For years my Intro to Lit class has had a nature theme.
Tag Archives: Flight Behavior
Nature Lit Has Healed for Centuries
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Bacchae, Barbara Kingsolver, climate change, environmental issues, Euripides, John Keats, Leslie Marmon Silko, Lord Byron, Lucille Clifton, Margaret Atwood, Mary Oliver, Midsummer Night's Dream, nature poetry, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Wendell Berry, William Blake, William Shakespeare, William Wordsworth, Year of the Flood | Comments closed
Kingsolver Explains Climate Denial
Rush Limbaugh has been calling Hurricanes Harvey and Irma liberal conspiracies. In “Flight Behavior,” Barbara Kingsolver shows the dangerous impact of such pronouncements.
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Barbara Kingsolver, climate change, climate change denial, global warming, Rush Limbaugh | Comments closed
To Save Planet, Scientists Must Protest
Saturday’s March for Science is a sign that scientists are realizing they don’t have the luxury of remaining aloof from politics. Barbara Kingsolver’s “Flight Behavior” explores the issue.
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Barbara Kingsolver, climate change, French Lieutenant's Woman, global warming, John Fowles, science education, Science March | Comments closed
Teaching Euripides in the Age of Title IX
Recently a student reported me for using sexist language in the classroom. (This while teaching a Kingsolver novel and Euripides’s “The Bacchae.”) The language did not reflect my own views, but the complaint made me realize that I need to be more careful with this generation of students.
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Alexander Pope, Bacchae, Barbara Kingsolver, Donald Trump, Euripides, Maxine Hong Kingston, Rape of the Lock, Sexism, sexual harassment, Title IX, Woman Warrior | Comments closed
Using Lit to Discover Purpose in Science
My Intro to Literature students, few of whom are English majors, are often startled to discover that literature understands them better than they understand themselves. Today’s post describes the encounters between two science majors and, respectively, Wordsworth’s “Intimations of Immortality” and Kingsolver’s “Flight Behavior.”
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Tables Turned", Barbara Kingsolver, climate change, Humanities, Intimations of Immortality, Science, William Wordsworth | Comments closed
A Talk with a Cli-Fi Activist
Dan Bloom, inventor of the term cli-fi for climate fiction, tirelessly advocates for such fiction, regarding it as indispensable in the struggle to save the human race. I interview him in today’s blog.
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Barbara Kingsolver, climate change, Dan Bloom, global warming, social cause literature | Comments closed
Monarchs & Ezekiel’s Burning Coals of Fire
Barbara Kingsolver’s “Flight Behavior” shows us Baptists farmers, not normally friends of environmentalists, turning to religious language to save the environment.
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Barbara Kingsolver, clearcutting, climate change, global warming, habitat destruction, monarch butterflies | Comments closed
The Peace of Wild Things
My Intro to Literature class explored how a disconnect from nature leads to existential anguish while opening themselves up to nature provides spiritual nourishment.
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Ancient Mariner, "Egrets", "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud", "Killing the Trees", "Peace of Wild Things", All the Pretty Horses, Bacchae, Barbara Kingsolver, Ceremony, Cormac McCarthy, Euripides, Leslie Marmon Silko, Lucille Clifton, Mary Oliver, Midsummer Night's Dream, Nature, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, spiritual healing, Wendell Berry, William Shakespeare, William Wordsworth | Comments closed
Kingsolver Tries to Save the Planet
I’m not entirely sure what to make of Barbara Kingsolver’s Flight Behavior (2012), which I’m currently teaching in my Introduction to Literature class. It fits well with my theme, which is “Humans in Nature,” and I certainly agree with Kingsolver’s point that climate change is one of the greatest dangers facing humankind. I just have […]
Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Barbara Kingsolver, climate change, monarch butterflies | Comments closed
