Derrick Jensen is an American author and environmental activist whose work deeply interrogates contemporary society and its values. Through his writing, he challenges established norms and exposes their destructive impacts on the world around us. His works serve as a call to re-evaluate our relationship with nature and ourselves, focusing on uncovering hidden power structures and the consequences of consumerist lifestyles. Jensen's style is penetrating and compels readers to reflect on the fundamental principles upon which our civilization is built.
Explains violence as a pathology that touches every aspect of our lives and indeed affects all aspects of life on Earth. This chronicle of a young man's drive to transcend domestic abuse offers a challenging look at our worldwide sense of community and how we can make things better.
An exploration of the lines of thought and experience that run between the massive lynchings in early twentieth-century America to today's death squads in South America soon explodes into an examination of the very heart of our civilization.
Bright Green Lies systematically debunks many of the lies and distortions that characterize the discourse of those who argue that 'technology will stop global warming' or that 'technology will save the planet.
This is a hard-hitting and sometimes scathing critique of the current educational system that not only gives a hands-on method for learning how to write, but also a lesson on how to connect to the core of our creative selves.
Jensen's furthest-reaching book yet, Dreams challenges the "destructive nihilism" of writers like Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris who believe that there is no reality outside what can be measured using the tools of science. He introduces the mythologies of ancient cultures and modern indigenous peoples as evidence of alternative ways of understanding reality, informed by thinkers such as American Indian writer Jack Forbes, theologian and American Indian rights activist Vine Deloria, Shaman Martin Prechtel, Dakota activist and scholar Waziyatawin, and Okanagan Indian writer Jeannette Armstrong. He draws on the wisdom of Dr. Paul Staments, author of Mycelium Running: How Mushrooms Can Help Save the World, sociologist Stanley Aronowitz, who discusses science's lack of accountability to the earth, and many more. As in his other books, Jensen draws heavily from his own life experience living alongside the frogs, redwoods, snails, birds and bears of the upper northwest, about which he writes with exquisite tenderness. Having taken on the daunting task of understanding one's dreams as a source of knowledge, Jensen achieves the near-impossible in this breathtakingly brave and ambitious new work.
The book explores the critical relationship between human waste and the environment, emphasizing its historical significance and current toxicity. Authors Derrick Jensen and Aric McBay blend analysis with evocative writing to highlight the disruption of natural cycles of decay and regeneration. They argue for a responsible way of living that ensures the survival of all life forms by recognizing that one being's waste should nourish another. This call to action underscores the fundamental processes essential for sustainability on Earth.
Two of America's most talented activists team up to deliver a bold and hilarious satire of modern environmental policy in this fully illustrated graphic novel. The U.S. government gives robot machines from space permission to eat the earth in exchange for bricks of gold. A one-eyed bunny rescues his friends from a corporate animal-testing laboratory. And two little girls figure out the secret to saving the world from both of its enemies (and it isn't by using energy-efficient light bulbs or biodiesel fuel). As the World Burns will inspire you to do whatever it takes to stop ecocide before it’s too late.
In this collection of interviews, Derrick Jensen discusses the destructive dominant culture with ten people who have devoted their lives to undermining it. Whether it is Carolyn Raffensperger and her radical approach to public health, or Thomas Berry on perceiving the sacred; be it Kathleen Dean Moore reminding us that our bodies are made of mountains, rivers, and sunlight; or Vine Deloria asserting that our dreams tell us more about the world than science ever can, the activists and philosophers interviewed in How Shall I Live My Life? each bravely present a few of the endless forms that resistance can and must take.
Derrick Jensen explores the pressing issues of environmental collapse and civilization's challenges, offering a blend of hope and deep ecological insight. This collection features significant excerpts from his influential works, emphasizing the need for genuine resistance and alternative solutions. Jensen's thought-provoking philosophy serves as a guide for those seeking to understand and combat the environmental crises of our time.
In this impassioned polemic, radical environmental philosopher Derrick Jensen debunks the near-universal belief in a hierarchy of nature and the superiority of humans. Vast and underappreciated complexities of nonhuman life are explored in detail—from the cultures of pigs and prairie dogs, to the creative use of tools by elephants and fish, to the acumen of caterpillars and fungi. The paralysis of the scientific establishment on moral and ethical issues is confronted and a radical new framework for assessing the intelligence and sentience of nonhuman life is put forth. Jensen attacks mainstream environmental journalism, which too often limits discussions to how ecological changes affect humans or the economy—with little or no regard for nonhuman life. With his signature compassionate logic, he argues that when we separate ourselves from the rest of nature, we in fact orient ourselves against nature, taking an unjust and, in the long run, impossible position. Jensen expresses profound disdain for the human industrial complex and its ecological excesses, contending that it is based on the systematic exploitation of the earth. Page by page, Jensen, who has been called the philosopher-poet of the environmental movement, demonstrates his deep appreciation of the natural world in all its intimacy, and sounds an urgent call for its liberation from human domination.