Nature and the Individual

The two panels I attended include Dear Reader and Part of Your World.  I will discuss the latter for the purpose of this blog post.

The Part of Your World panel examined the effects of environment upon individuals. The five papers presented analyzed the role of environment--urban, semi-urban, and rural--on the main characters. While nature was a constant theme in this panel, at the end of the panel I realized that this panel revealed the age old idea of nature vs nurture; specifically, whether man is a product of his surroundings and his learned traits, or if genetic predisposition and innate qualities control man. This panel lends insight into the dominance of nature over nurture, since almost all of papers argue that environment shapes individuals and their actions and behavior.

I found Sarah Collins’ paper, “Take a Walk on the Wild Side: The Battle of the ‘Id’ in Nature,” interesting in regards to this debate because she uses Freud as a lens to explain the primitive urges of four men while they travel through nature, further distancing themselves from civilization. As the men move further from structure and order, they become more violent and sexual. Her paper reveals that both nature and nurture are responsible for the men’s transformations; innate and primal qualities are suppressed in the men until their environment changes to foster these urges.

-Nim