Carolyn Merchant

Carolyn Merchant is Distinguished Professor Emerita at UC Berkeley, specializing in environmental history, philosophy, and ethics. Her landmark book The Death of Nature (1980) revolutionized understanding of the Scientific Revolution's environmental and gender implications. She examines Western culture's evolving relationship with nature through works like Reinventing Eden and The Anthropocene and the Humanities.

Merchant's research connects environmental change with social justice, analyzing how mechanistic worldviews shaped exploitation narratives. Her interdisciplinary approach spans history of science, ethics, and policy, influencing environmental thought globally. She has received the MacArthur 'genius' grant and the ASEH's highest honors.

Major Honors

• MacArthur Fellow (1985)
• American Society for Environmental History Distinguished Scholar (2010)
• ASEH Distinguished Service Award (2017)