Annotation+1+-+The+Lorax+Redux


 * EcoEd **
 * Reading Annotation Template **
 * Kelley Fischbach, February 25, 2014 **
 * Annotation 1 – “The //Lorax// Redux” **


 * 1. **** Full citation:  **

Darling, E. (2001). The Lorax Redux: Profit Biggering and Some Selective Silences in American Environmentalism. //Culture and Ecology//, 51-66.


 * 2. **** Where are the author/s located, what are their backgrounds and what kinds of expertise do they have?  **

The author of this article, Eliza Jane Darling, is an American writer who formerly taught in Britain. She is a self-proclaimed “redneck” and felt the strains of intellectual insecurity throughout most of her life, driving her current work. Eliza is heavily influenced by a former professor that she refers to as VFM (a very famous Marxist). Throughout her writings, she aims to write “fearlessly,” without the worry of being wrong – something she aims to change about the way that the industry is perceived. She says that her least favorite aspect of academia is “the ironic condescension of an intellectual radicalism which professes inclusivity by practices marginalization, especially through language.” []


 * 3. **** List at least three details or examples from the text that point to something important about culture, education and/or the challenge of environmental sustainability in the United States.  **


 * One example from this article that brilliantly describes a challenge of environmental sustainability in the United States is the conflicting needs of our culture, mentioned by the author, for both economic growth and environmental preservation. Darling notes how adeptly this contradiction is exemplified in //The Lorax//.
 * Another very important factor that Darling mentions as a reason for her analysis of this children’s book is that “children are capable of confronting a great deal more complexity than adults typically give them credit for.” In this sense, it is increasingly important to critique and analyze the material that the next generation of children will have access to in the process of shaping the way they view environmental issues.
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">One further cultural implication that is made in this article is the fact that children are very impressionable and that it is the job of this generation to prepare the next for the environmental situations that they will face – Darling states that “hope for restoration remains as long as the younger generation will heed the mistakes of its forefathers” (page 54).


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">4. **** <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">What three quotes capture the critical import of the text?  **


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">“What strikes the reader as remarkable about the tale is not merely Seuss's uncanny faculty for capturing 500 years of industrialization, urbanization and environmental degradation in a few colorful and capricious pages, but his ability to describe the inherent contradictions of the capitalist mode of production which eventually lead to its own collapse” (page 53).
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">“As such, his story is above all one of transformation, of raw nature into processed commodities, unspoiled beauty into contaminated ugliness, the Garden of Eden into a fetid cesspool” (page 53).
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">“What rankles, however, is not so much the lesson children learn from The Lorax as the American environmental movement's seemingly unproblematic embracing of its meaning. The Lorax resonates with liberal environmentalism because it affirms the latter's facile assumption that nature can be saved by excluding humans - and especially workers - from it” (page 65).


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">5. **** <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">What is the main argument of the text?  **

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">What I see as the main argument in this article is that there is no simple, “cookie-cutter” answer to the concern of environmental conservation – When capitalistic “private property” companies step in to “preserve” nature, we are left in a paradoxical situation in which we in fact lose bits and pieces of the previously untouched wilderness, although this can also be seen as making these resources more accessible to the public.


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">6. **** <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">Describe at least three ways that the main argument is supported.  **


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">The author describes the ridiculous nature of confining nature to private property lines in explaining the global nature of problems that exist within the borders. For example, the biggest environmental issues in Yosemite are not issues from within the borders of Yosemite, but rather from global air quality issues from places far from the preserve (page 66).
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">This argument is also supported by Darling’s description of how this process cannot truly be sustainable and effective until it incorporates how humans impact the system – from mere presence to capitalistic tendencies (page 66).
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">Darling also makes the argument that preserving certain swatches of wilderness cannot possibly compensate for the “exploitations” of others, although she notes that this type of preservation is often the misguided rationalization for this exploitation (page 66).


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">7. **** <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">What parts of the argument did you find most and least persuasive, and why?  **

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">While I found virtually all of Eliza Darling’s message incredibly persuasive, I was left confused as to her connection between this paradoxical system of “buying up” the wilderness to preserve it, and Seuss’s book, //The Lorax//. While she earlier made some great connections to his deeper meanings behind the book, this seemed to be a stretch. There comes a point where a children’s book should be written off as exactly that… And I felt that this was that point. <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">This leap between topics aside, I found the text to be very persuasive. In particular, I felt incredibly compelled by the author’s description of how the need to preserve nature has evolved into a private party “spending spree”, as our once untouched bits of nature are being confined into squares of private property for the supposed betterment of society and the environment.


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">8. **** <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">What kinds of corrective action are suggested by the text (either overt or implied)?  **

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">There is really only one main take-away from this article, which can be summed up as the following: We need to do more than plant trees and clean trash from the side of highways if we hope to see any changes in the environment for future generations. To conclude her essay, Darling asks, “Is it sufficient to grow another Truffula forest, even a highly protected one, while the seas of capitalism threaten to engulf it on all sides, a potential sacrificial offering on the almighty altar of profit-biggering?” (page 66).


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">9. **** <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">Explain how the argument and evidence in the text relates to our effort to conceptualize, design and deliver EcoEd?  **

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">The argument posed by Eliza Darling complements our efforts in EcoEd to conceptualize, design, and deliver environmental curricula in that she also feels strongly that one of the best ways to enact change is to instill new ways of thinking in the minds of our youth. Like Eliza, we aim to use EcoEd to introduce students to the complexities of environmental issues, without trying to shield them from some of the more “difficult” material. In this sense, both our program and the author’s ideals are very much in alignment.


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">10. ****<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">What additional information has this text compelled you to seek out? (Describe what you learned in a couple of sentences, providing at least two supporting references). **

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">After reading this article, I was very interested in seeing the ways in which other writers or sociologists have viewed //The Lorax//. I came across a few different sources:

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">The first thing I came across was an article published by the BBC about the supposed “five ways” in which //The Lorax// can be interpreted. The first two were discussed in great detail in the article by Darling (an environmental warning and a critique of capitalism). However, this article also introduced a few other plausible interpretations: a personal crusade of Dr. Seuss, propaganda, and marketing for SUV’s (due to greenwashing campaigns published by companies soon after the movie came out in 2012). This article was very interesting, although brief, and gave me a few other things to contemplate in reference to this book. <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">[]

<span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">I then read a very interesting article that portrayed a different argument as the underlying message of //The Lorax//: “Concerns about our planet become trivialized when there is a profit to be had.” While I agree with most of the information presented in Darling’s text, I tend to think more like the author of this “Dauntless Media” article, who sums up this book as “the consequences of acting before you think.” <span style="font-family: Arial,sans-serif;">[]