Nature - autonomous learning

de-naturalisation 155therefore, be topically important for human geographers. The researchdiscussed in the two subsections below focuses on economic sectors wherethe physical environment is ‘confronted directly’: i.e. the extractive sector(mining and fisheries) and the cultivation sector (agriculture, aquacultureand forestry).The materiality of the non-humanRegardless of how it is represented, the non-human world has definitematerial characteristics that present both obstacles and opportunities forsocieties – or so many present-day Marxist geographers would argue.These physical characteristics constrain and enable how different societiesuse the environment. At issue here is not environmental determinism– where societies become a passive, dependent variable – but, rather, asociety–environment dialectic. A dialectic is a dynamic, two-way relationship ofmutual influence and adjustment. As I noted in my earlier discussionof Michael Watts’s research, Marxist geographers are especially interestedin how capitalist societies appropriate natural resources. In other words,they are interested in the historically specific society–environment dialecticfound in capitalist societies which, in turn, varies geographically dependingon the specific elements of economy and environment in question.For many Marxist geographers, the non-human world still has a degree ofrelative independence and agency – even in an era where it seems that wecan control that world down to the genetic and molecular level (see Hudson2001: ch. 9).William Boyd, Scott Prudham and Rachel Schurman (2001:557) capture well the challenge of studying this world from a geographer’sperspective:‘On the one side lies the danger of overlooking the significanceof the biophysical world in nature-based industries and lapsing into puresocial constructionism. On the other lies the spectre of environmentaldeterminism’.This negative comment about ‘pure social constructionism’ indicatesa determination on the part of some Marxist geographers to avoid seeingthe non-human world as mere putty in the hands of modern societies.Indeed, within the Marxist academic community more generally (whichcross-cuts several disciplines), a process of ‘greening’ has occurred overthe past decade or so.This has involved taking seriously the way that thenon-human world physically conditions what societies can (and cannot)practically do. It combines an attention to the internal structure of capitalist