Paul Howe Shepard, Jr. (June 12, 1925 – July 27, 1996) was an American

environmentalist Environmentalism is a broad Philosophy of life, philosophy, ideology, and social movement about supporting life, habitats, and surroundings. While environmentalism focuses more on the environmental and nature-related aspects of Green politics, g ...

and author best known for introducing the "

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( ; referred to colloquially as the ''ice age, Ice Age'') is the geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fin ...

paradigm In science and philosophy, a paradigm ( ) is a distinct set of concepts or thought patterns, including theories, research methods, postulates, and standards for what constitute legitimate contributions to a field. The word ''paradigm'' is Ancient ...

" to

deep ecology Deep ecology is an environmental philosophy that promotes the inherent worth of all living beings regardless of their instrumental utility to human needs, and argues that modern human societies should be restructured in accordance with such idea ...

. His works established a normative framework in terms of

evolution Evolution is the change in the heritable Phenotypic trait, characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. It occurs when evolutionary processes such as natural selection and genetic drift act on genetic variation, re ...

ary theory and

developmental psychology Developmental psychology is the scientific study of how and why humans grow, change, and adapt across the course of their lives. Originally concerned with infants and children, the field has expanded to include adolescence, adult development ...

. He offered a critique of sedentism/

civilization A civilization (also spelled civilisation in British English) is any complex society characterized by the development of state (polity), the state, social stratification, urban area, urbanization, and symbolic systems of communication beyon ...

and advocates modeling human lifestyles on those of nomadic prehistoric humans. He explored the connections between

domestication Domestication is a multi-generational Mutualism (biology), mutualistic relationship in which an animal species, such as humans or leafcutter ants, takes over control and care of another species, such as sheep or fungi, to obtain from them a st ...

language Language is a structured system of communication that consists of grammar and vocabulary. It is the primary means by which humans convey meaning, both in spoken and signed language, signed forms, and may also be conveyed through writing syste ...

, and

cognition Cognition is the "mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses". It encompasses all aspects of intellectual functions and processes such as: perception, attention, thought, ...

Early life and education

Shepard was born in

Kansas City The Kansas City metropolitan area is a bi-state metropolitan area anchored by Kansas City, Missouri. Its 14 counties straddle the border between the U.S. states of Missouri (9 counties) and Kansas (5 counties). With and a population of more t ...

and earned his

bachelor's degree A bachelor's degree (from Medieval Latin ''baccalaureus'') or baccalaureate (from Modern Latin ''baccalaureatus'') is an undergraduate degree awarded by colleges and universities upon completion of a course of study lasting three to six years ...

from the

University of Missouri The University of Missouri (Mizzou or MU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Columbia, Missouri, United States. It is Missouri's largest university and the flagship of the four-campus Univers ...

. He went on to earn a

doctorate A doctorate (from Latin ''doctor'', meaning "teacher") or doctoral degree is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities and some other educational institutions, derived from the ancient formalism '' licentia docendi'' ("licence to teach ...

from

Yale Yale University is a private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, and one of the nine colonial colleges ch ...

, and his 1967 book ''Man in the Landscape: a Historic View of the Esthetics of Nature'' was based on his thesis. From 1973 until his retirement in 1994 he taught at

Pitzer College Pitzer College is a private liberal arts college in Claremont, California. It was founded in 1963 as a women's college in the Claremont Colleges consortium and became coeducational in 1970. Pitzer enrolls approximately 1000 students. Pitzer off ...

and

Claremont Graduate University The Claremont Graduate University (CGU) is a private, all-graduate research university in Claremont, California, United States. Founded in 1925, CGU is a member of the Claremont Colleges consortium which includes five undergraduate and two grad ...

Career

He taught biology at Knox College and established the school's Green Oaks Biological Field Station with George Ward.

Legacy

Shepard's books have become landmark texts among

ecologist Ecology () is the natural science of the relationships among living organisms and their environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community, ecosystem, and biosphere levels. Ecology overlaps with the closely re ...

s and helped pave the way for the modern

primitivist In the arts of the Western world, Primitivism is a mode of aesthetic idealization that means to recreate the experience of ''the primitive'' time, place, and person, either by emulation or by re-creation. In Western philosophy, Primitivism propo ...

train of thought, the essential elements being that "

" itself runs counter to

human nature Human nature comprises the fundamental dispositions and characteristics—including ways of Thought, thinking, feeling, and agency (philosophy), acting—that humans are said to have nature (philosophy), naturally. The term is often used to denote ...

