A Historical and Systematic Survey of European Perceptions of Wilderness

Bibliographic Data

ID8068032
AuthorsThomas Kirchhoff (0000-0002-3800-6040, Department of Theology and Science Protestant Institute for Interdisciplinary Research Schmeilweg 5 69118 Heidelberg, Germany, corresponding author), Vera Vicenzotti (0000-0001-6066-0009, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences Department of Landscape Architecture, Planning and Management Box 58 230 53 Alnarp, Sweden)
Year2014
Volume23
Issue4
Pages443-464
Publication date2014-06-25
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueEnvironmental Values (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0963-2719 • E-ISSN: 1752-7015
PublisherSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.3197/096327114x13947900181590
OpenAlexW2321379423
LanguageEN
Citations received19
References cited33

This paper develops a historical and systematic typology of perceptions of wilderness that exist in contemporary western European cultures. After describing notions of wilderness associated with worldviews that emerged during the Enlightenment period (theological, early Enlightenment, liberalism, democratism) and as a critical response to it (Rousseauism, early Romanticism, English and German conservatism), we outline four recent transformations of these traditional notions of wilderness: wilderness as an ecological object, as a place of nature's self-reassertion, as a place of thrill and as a sphere of amorality and meaninglessness. In our conclusion, we suggest what practical relevance arises from such a nuanced understanding of the inherently ambiguous concept of wilderness

Aesthetics · Archaeology · Conservatism · Enlightenment · Environmental ethics · Epistemology · German · Political science · Romanticism · Social science · Sociology · Typology · Wilderness · Anthropology · Environmental Philosophy and Ethics · Geographies of human-animal interactions · Religious Tourism and Spaces · Ecology · History · Law · Philosophy

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