Insects and sustainability: examining the portrayal of insects in Malaysian English language newspapers through the posthumanist perspective
Keywords:
Insects, Malaysian news portals, Posthumanism, Anthropocene, human-insect relationshipsAbstract
Emerging decades ago, posthumanism now spans fields from science to the humanities. Traditionally, posthumanism places an emphasis on the relationships between human and technology but it has been expanded well beyond its incipient phase by pervading into the space of biodiversity and the Anthropocene. When insects are inserted into the equation, it enriches the discourse of posthumanism in relation to anthropogenic aspects and impacts on humans. Given the scarcity surrounding the discussion of insects in the field of the humanities, this study examines the portrayal of insects in selected Malaysian news articles with regard to their three pertinent roles to the ecosystem; sustainers, equalizers and destroyers. Examined alongside the concept of posthumanism, this study argues that the existence of insects has been unjustly overlooked in the Malaysian context. Correspondingly, Malaysian news articles are playing an instrumental role in highlighting both their importance and destructiveness to their surrounding as a way to challenge the anthropogenic worldviews that human’s dominance remains unchallenged so far. Highlighting the complex human-insect relationships challenges human-centric views and offers new insights, urging us to reconsider our coexistence with often-exploited insects in Malaysian media.
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