ECO- FEMINISM: A Significant World-View towards Empowering Women and Environment.

Abstract

Abstract: The ‘technology and development ‘obsessed world today unleashes destruction, oppression and death. In its race towards globalization, men have come to view nature as a commodity and a source of profit, crushing and trampling the ecosystem. Men conquer, control and oppress - both nature and women. Women and nature are united through their shared history of oppression by a patriarchal Western Society.  Dr Vandana Shiva, an Indian eco-feminist claims that women have a special connection to the environment through their daily interactions with it that has been ignored.¹ She opines that women in subsistence economies who produce “wealth in partnership with nature have been experts in their own right of holistic and ecological knowledge of nature’s processes”. However she points out that “these alternative modes of knowing, which are oriented to social benefits and sustenance needs are not recognized by the capitalist reductionist paradigm, because it fails to perceive the interconnectedness of nature, or the connection of women’s  lives, work and knowledge with the creation of wealth.²This paper attempts to explore the significance of eco feminism as a world view towards creating a harmonious and violence- free world that not only celebrates the interconnectedness of all forms of life as inherently valuable but also seeks possibilities for empowerment of both