Abstract
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In Wild Dog Dreaming, published in 2011, Deborah Bird Rose writes about ‘Anthropogenic
extinction’ as ‘a fact of death that is growing exponentially.’2 She notes that ‘we are entering
an era of loss of life unprecedented in human history’ and states that ‘[t]he question,
of course, is: if we humans are the cause, can we change ourselves enough to change our
impacts?’ (2) Rose moves on to quote Michael Soulé’s observation that ‘[p]eople save what
they love’, and asks with him, ‘[a]re humans capable of loving, and therefore of caring for,
the animals and plants that are currently losing their lives in a growing cascade of extinctions?’
She follows this question up with another, more imperative one, ‘[h]ow [are we] to
invigorate love and action in ways that are generous, knowledgeable, and life-affirming?’
(2) In interview three years later, Rose reiterates this view, urging her audience to take this
moment, this challenge of the Anthropocene, ‘to enhance our capacity for love, for care,
for keeping faith with earth, keeping faith with life.’3