The future of ecocriticism: Strategic openness and sustainability -an interview with scott slovic

Abstract

This interview was conducted in May, 2010, when Professor Slovic, one of the most distinguished promoters of American eco-criticism, was teaching an intensive course on ecocriticism and theory at Shandong University. During his stay in China he visited several universities in Sichuan and delivered a series of lectures on ecocriticism, specifically concerning the strategic openness and future sustainability of ecological literary criticism. The interview begins by defining ecocriticism in a broader sense, which characterizes Slovic's definition of strategic openness, exploring a variety of aspects of ecocriticism and its future development. Other issues covered include an overview of scholars' efforts to localize ecocriticism in specific cultural discourses by transferring various ecological paradigms. Slovic comments on ecological aesthetics and ecological ethics and makes comparisons between early literary works and what is happening today so as to situate proto-ecocritical approaches outside of ecocriticism in the contemporary sense. In addition, Slovic thinks that the future of ecocriticism will be more practical as people make green appeals to more environment-friendly lifestyles, which have been increasingly reflected in literary works on animal liberation, food literature, and so on. He argues that strategic openness and future sustainability of ecological literary criticism will characterize this discipline in the future.