The "Environmental Uncanny": Unsettling the Multispecies Encounter in Contemporary Environmental Poetry

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Both within and outside literature, encounters with other-than-human life are often framed through aseries of assumptions, excluding many forms of life that are nonetheless essential, from bacteria to plantlife. Using Amitav Ghosh's concept of the "environmental uncanny" as a springboard, I will examine howa range of contemporary poetry approaches neglected organisms by using elements of the uncanny todisrupt these expectations, from Christian Bök to dg nanouk okpik. I will employ perspectives from darkecology and multispecies studies to delve into uncanny ecological entanglements. My PhD will exploretexts which problematise our assumptions about nonhuman life, responding to the alterity ofinvertebrates, the plurality of insect communities, and the facelessness of plant life. I will then turntowards the uncomfortable intimacies of parasites and bacteria, before examining entangled ecosystemsthat can offer a path to hope, if we confront our role within webs of social and ecological harm.