This paper considers how ecology, as suggested by recent articulations of socio-ecological theory, locates our understanding of the human as contingent and in relation to other species and various material states of being. This stance offers an ethical framework and lens for inquiry that challenges traditional disciplinary divisions (natural and social sciences, for example). It offers, as well, an ethics of land stewardship that I am calling a “relational ecology.” To develop this framework, I expand on philosopher of science Isabelle Stengers’ call for an “ecology of practices” (2010) and other emerging concerns in posthumanist philosophy.
Results/Conclusions
I use examples from two areas of my research to illustrate how a relational ecology provides new insights into our understandings of land stewardship. First, I discuss my anthropological research into the livelihood practices of rural alligator hunters in the Florida Everglades (2011). In doing so I show the important relations among plants, animals, and humans that constituted this lifestyle and produced, in part, the Everglades landscape of the early 20th century. Second, I discuss our research into the production and management of suburban landscapes in areas adjacent to Everglades National Park. In these projects we have found a strong correlation between people’s experience with the Everglades and land stewardship practices in the suburbs. Both of these research projects have been supported through the National Science Foundation’s Florida Coastal Everglades, Long Term Ecological Research Program.