Media, Ecology and Conservation

Using the Media to Protect the World's Wildlife and Ecosystems

This book focuses on global connectivity and the role of new digital and traditional media in bringing people together to protect the world's endangered wildlife and conserve fragile and threatened habitats. New media offers opportunities for like-minded individuals, community groups, businesses, and public organizations to learn and work cooperatively for the good of all species. One of the key themes of this book explores the important issue of how new information and communication technologies mediate the natural world and our understanding of our place in it. By exploring the role of film, television, video, photography, and the internet in animal conservation in the United States, India, Africa, Australia, and the United Kingdom John Blewitt investigates the politics of media representation surrounding important controversies such as the trade in bushmeat, whaling, and habitat destruction. The work and achievements of media/conservation activists are located within a cultural framework that simultaneously loves nature, reveres animals but too often ignores the uncomfortable realities of species extinction and animal cruelty.