Val Plumwood was an Australian philosopher and ecofeminist known for her work on anthropocentrism. From the 1970s, she played a central role in the development of radical ecosophy. Working mostly as an independent scholar, she held positions at the University of Tasmania, North Carolina State University, the University of Montana, and the University of Sydney, and at the time of her death was Australian Research Council Fellow at the Australian National University. She is included in Routledge's Fifty Key Thinkers on the Environment (2001).
Plumwood in 1990
Plumwood and Sean Kenan, 1987
Plumwood, fourth from the left, 2004, at the home she built with Richard Sylvan near Plumwood Mountain
Plumwood (right) and Sky Kidd, 2007
Ecofeminism is a branch of feminism and political ecology. Ecofeminist thinkers draw on the concept of gender to analyse the relationships between humans and the natural world. The term was coined by the French writer Françoise d'Eaubonne in her book Le Féminisme ou la Mort (1974). Ecofeminist theory asserts a feminist perspective of Green politics that calls for an egalitarian, collaborative society in which there is no one dominant group. Today, there are several branches of ecofeminism, with varying approaches and analyses, including liberal ecofeminism, spiritual/cultural ecofeminism, and social/socialist ecofeminism. Interpretations of ecofeminism and how it might be applied to social thought include ecofeminist art, social justice and political philosophy, religion, contemporary feminism, and poetry.
French writer Françoise d'Eaubonne coined the term in a 1974 book
Petra Kelly
Wangari Maathai