According to the English writer Robert Macfarlane, Hundreds of words about the air, the plants, the earth and its landscapes live forgotten. The new dictionaries eliminate terms on nature to replace them with technological terms, an act that further separates us from the environment. For this simple reason, Macfarlane rescues inspiring words about nature so that we can shape reality, to reconnect.
kenton kreuger
Describing the essence of nature is key to being able to relate to it. It is from language that we structure reality, we name things. But it is not just about providing names or transferring ideas, words about nature work as a philosophy that helps us understand what the whole is built.
In this sense, we can translate the natural world as we best appreciate it. Create a dictionary of nature that describes the world for us, that helps us imagine what we once saw, that helps us to reconnect.
The virtual language that distances us from nature
Why have we stopped talking about nature? Technology is a good explanation, it is not necessarily the culprit, but the cause of our break with the environment. We live tied to a screen, learning virtual language in order to be part of something, to understand it and experience it. Can we do the same with nature?
“Language not only records experience, it produces it” – Robert Macfarlane
If words like “dandelion” or “heron” are removed from the dictionary to include “chat room” or “voicemail”, then we are limiting the experiences we can have with nature.
For example, the word “petricor” defines an experience. When the rain falls, it releases a very particular smell, something that makes us connect, that makes us experience it from other senses. We not only observe the rain, we feel it, we smell it, we connect it with emotions.
Likewise, Australian environmental philosopher, Glenn Albrecht, coined the term «solastalgia» to describe the anguish or pain caused by the loss of territory. Now, if we allow the words about nature to be forgotten, then we will be unable to record what we are destroying, both environmental awareness and nature.
In the sense of rescuing what we experience from nature, let’s name different scenarios. For now we only know their words in English, but we could grant new terms in Spanish. Let’s experience the environment through language with these…
20 words about nature
It might interest you