- that human nature is a

consciousness Consciousness, at its simplest, is awareness of a state or object, either internal to oneself or in one's external environment. However, its nature has led to millennia of analyses, explanations, and debate among philosophers, scientists, an ...

shaped by our evolution and our environment. We are, essentially, "beings of the

Paleolithic The Paleolithic or Palaeolithic ( years ago) ( ), also called the Old Stone Age (), is a period in human prehistory that is distinguished by the original development of stone tools, and which represents almost the entire period of human prehist ...

". Based on his early study of modern ethnographic literature examining contemporary nature-based peoples, Shepard created a developmental model for understanding the role of sustained contact with nature in healthy human psychological development, positing that humans, having spent 99% of their social history in hunting and gathering environments, are therefore evolutionarily dependent on nature for proper emotional and psychological growth and development. Drawing from ideas of

neoteny Neoteny (), also called juvenilization,Montagu, A. (1989). Growing Young. Bergin & Garvey: CT. is the delaying or slowing of the Physiology, physiological, or Somatic (biology), somatic, development of an organism, typically an animal. Neoteny i ...

, Shepard postulated that many humans in post-agricultural society are often not fully mature, but are trapped in infantilism or an adolescent state. He died of

lung cancer Lung cancer, also known as lung carcinoma, is a malignant tumor that begins in the lung. Lung cancer is caused by genetic damage to the DNA of cells in the airways, often caused by cigarette smoking or inhaling damaging chemicals. Damaged ...

on July 21, 1996, in Salt Lake City.Pace, Eric. "Paul Shepard Professor and Author, 71". Obituary in ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'', July 22, 1996, page A15 Some of his most influential books are ''The Tender Carnivore and the Sacred Game'', ''Nature and Madness'', ''Coming Home to the Pleistocene'', ''Where we Belong'', and ''the Others''.

Selected works

*''Man in the Landscape: An Historic View of the Esthetics of Nature''. New York: Knopf, 1967. *''The Subversive Science: Essays Toward an Ecology of Man''. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1969. *''Environ/mental: Essays on the Planet as Home''. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1971. *''The Tender Carnivore and the Sacred Game''. New York: Scribners, 1973. *''Thinking Animals: Animals and the Development of Human Intelligence''. New York: The Viking Press, 1978. *''The Sacred Paw: The Bear in Nature, Myth, and Literature'' New York: The Viking Press, 1985. Coauthored with

Barry Sanders Barry Sanders (born July 16, 1968) is an American former professional football running back who played for the Detroit Lions of the National Football League (NFL) for 10 seasons. Sanders led the league in rushing yards four times and in rushin ...

*''Nature and Madness''. San Francisco:

Sierra Club Books Sierra Club Books was the publishing division, for both adults and children, of the Sierra Club, founded in by then club President David Brower. They were a United States publishing company located in San Francisco, California with a concentrat ...

, 1992. ''Natura e follia'', a cura di Dominique Lestel, traduzione di Francesca Frulla, Edizioni degli animali, Milano 2020 (Italian translation). *''The Only World We've Got: A Paul Shepard Reader''. San Francisco: Sierra Club Books, 1996. *''The Others: How Animals Made Us Human''. Washington, D. C.: Island Press/Shearwater Books, 1996. *''Traces of an Omnivore''. Washington, D. C.: Island Press/Shearwater Books, 1996. *''Coming Home to the Pleistocene'' Florence R. Shepard (Ed.) Washington D.C.: Island Press/Shearwater Books, 1998. *''Encounters With Nature: Essays by Paul Shepard''. Florence R. Shepard (Ed.) Washington, D.C: Island Press/Shearwater Books, 1999.

References

External links

Paul Shepard Papers.
Manuscripts and Archives, Yale University Library. {{DEFAULTSORT:Shepard, Paul 1925 births 1996 deaths American ecologists American non-fiction environmental writers Deaths from lung cancer in the United States Human ecologists Deaths from cancer in Utah