The Possibilities of Nature in a Postmodern Age: The Rhetorical Tactics of Environmental Justice Groups

Abstract

Mourners trudge up the steps to the imposing Kentucky state capitol. The men, in particular, are dressed in the uniforms of ordinary folk—cowboy hats and overalls or baseball caps, jeans, and polyester shirts. Six pallbearers carry a wooden coffin draped with a Kentucky state flag. To the haunting strains of “Wayfaring Stranger,” they lay the coffin down in the rotunda. A woman in black delivers a eulogy, decrying that “The burial of Kentucky in waste can be witnessed continually and perpetually.”