Empowering Nature and Women: Ecofeminist Analysis of Atwood's The Edible Woman and Watson's Tiny Sunbirds Faraway

Margret Atwood's novel The Edible Woman (1969) has been analyzed by scholars as a novel, which explores the themes of sexual identity and the struggle of women against society in an attempt to establish an identity for themselves. Christine Watson's novel Tiny Sunbirds Faraway (2011) has been analyzed as a work that depicts the importance of the presence of father and mother in the lives of the members of a family, in particular, and its importance for a consolidated society, in general. A striking notion that is worth analyzing in both novels, however, has not been given any attention, namely, the relationship between the oppression of nature and the oppression of women in the two novels. Though the texts’ settings differ, The Edible Woman’ s context is Canada, whereas the context of Tiny Sunbirds is the Niger Delta area, Nigeria, Africa, both are undergirded by the preservation of nature for the benefit of man and woman. The present study investigates feminist ecological principles in the two novels. It also calls for the preservation and development of nature for the benefit of man within the framework of the joint relations between women and nature, on one hand, and between women and nature and the environment, on the other. The study relies on textual analysis and applies the principles of the environmental feminist critical movement called ecofeminism. Exceeding previous studies’ treatment of feminist ecology within an ideological framework of different orientations with some historical depth, the current study seeks, through the analysis of the two texts under investigation, to put solutions for the future relationship of cooperation between men and women in an ethical context that transcends male domination and prevents women’s oppression. It also seeks to present an ideological critique based on women’s experiences in the field of social production and nature conservation.