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Paper short abstract

This paper will explore how locals on the Isles of Lewis and Harris experience and respond to environmental changes and island industrialization projects through engaging in conservation projects, nature education, and community building.

Paper long abstract

In the Outer Hebrides, tensions over land-use often arise over questions of how to use previous crofting lands (e.g. for tourism or renewed crofting), and how to manage the nearby sea, either by creating protected zones, increasing fishing, or using the space for more renewable energy production. To better understand these tensions, it is critical to investigate the different motivations for these various types of land-use and how they connect to both the commodification and care of natural and cultural heritage. Based on ethnographic fieldwork on conservation, language revitalization, and tourism in the Outer Hebrides, I argue that what motivates commodification and care in this context is a commitment to maintaining a sense of “authenticity,”—though notions of what actually constitutes 'authenticity' vary. I focus in particular on the problem of 'double binds' (Eriksen 2016) and pervasiveness of market environmentalism, both of which make it difficult for development and conservation to avoid the problematic entwinement of commodification and care of nature and culture. Further, I examine the role of stories and local histories of natural and cultural heritage used collectively by people to cope with environmental and economic changes as a community. I show that through these stories and histories, which capture but also perform the authentic, we can illuminate the complex ties and contradictions between sustainability and economic growth, and the ways both are framed as continuous with the authentic environmental and cultural heritage of the region.