Director, Environmental Studies
Professor of English

STUDY QUESTIONS

Gary Snyder, “The Place, the Region, and the Commons”

The Practice of the Wild

1. What does Snyder mean by saying that “The world is places?” Do you agree? (25)

2. What does mean by “a civilization of wildness?” (25)

3. In what sense does a place have “fluidity?” (27)

4. What does he mean to say that “Each place is its own place, forever (eventually) wild.” (27)

5. One key issue in environmental literature is the relationship between nature and culture. What is his view of the relationship between nature and culture – in earlier societies, in ours, and ideally?

6. Another key issue in nature writing, environmental philosophy, and specifically bioregionalism is the relationship between the “one and the many,” or the “part and the whole.” Snyder responds to that issue in the following way: “To know the spirit of the place is to realize that you are a part of a part and that the whole is made of parts, each of which is whole. You start with the part you are whole in.” (38) What does he mean, what significance does it have for our vision of nature? How is it related to bioregionalism?

7. A hotly debated issue is the relationship between Euro-Americans and Native Americans concerning the land. Snyder takes a controversial stand when he says the following. “Native Americans to be sure have a prior claim to the term native. But as they love this land they will welcome the conversion of the millions of immigrant psyches into fellow ‘Native Americans.’ For the non-Native American to become at home on this continent, he or she must be born again in this hemisphere, on this continent, properly called Turtle Island .” Why would such a claim be controversial? What does Snyder make that claim? (40)

8. For Snyder, why is it “not enough just to ‘love nature’ or to want to ‘be in harmony with Gaia.’” (39)

9. Snyder presents a critique of contemporary politics. What is it? Why does he hold this view? How is it related to bioregionalism? How is politics related to nature (it generally has not been in the past)? (41)

10. What are the characteristics of bioregionalism that Snyder mentions? Make a list. Does bioregionalism seem attractive to you? Why? What problems does such an idea/ideal have?

11. How does Snyder speak of the spirituality of nature and of religion?

12. In this essay, what is Snyder urging the reader to do? What would be required to do that? What would keep a reader from doing that? Does the essay motivate you to do that? Why or why not?

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