Forms of grief and loss in ecological grief

My major work from last year, a more in-depth application of grief theory into ecological grief, has now been published: 

Pihkala, Panu. 2024. “Ecological Sorrow: Types of Grief and Loss in Ecological Grief.” Sustainability 16 (2): 849. https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/16/2/849

A Table of Contents is available here:

https://www.academia.edu/109236363/Ecological_sorrow_Types_of_grief_and_loss_in_ecological_grief_TOC_

 

Some may ask: why is the article so long, 35 pages? I did not want to split it into two or three different articles, because I argue that it’s elementary to observe the intricate connections between many kinds of loss and grief. I wanted to create a broad-ranging frame about ecological loss and grief. Sometimes progressive rock bands do double albums, and this is probably the longest one I’ll ever make.

 

The article does several things:

 

a) it promotes and extends the pioneering categorizations of Randall (2009) and Cunsolo & Ellis (2018), exploring more nuance on the basis of recent grief research. This includes more in-depth discussion of intangible loss, anticipatory grief/mourning, disenfranchised grief, and ambiguous loss.

 

b) it introduces several frameworks and concepts from grief theory for the first time into ecological grief. These are Nonfinite loss and Chronic sorrow.

 

c) possible complicated or prolonged forms of ecological grief are discussed in more nuance. The article proposes four categories of these, including “inhibited ecological grief” (seems absent while there would be a good reason for it to be there, even though people grieve differently). This should be helpful also for continuing discussions about healthcare and ecological grief.

 

d) it proposes a couple of new terms and frameworks to capture specifics of ecological grief (section 4.1., “Special forms of ecological loss and grief”). These are:

 

- Transitional loss and grief.

This concept extends Randall’s “transitional loss” and points out that there can be both loss and grief, which happen over a period of time. Ecological grief emerges as often combining past losses, ongoing losses, and predicted losses.

 

- Lifeworld loss.

A concept which aims to give recognition to how comprehensive some ecological changes and losses are, for example for indigenous peoples. In Figure 1, Interlapping dimensions of lifeworld loss, “interspecies lifeworlds” are also shown, pointing out that it’s not only about humans.

 

- Shattered dreams.

A profound form of intangible loss, and affects for example young people in relation to climate change (especially in the most vulnerable locations).

 

Some of the advantages of the results:

 

- intangible loss:

encourages people to discern that there can be numerous intangible aspects in ecological losses (such as loss of identity), and that for example young people often feel many “invisible”, intangible losses because of ecological crisis, such as loss of future plans/dreams.

 

- ambiguous loss:

the article, seemingly for the first time in relation to ecological loss and grief, probes the other type of ambiguous loss as coined by grief scholar Pauline Boss: physical presence but psychological absence. In grief research, a classic example is a relative with dementia. They are there, but something elementary about their essence is gone at the same time, or gone most of the time. In the article, I’m proposing that something similar happens regularly with ecological loss: for example, a forest without birdsong is physically there, but something elementary about its foresthood is now gone, and it’s difficult to know whether the birds will return or not.

 

- temporalities:

helps to resist one-sided interpretations of anticipatory grief: ecological grief includes many temporalities, and anticipatory mourning can be either constructive or excessive (in the case of which it resembles catastrophizing).

 

- connections between anxiety and grief:

these have been probed before in many of my research articles (such as the ProcessModel), but certain grief frameworks such as nonfinite loss and chronic sorrow help to understand these dynamics even more. The lists of characteristics of nonfinite loss and chronic sorrow are strikingly familiar for those who personally know eco-anxiety and grief.

 

Future work based on the article:

 

There are many possibilities, but I’ll mention just three which are on my table.

 

First, I’m currently writing an application of the results into loss and grief about non-human animals, together with philosopher Elisa Aaltola; while that topic is present in the current article, it needs nuanced attention. For example, many young people experience shattered assumptions and moral injury when they realize the extent of factory farming and animal suffering.

 

Second, we’re planning a follow-up article with my podcast co-host Thomas Doherty about coping with these various types of loss and grief.

 

Thirdly, we’re thinking with the Climate Mental Health Network about how to apply this into practice especially in relation to climate sorrow.

 

I hope that the article will be useful for you, Dear Reader, and if the text is long, the Graphic Abstract mentions key contents.

 

Helsinki, 12^th Feb 2024