#20 Beloved beasts and the preservation of possibility with Michelle Nijhuis

On today’s podcast, we are speaking with journalist and author Michelle Nijhuis about her beautiful new book, “Beloved Beasts: Fighting for life in an age of extinction”. The book traces the conservation movement’s history from the late nineteenth century to today and explores the evolving science and philosophy of conservation and the major milestones along the way. But it also shines a light on the dark side of the movement, including elements of racism, colonialism and elitism. In our chat with Michelle, we talked about her inspiration for the book and asked her to reflect on the legacies of key figures in conservation, such as Rachel Carson and Michael Soulé. With the accelerating climate crisis, the book ends by encouraging solidarity and compassion among conservationists and environmentalists, recognizing that the survival of our own species is inextricably intertwined with the survival of others. There was so much that we wanted to talk to Michelle about, but didn’t get to. We highly recommend that you check out the book for yourselves, but in the meantime, we hope you enjoy our conversation. https://michellenijhuis.com/