- Environmental Science, Nature
This chapter examines how the American Museum of Natural History's Hall of Biodiversity works to produce a certain form of “truth” about nature by exploring both what is memorialized and, in the act ...
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This chapter examines how the American Museum of Natural History's Hall of Biodiversity works to produce a certain form of “truth” about nature by exploring both what is memorialized and, in the act of remembering, what is forgotten. It assesses what is made legitimate for display and how it is organized, how the visitor's gaze is constructed, and how power and education intersect in the Hall of Biodiversity. It argues that the exhibit tells the “truth” of the world through science and display, providing characteristic ways of seeing nature, generating biopolitical maps of biodiversity, reinforcing particular narratives of nature and culture, and constructing green subjectivities. It therefore operates as a producer, instrument, and means for the circulation of particular kinds of green governmentality.Less
This chapter examines how the American Museum of Natural History's Hall of Biodiversity works to produce a certain form of “truth” about nature by exploring both what is memorialized and, in the act of remembering, what is forgotten. It assesses what is made legitimate for display and how it is organized, how the visitor's gaze is constructed, and how power and education intersect in the Hall of Biodiversity. It argues that the exhibit tells the “truth” of the world through science and display, providing characteristic ways of seeing nature, generating biopolitical maps of biodiversity, reinforcing particular narratives of nature and culture, and constructing green subjectivities. It therefore operates as a producer, instrument, and means for the circulation of particular kinds of green governmentality.
Stephanie Rutherford
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780816674404
- eISBN:
- 9781452946740
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Minnesota Press
- DOI:
- 10.5749/minnesota/9780816674404.001.0001
- Subject:
- Environmental Science, Nature
Take four emblematic American scenes: the Hall of Biodiversity at the American Museum of Natural History in New York; Disney's Animal Kingdom theme park in Orlando; an ecotour of Yellowstone and ...
More
Take four emblematic American scenes: the Hall of Biodiversity at the American Museum of Natural History in New York; Disney's Animal Kingdom theme park in Orlando; an ecotour of Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks; the film An Inconvenient Truth. Other than expressing a common interest in the environment, they seem quite dissimilar. And yet, as this book makes clear, these sites are all manifestations of green governmentality, each seeking to define and regulate our understanding, experience, and treatment of nature. This book shows how the museum presents a scientized assessment of global nature under threat; the Animal Kingdom demonstrates that a corporation can successfully organize a biopolitical project; the ecotour, operating as a school for a natural aesthetic sensibility, provides a visual grammar of pristine national nature; and the film offers a toehold on a moral way of encountering nature. But one very powerful force unites the disparate “truths” of nature produced through these sites, and that, the book tells us, is their debt to nature's commodification. This book's analysis reveals how each site integrates nature, power, and profit to make the buying and selling of nature critical to our understanding and rescuing of it. The combination, it argues, renders other ways of encountering nature—particularly more radically environmental ways—unthinkable.Less
Take four emblematic American scenes: the Hall of Biodiversity at the American Museum of Natural History in New York; Disney's Animal Kingdom theme park in Orlando; an ecotour of Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks; the film An Inconvenient Truth. Other than expressing a common interest in the environment, they seem quite dissimilar. And yet, as this book makes clear, these sites are all manifestations of green governmentality, each seeking to define and regulate our understanding, experience, and treatment of nature. This book shows how the museum presents a scientized assessment of global nature under threat; the Animal Kingdom demonstrates that a corporation can successfully organize a biopolitical project; the ecotour, operating as a school for a natural aesthetic sensibility, provides a visual grammar of pristine national nature; and the film offers a toehold on a moral way of encountering nature. But one very powerful force unites the disparate “truths” of nature produced through these sites, and that, the book tells us, is their debt to nature's commodification. This book's analysis reveals how each site integrates nature, power, and profit to make the buying and selling of nature critical to our understanding and rescuing of it. The combination, it argues, renders other ways of encountering nature—particularly more radically environmental ways—unthinkable.
