Environmental geography has experienced a renaissance in recent years. This survey course introduces students to current debates, key conceptual approaches, and outstanding recent research within human geography, focusing on political ecology. Specifically, we will explore the ways in which political ecology has been challenged and “othered” in various ways, particularly given the fact that the both the “material turn” and the “cultural turn” have destabilized concepts like “environment” and “nature”–with significant consequences for political ecologists. Topics to be covered include: environmental racism; social construction of nature; animal geographies; and posthumanism and biopolitics.