BOOK REVIEWS
es for economic development, a point of
view that has endured for the last 300 years.
Devastated landscapes, species extinctions,
toxic pollution -- and, more recently, during
the Bush administration, concerted efforts
to deny global warming, drill in ANWR
and gut the nation’s environmental protec-
tion laws -- have been the result.
Environmentalists always resisted this
soulless materialism. John Muir valued
science; his works on how glaciers formed
the Sierra’s valleys and the importance of
a forest’s tree roots in holding water in the
soil remain important contributions to geol-
Strange Beginnings
ogy and ecology. But he also experienced ISBN: 1-896580-11-4
James William Gibson, A
nature as spiritually alive; his writings tried Published by: Trade Wind Books
Reenchanted World: The Quest to consecrate places as “holy” -- that is, as Written by: Karen Needham
for a New Kinship with Nature something more than real estate. Modern Illustrated by: Launi Lucas
(New York: Metropolitan Books/Henry
activists like Paul Watson and Julia But-
Holt) April. 306 pages $27.00
terfly Hill have added their transcendent
Reviewed by Victor Elderton

experiences to this legacy, helping us see
whales as creatures with families and emo-
T
here’s a time in almost every activist’s
tional lives and redwood trees as a living
I
think every envir

onmental educator has
spent hours peering into a microscope
personal outdoor history when
connection to the distant past-elders to be
looking at aquatic insects and marveling.
ordinary adventures, fresh air, and fellow-
respected.
The world of aquatic insects somehow
ship change into another, deeper kind of
Those of us who’ve long understood
seems so alien and their metamorphosis
experience. A familiar mountain trail looks
the world to be enchanted and wild animals
so completely different than us, it borders
different. We see both small details, like the
are our totemic kin have always hoped
on the miraculous. Even Dr. David Suzuki
twisting grain of the wood in a dead tree,
others would come to share this vision.
in a recent interview said when he retires
and whole panoramas of shadow and light
he’ll be spending his time peering into a
Beginning in 2005, anti-environmental
across a distant range. Or we find ourselves
microscope at microscopic realms. In the
legislation in Congress failed, and lawsuits
drawn to a wild animal: a chance encounter
interview he said it was pond water where
filed by environmental groups such as the
with a desert tortoise keeps reappearing in
he got his first inspirations to investigate
Center for Biological Diversity successfully
memory and we worry about its fate. And
nature and it still holds endless fascination
challenged many of the administration’s
there are the moments of pure mystery, as
for him. Well that’s another trait that Dr.
worst administrative decrees. As aware-
when a forest feels sentient, or an ocean reef
Suzuki and I have in common.
ness of perils to the earth and the fragility
vibrant, actively welcoming.
of life grew, so did belief in enchantment.
James William Gibson calls these
In Strange Beginnings, Karen Need-
In struggles to preserve open spaces terms
boundary-shifting experiences “enchant-
hams’ expert and accurate identification
like “sacred,” “special,” and “alive” became
ment.” In hunting and gathering societies
along with Launi Lucas’s brilliant illustra-
increasingly common. Even mainstream
tions make this book one of the best quick
people routinely experienced the world as
religions, including conservative Protestant
and explanatory manuals of the most
enchanted. Within their cultures animals
denominations that in the 1980s and 1990s common fresh water insects in our region.
and important plants were what anthro-
thought this culture idolatrous or even The text is easily followed, basic, informa-
pologists call “other-than-human persons,”
Satanic have begun to label pollution and tive and makes it easy for students of all
and every species had a guardian spirit.
global warming “sins” -- insults to God’s ages. It identifies aquatic insects without
Mountains, rivers, springs all existed on a
sacred creation, the Earth.
being overly technical, provides a fact or
spiritual level, too. This way of seeing the
two that is not obvious about them and
world faded under the influence of mono-
These cultural changes are profound --
illustrates some of the other organisms
theistic religions in which God was thought
especially the fact that they are mainstream.
an insect larvae and its adult form would
to be completely transcendent and removed
Far from being pessimistic about the Earth’s
likely interact with. Each description is
from earth, as well as the influences of
future, Gibson concludes that the culture
accompanied by a before and after illustra-
science and the secular philosophies of the
of enchantment “has opened people’s
tion of a particular insect, with a larval
European Enlightenment. Sociologist Max
imaginations, and in doing so it has
form and the adult it will become, with life
Weber argued that modernization and secu-
changed the political climate. The spread of
history notes for both.
larization brought about the “disenchant-
enchantment means that the environmental
Needham is an accomplished ento-
ment of the world and its transformation
movement and its allies can now shift their
mologist, curator of the University of BC
into a causal mechanism.” A disenchanted
Entomology Museum, who has resisted
strategy from defense to offense.”
nature became a collection of inert resourc-
the temptation to over burden the text with
Page 48 http://www.clearingmagazine.org Clearing - 2009 Compendium Edition
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