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Apocalypticism and Joy: Rereading the Environmental Rhetoric of Silent Spring

  • Journal of Humanities, Seoul National University
  • 2024, 81(3), pp.397-420
  • DOI : 10.17326/jhsnu.81.3.202408.397
  • Publisher : Institute of Humanities, Seoul National University
  • Research Area : Humanities > Other Humanities
  • Received : July 23, 2024
  • Accepted : August 7, 2024
  • Published : August 31, 2024

Jiwon Rim 1

1서울대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

Tracing the now-familiar apocalyptic environmental rhetoric back to Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring, this article argues that Silent Spring, quite contrary to the common perception, does not draw its persuasive power from the prediction of inevitable environmental “end.” I read Silent Spring as essentially an attempt to carve out the time of ecological action between the impending-but-not-inevitable doom and readerly present, evoking the still-remaining joys of nature. We are living in a time in which apocalyptic environmental warnings and their “shock” became everyday news. By reevaluating everyday joy as an unexhausted source of the rhetorical power of Silent Spring, this article attempts to draw outlines of a new environmental rhetoric beyond the overused apocalyptic one.

Citation status

* References for papers published after 2023 are currently being built.