Environmental Humanities

The visual essay is considered an unorthodox scholarly product because of the remote way it presents and executes research (Pouwels 2012:2). It is practiced in the arts, used to present information, and used for entertainment purposes but subsequently, visual essays are a challenging, sophisticated form of visual anthropology and sociology (Pouwels 2012:10).

​

We are living in a world that is constantly consuming visual material in the form of videos, photographs, and social media posts (Heng, 2019:1). Social researchers are aware of this shift and the affordances smartphones, e-publishing, digital printing, and other technologies have given us which have made communicating social research in visual forms popular. However visual essays still approximate text-focused studies by presenting a coherent and have a partly theoretical framework and methodology(Heng, 2019: 21).

​

Visual essays are a constant work in progress because of their expressive format (Pouwels 2012:3). All the images, videos, words, design, and layout are all important components in making an informed statement while making a contribution to the mode of expression (Pouwels 2012:10). Complexities lie within the combination of signifiers to generate a whole (Pouwels 2012: 2).

The construction of a visual essay requires the author to steer the receiver in a specific direction while pursuing a more reciprocal relationship between text and visual imagery. Being the author of a visual essay is being sensitive to the responses visual data, photographs, and film video could trigger (Pouwels 2012: 9). This unique production of insights in contemporary culture makes the visual essay one of the most visual experimental and experiential ways of analysing, visualising, and expressing insight (Pouwels 2012: 10).

Environmental Humanities

Environmental humanities also titled humanities for the environment, offer insights on how the humanities can influence the human capacity to perceive and cope with changes in the environment. It is also a growing field in universities around the world that promotes interdisciplinary scholarship that aids in understanding relations between human beings and the environment in all the areas of cultural production (Environmental Humanities South [sa]).

Ranging from social justice movements, the creative arts, and government policies, the environmental humanities broadly questions sustainability, the wellbeing of humans, and the environment. With the increasing pressure on the biosphere, the environmental humanities have provided an intellectual space enabling researchers, students, scientists, and artists to critically reflect on concepts underlying contemporary environmentalism (Environmentalism Humanities South [sa]). Environmental humanities is both aspirational and descriptive, it encourages a seismic shift in environmental thought where the humanities are pressurised to prove their social usefulness and politics pushed to respond quicker to climate change( Rose, Dooren, Kearnes, Cookes & O’ Gorman 2012).

​

According to Holm and Brennan (2018:1) The Humanities Manifesto pointed out that the humanities have provided various good reasons for why human beings resist change. Although change is slow and when in the face of adversity humans tend to be in a state of denial and despair causing them not to act, change does happen (Holm & Brennan 2018: 2). This is evident in the research provided by the humanities to facilitate this change. Human beings tend to have a compressed impression of time causing us to overvalue short-term benefits over long-term gain (Holm & Brennan 2018:8). Change may not happen as quickly as we would like because humans often wait for others to act first in order to develop mutual trust in the need for change. This is called prisoners dilemma and despite the availability of information, there is a lack of will to act. (Holm & Brennan 2018:8)

​

However, closer inspection of history shows that humans do alter their behavioural patterns. Thinking in a way that is not in the political cycle of three to four years avoids despair, but in considering the long game there is a true commitment to contribute to society’s knowledge base. Evidence of environmental change and behavioural patterns is especially important in the current-age of climate-change denial. There is a call for universities, civilians, and businesses to come together and create an evidence-based platform.

Environmental humanities are crucial in the promotion of pro-environmental behaviour. Because it functions as a humanistic discipline, it can assist in understanding and engaging the global ecological problems by its provision of insight in human actions, perception, and motivation. The already existing theories fail to capture the full range of commitments, assumptions, and belief systems surrounding the environment.

​

The Environmental Humanities Observations was established in order to help seek a range of evidence that is seasoned, scaled, and culturally diverse in the way it responds to the complex environmental issues under examination. The environmental humanities integrate perspectives from various fields such as history, literature, philosophy, arts, psychology, and sociology to better explore the roles of human perception and agency when faced with global climate change. The functioning of Earth has been deeply affected by the magnitude of the human imprint on the global environment (Steffen 2011: 2). Climate change has created a focus on the capabilities of contemporary human civilization to influence the environment (Steffen 2011 :19). The activity of humans can adversely affect the ecosystem which helps house human life and being considerate of the relationship we have with the environment is crucial.

​

 The intention is to create an understanding of the complexities of human-environmental relationships and ‘new modes of knowledge necessary to guide global decision-makers while’ (Holm, 2015: 13). Teaching programs and courses in environmental humanities have shown steady, varied, and uneven growth. Any naïve belief systems held by humans must be disrupted in responsible and respectable ways which is the crux of the new human condition and Anthropocene society (Steffen 2011: 21). What is suggested by the term the Anthropocene is that the Earth is moving out of the geological epoch titled the Holocene and human activity is responsible.

Due to climate skepticism also referred to as denial of climate change, there is cognitive dissonance and confinement of the term ‘Anthropocene’ entirely to the research community when it in fact should have wide awareness (Steffan 2011: 21). Thankfully, the concept continues to grow in awareness within the public leading to greater change and an environment where humans can continue to exist.