Speaking With Nature : The Origins of Indian Environmentalism – Ramchandra Guha

Description

Indian environmentalism is usually traced to Chipko, Silent Valley or the Narmada Bachao Andolan. Ramachandra Guha shows that its roots go much deeper, at least to the 1930s and 1940s, when Indian thinkers developed ecological ideas grounded in their own history while engaging with the wider world.

Through the lives and ideas of ten pioneers, among them Rabindranath Tagore, whom Guha calls an unacknowledged founder of modern Indian environmentalism, the economists Radhakamal Mukerjee and J.C. Kumarappa, K.M. Munshi and the town planner Patrick Geddes, the book recovers a rich, home-grown tradition of thinking about nature, cities and sustainability. Hardcover edition.