Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
ceased, dingoes were also allowed to hunt young, old or infirm 'brumbies'
(the aforementioned imported workhorses).
The ecological management regime introduced by the QPWS changed
this in the act of making Fraser Island a safe and attractive tourist desti-
nation. From the late 1990s onwards, open landfill sites were closed, fish
offal had to be buried, food waste was sent for compaction to the main-
land, many brumbies were removed and feeding dingoes was prohibited.
As Healy points out, these measures ultimately forced dingoes to become
what they were presented as being 'naturally', in other words 'wild' and not
to be interacted with. This manufactured wildness, as several long-standing
Fraser Island residents pointed out in criticisms of the QPWS management
approach, placed dingoes in a very difficult situation. Starved of previous
food sources, many of them had to start taking risks and attacked humans
as a matter of expediency or necessity. Their behaviour, despite ecotourist
rhetoric, was neither consistent with, nor a deviation from, their supposedly
wild character. It was circumstantial.
IN WHAT SENSE IS 'NATURE' A 'CONSTRUCTION'?
This chapter has been a very long one, at least if you've examined all three
bodies of case material presented. I'll therefore keep this penultimate section
as short as I possibly can. To take stock of the lessons we can reasonably
draw from the Clayoquot, new genetics and Fraser Island cases, a more
philosophical discussion is now in order.
In the previous pages, I've shown in some detail that what appears to be
'natural' is indissociable from what's normally understood to be its antithe-
sis. Disputes over old growth trees, scientific research into human genes
and even 'direct' encounters with wild animals all, I have demonstrated,
make reference to an asocial nature that's belied by close scrutiny of the
representational practices involved. I use the term 'representational prac-
tices' because I've sought to emphasise that representations are performative .
Even as they often appear to refer to a natural world separate from them-
selves, they conjure up that separateness as a rhetorical means of securing
their own validity. This conjuring, allied with the specific epistemic content
of any given representational act, comprises the 'force' of any representation
of nature, though it's an empirical question just what specific effects follow
from it.
Am I thereby arguing that representations of nature make the world in
their own image? No, I'm not. To insist, as I have done, that these repre-
sentations are purposeful constructions (things made), arising from equally
purposeful engagements with what we call nature, is not to say that this
'nature' is constructed by us without ontological remainder. This sort of
'radical constructivism', as it has sometimes been called, has (understand-
ably) attracted the ire of critics. It appears to imply two things that the
 
Search WWH ::




Custom Search