Before the New Materialism: Environmental Justice in the Texts of Toni Morrison, Alice Walker, Octavia Butler, and Sherri Smith

Abstract

This thesis examines the intersections of race, gender, class, and environment in African American women's fiction, focusing on their responses to social and environmental injustice, political neglect, and racial capitalism as well as their vision of nature as a potential pathway for justice and liberation. It investigates African American women's literary representations of nature from the Civil Rights movement to the early 21st century. It explores works by prominent black feminist authors such as Toni Morrison, Alice Walker, Octavia Butler, and Sherri Smith to examine and understand the experiences of African American women in relation to environmental issues. This interdisciplinary approach seeks a better understanding of the overlapping of racial, patriarchal, and ecological hierarchies to address and resist interconnected forms of oppression. By engaging with theoretical frameworks such as new materialism, feminism, and ecocriticism, my research highlights African American women’s unique contributions to American environmentalism and justice, providing nuanced insight into the complex interconnections between human and nonhuman worlds in relation to social identities and power dynamics as well as proposing alternative frameworks for addressing and resisting social and ecological challenges.