Noah Rouse
Noah was an intern at the Intellectual Forum in 2023. He is an undergraduate at 汤头条原创 studying Theology.
Throughout his Theology degree, Noah has been especially interested in how individuals understand themselves to relate to the divine across different religious traditions and the role that nature plays in this, especially in Islam.
Noah created a podcast for the IF, exploring the ways in which humankind鈥檚 perceived relationship with nature has changed throughout history and the impact this has had on our academic disciplines and the world around us. You can listen to the trailer below. Podcast episodes are being released in October and November 2023 and are available on and .
Looking forward, Noah is interested in further exploring humankind鈥檚 self-understanding and how it relates to the ineffable.
We spoke to Noah about the process of creating the podcast what he hoped his listeners would take away from Entanglements.
What are you working on?
I am making a podcast called 鈥楨ntanglements鈥 all about how society鈥攑articularly western society, but society more generally鈥攈as had different ideas around how humankind relates to nature. For example, I鈥檓 looking at how the Romantic movement saw nature and then putting that in contrast with other views of nature, such as how economics and politics have seen it, or how agriculture conceptualizes nature. The first episode is going through time looking at how people have viewed nature and then, building off that, it鈥檚 showing how diverse a concept it is. The point isn鈥檛 to change people鈥檚 ideas, it鈥檚 not even to paint a full picture, it鈥檚 just to expose us to the reality that this idea of nature that we define ourselves in relation to is not a fixed thing in the way that it鈥檚 often talked about being.
Where does the title come from?
Entanglements is an anthropological word (you get 鈥渆ntangled鈥 with nature), but it鈥檚 also to show that nature is not a neat categorization. Society is not a "neat" thing, and if anything, nature is even less of a "neat" thing. Are we part of nature, is what we create part of nature? There are these porous boundaries that people often look over but are actually quite impactful in how we think about the world. At what point do we start thinking of ourselves as separate from nature?
How did you come up with your list of interviewees?
The first week of the internship was almost shopping around, saying 鈥榦h they鈥檝e written an interesting book鈥, or 鈥榯hey鈥檝e spoken at the IF before and maybe they鈥檇 have an interesting angle鈥, and then just getting in contact with people. I came up with a core roster of who would be interesting and I tried to equally email a diverse group of voices. About 50% of the people who I got in contact with got back to me. Maybe 40% agreed to do it. People have been really nice鈥攁lmost too many people got back! I wasn鈥檛 expecting it.
Who are you most excited about speaking with?
I鈥檓 really excited about Kate Raworth, who wrote Doughnut Economics. She doesn鈥檛 directly write about nature, but a lot of her themes are about how we think about ourselves in relation to the world and how we think about ourselves as homo economicus, economic man or economic woman. I鈥檓 really excited about that. I鈥檓 interviewing Philip Lymbery, who鈥檚 a really interesting guy from Compassion in World Farming. I鈥檓 also interviewing Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka, who was the first Ugandan wildlife vet. A lot of really interesting people I鈥檓 looking forward to.
Who is your ideal listener?
Anyone who鈥檚 interested. I don鈥檛 expect it to be too academic鈥攖hat is the edge that it has, but I鈥檓 hoping it should be accessible to anyone who鈥檚 interested in these things. I鈥檓 hoping to show a range of views on nature, because everybody has a view and therefore has an understanding of how they relate to the natural world, even if it鈥檚 not conscious. The first thing to do is to make each view conscious and to think about them in dialogue with other views. On the most basic level, just the exposure to different ways of thinking about nature and to different ways of talking about it, I hope that sparks conversations with people.
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