Guest Author - Alegra M. Bartzat

There are many terms that are used to describe environmentalism and other variations on the theme. Let's start with some definitions from the Oxford American College Dictionary:

environment, n. -
1. the surroundings or conditions in which a person, animal or plant lives or operates.
2. the natural world, as a whole or in a particular area, esp. as affected by human activity.

ecology, n. -
1. the branch of biology dealing with the interactions between organisms and their environments.
2. (Ecology) the political movement that seeks to protect the environment, esp. from pollution.

environmentalist, n. –
1. a person who is concerned with or advocates the protection of the environment.

conservation, n. -
1. the act of conserving something in particular.
2. preservation, protection, or restoration of the natural environment, natural ecosystems, vegetation, and wildlife.

preservation, n. -
1. the action of preserving something or the state of being preserved, esp. to a specified degree.


Now, a Brief Historical Context of How These Words Have Been Used will help you to take the see the meaning in these definitons. Because witout context, definitions are meaningless.

However, in the current scene of the environmental movement, some of these phrases take on a different meaning. Without an understanding of what these terms mean, it is easy for the public to be exploited or deceived.

In order to fully understand these terms, an understanding of the history of the environmental movement is helpful.

Though there is no widely recognized political or social movement, ecology can be used to describe interactions between living and non-living beings in any environment, and in particular, the interactions betweens humans and the environment. Throughout the existence of humanity, various cultures have had various relationships with the environment. Some cultures were victims to massive soil depletion and pollution, while others maintained a balanced relationship with the land. There have been many, many short-lived movements in reaction to environmental destruction, whether water pollution, air pollution, soil depletion, or otherwise.

In America, the environmental movement could be argued to begin with the naturalists, those like Thoreau and Emerson, who championed a life lived in harmony with natural and wild environments. Shortly thereafter began the preservationist movement, with figures such as John Muir, who fought to have areas set aside as preserves, where the land would go essentially untouched.

The modern environmental movement is largely agreed upon to have started with Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring (1962). This book chronicled the effects of chemical pesticides, which were discovered to be detrimental to the environment when DDT caused birds’ shells to thin to the point where the birds were not surviving to hatch in the spring, hence the name Silent Spring.