War Against Ourselves. Jacklyn Cock
a rock tunnel that symbolised their rebirth as transformed individuals. These activities were part of a programme of ‘ecotherapy’, which is rooted in the notion of nature as a healer.
This notion is included in the ‘mapping exercise’ this chapter attempts. It is what Haraway has called ‘a travelogue through mindscapes and landscapes of what may count as nature’ (Haraway, 1992: 295). Nature, as Williams has suggested, is ‘perhaps the most complex word in the (English) language’ (Williams, 1980: 69). It is a dense social concept, a sort of keyword whose meanings are always unstable and contested. It is often invoked as a singular, undifferentiated entity: an entity with intrinsic powers that speaks with a single voice (Soper, 1995). But there is no consensus on how to understand and value nature. Different cultures, and individuals within them, have constructed different meanings and purposes for nature, which are embedded in a complex set of beliefs, practices and values. Nature is variously seen as a locus of resources; a site of biodiversity; a source of identity; a repository of spiritual values; an object of state regulation and control; a site of alternative visions of development; the embodiment of various institutions, practices and traditions; a social construct; a site of struggle; a means of healing and personal liberation; and so on. To make the point more concretely, the same stand of trees may be valued by conservationists as a store of biological diversity, by commercial foresters as a block of exportable tropical hardwood, by ornithologists as the habitat of a rare species, or by believers as a sacred grove containing great spiritual power. But in all these perspectives, nature exists ‘out there’, beyond human actions.
Nature is often understood as human experience of wilderness, an experience grounded in an activity such as hiking in a rural area, or staring out of the car window at animals in a national park, or jogging on the beach, or travelling to see the spring flowers in Namaqualand. The experience is limited in time to a few holiday days or hours; it is time apart in a place quite separate from ‘real’ life, grounded in an appreciation of the power of nature as a healing force.
NATURE AS A HEALING FORCE
For Rachel Carson, whose notion of a ‘web of life’, a matrix of soil, water, air and living creatures, is at the centre of this book, nature was a healing presence, a presence where people could find calmness, courage and reassurance. She wrote:
Those who dwell, as scientists or laymen, among the beauties or mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life. Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. There is symbolic as well as actual beauty in the migration of birds, the ebb and flow of tides, the folded bud ready for spring. There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature — the assurance that dawn comes after the night and spring after the winter (Carson, cited in Hynes, 1989: 59).
In a 1954 talk, Carson spoke of how ‘the pleasures, the values of contact with the natural world’ are ‘available to anyone who will place himself under the influence of a lonely mountain top — or the sea — or the stillness of a forest; or who will stop to think about so small a thing as the mystery of a growing seed’ (cited in Lear, 1998: 160).
This notion of nature as a healing force was explained to me by National Peace Accord Trust (NPAT) worker Maggie Seiler.1 This force is harnessed in ecotherapy, a social programme which, as she puts it,
uses local wilderness experiences to increase psychological awareness and to bring about healing. Group processes, individual reflection, symbols and rituals are used in a wilderness setting in order to heighten people’s awareness of the connection between each other, themselves and the natural environment.
Over lunch in a Johannesburg coffee bar, she described how healing communities and building stability is the major focus of the NPAT. Its aim is ‘to aid transformation in South Africa and break the cycles of violence, trauma, apathy and despair’ through facilitating community-based networks and running ecotherapy programmes. Nature is used to set in motion a process that supports individuals’ attempts to confront their past experience and their current problems. Ecotherapy programmes take people out of their everyday environment and provide them with opportunities for psychological shifts and changes in behaviour. The therapy is designed to help people find balance, direction and healing in their lives by strengthening their relationship with nature.
One of the ways in which they try to achieve this is through the notion of ‘risk’:
The physical terrain along the journey into the wilderness presents a number of challenges and risks. To complete the journey trail participants have to negotiate steep mountain slopes, rivers or ravines. They have to face danger, confront their fears of heights, or snakes or simply intense physical exercise and simultaneously understand their own limitations in order to set appropriate boundaries (Abrahams, 2006: 5).
These and other experiences, such as solitary periods of reflection, are aimed at building insight, self-reliance, trust and compassion for others.
In 2006 the NPAT took 1 800 people through its programme. These were all people who had experienced the dehumanising effects of violence and trauma. According to Seiler, ‘rehabilitation required the restoration of community values and trust …. Healing starts with a personal healing journey. Ecotherapy wilderness trails aid the process.’ While the NPAT focused on the Drakensberg initially, it now uses a beautiful wilderness site in the Magaliesberg for militarised youth from Gauteng. Seiler described how a group of ex-combatants arrived at Matlapeng ‘full of hatred and anger’, with a ‘sense of abandonment’ and strong feeling that their sacrifices had ‘not been acknowledged’. She described them as ‘heavily involved in violent crime. These are the people who are undermining our democracy. They talk about “the coup” after 2010 and look to Jacob Zuma to give them what they want.’ The objective of the ecotherapy process was to
reduce blame of external factors and shift the locus of responsibility inwards. By doing this, the individual increases the personal sense of power and opens up other resolutions to the situation in which the individual takes responsibility for changing his/her situation, rather than waiting for something or someone external to save him/her.
Four days in the wilderness include powerful experiences such as a long climb up a mountain and a ‘solo fast process in which all distractions are removed from the individual: other people, food, familiar surroundings and daily conveniences.’ After the solo fast, the ex-combatants ‘cleanse themselves of all the toxic material that has surfaced’ through ‘the purificiation process of the sweat hut.’ Participants describe these as ‘a life changing process’: ‘I’m awake now, I see what I must do. I feel powerful, I can change my life and I’m not waiting anymore. It’s my responsibility to change things.’ Seiler speaks movingly of how this ‘connecting to nature’ results in ‘major personal transformation’. Long-term research into the effects of NPAT interventions over a three-year period confirm this view.
Another agency, Educo, aims through encounters with wild nature to rekindle integrity and fundamental life values. Programmes are held in pristine wilderness areas, offering opportunities for both action learning and the enchancement of emotional and spiritual awareness. Solitary time in the wilderness, journal writing and personal storytelling are used to deepen self-understanding. In 1997 Educo Africa launched its Youth at Risk Programme reaching out specifically to youth who have been severely marginalised and disempowered by chronic familial and societal trauma and deprivation. It claims that wilderness encounters are a positive method of addressing these youths’ problems.
Educo programmes are based on what the organisation calls ‘the circle of courage’. Components are
the spirit of belonging (building a sense of community and creating a shared context for acceptable behaviour); the spirit of mastery (using challenging activities such as rock climbing, abseiling, wilderness survival skills); the spirit of independence (fostering self-reliance in a non-institutionalised setting, hiking and sleeping out in nature); and the spirit of generosity (looking out for one another’s well being, peer support and encouragement and involvement in a local service project) (Gamble and Roberts, 1998: 16).
According to Roberts, people can ‘learn sharing and co-operation through hiking in wild and beautiful country.