Climate change, biodiversity loss, and environmental injustice are complex, messy, and gravely important issues. In addressing these concerns, traditional ecocriticism understandably has taken itself very seriously. Unserious Ecocriticism, by contrast, highlights alternative responses to the challenges of environmental collapse and catastrophe. By theorizing an unserious ecocriticism, contributors to this volume validate and empower alternatives to mainstream environmentalism, scholarship, and artmaking. The essays, artworks, and non-traditional scholarly formats of this edited collection demonstrate that the creative tools available to artists and those who study them are particularly well positioned to inventively disrupt normative modes of ecocritical presentation and environmentalist thought. Rather than approach environmental crises through tragic and dire warnings, contributors take seriously the unexpected or easily dismissed, play with format and form, embrace the bodily and abject, take pleasure in their subjects of study, have fun, and crack jokes. In Unserious Ecocriticism, humor, playfulness, parody, and irreverence become tools to challenge expectations, cope with complicated problems, and imagine new futures. Edited by Jessica Landau and Maria Lux, with a foreword by Aaron Sachs and contributions from Allie ES Wist, Deke Weaver, Kathleen McDermott, Annie Ronan, Kimiko Matsumura, Ina Linge, Paula Kupfer, Craig Carey, Anna Ialeggio, Topher Lineberry, Stentor Danielson, Patrick Gonder, Matthew Teti, Nicole Seymour, with Emily Eliza Scott, Rob Gioielli, and Jenny Price, Phaan Howng, and Jennifer Schell. "In face of the daunting and dark apocalyptic tones that often characterize writing about ecological collapse, Unserious Ecocriticism shows that there is an important place for forms of expression that aren’t so heavy or grim, while nevertheless maintaining a critical edge about the systems of power and habits of being that are damaging our planet. “Unserious” ecocriticism can still be dark, in the sense of dark humor, and indeed the book shows that taking such an approach can serve as a coping mechanism in the face of unimaginable loss. This book is a pleasure to read—most other books on climate neglect to endeavor the lightheartedness or blend of self-deprecation and humility that this book shows on page after page. I laughed aloud several times. I can’t think of an academic book that’s ever made me do that." —<b>Chris Ingraham</b>, University of Utah "More than most books that hope for it, Unserious Ecocriticism has the potential to be used in classes on related topics, both graduate and undergraduate. The chapters are approachable, not too theoretical or abstract, and the book provides models of scholarship of a variety of disciplines and styles. In addition, the wide-ranging content would give classes a good deal of material to examine together. In both content and style, this book will offer a lot in a classroom setting." —<b>Christy Tidwell</b>, South Dakota School of Mines & Technology <b>Jessica Landau</b> is an assistant instructional professor in the Committee on Environment, Geography, and Urbanization (CEGU) at the University of Chicago. Her work, typically about the representation of large North American mammals, cryptozoological and otherwise, has been published in American Art, Curator: the Museum Journal, as well as other journals, edited volumes, and exhibition catalogs. <b>Maria Lux</b> is an artist and associate professor of art at Whitman College whose research-based practice is centered on animals and their relationship to human knowledge. Her multi-disciplinary installations have included objects ranging from a life-sized parade float of a sheep wearing a life vest, to fake raccoons attached to Roombas. Her artwork has been exhibited in gallery spaces as well as storefront windows and abandoned malls. An auto-narrated audiobook is available via the "Download" button above.

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