Back to nature or return to nature is a philosophy or style of living which emphasises closeness to nature, rather than artifice and civilisation. In this, the rustic customs and pastoralism of country life are preferred to urban fashion and sophistication. [1] [2] [3] [4]
At the end of the nineteenth century, a variety of back to nature movements developed in Germany which were collectively known as Lebensreform (life reform). These included naturism and naturopathy. [5]
In the history of the United Kingdom and the British Empire, the Victorian era was the reign of Queen Victoria, from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. Slightly different definitions are sometimes used. The era followed the Georgian era and preceded the Edwardian era, and its later half overlaps with the first part of the Belle Époque era of continental Europe.
Asceticism is a lifestyle characterized by abstinence from worldly pleasures, often for the purpose of pursuing spiritual goals. Ascetics may withdraw from the world for their practices or continue to be part of their society, but typically adopt a frugal lifestyle, characterised by the renunciation of material possessions and physical pleasures, and also spend time fasting while concentrating on the practice of religion or reflection upon spiritual matters, which is thought by some to allow the practitioner's core of consciousness to expand and connect with the infinite universal consciousness. Some individuals have also attempted an ascetic lifestyle to free themselves from addictions to things such as alcohol, tobacco, drugs, entertainment, sex, food, etc.
Green anarchism, also known as ecological anarchism or eco-anarchism, is an anarchist school of thought that focuses on ecology and environmental issues. It is an anti-capitalist and anti-authoritarian form of radical environmentalism, which emphasises social organization, freedom and self-fulfillment.
Nature conservation is the moral philosophy and conservation movement focused on protecting species from extinction, maintaining and restoring habitats, enhancing ecosystem services, and protecting biological diversity. A range of values underlie conservation, which can be guided by biocentrism, anthropocentrism, ecocentrism, and sentientism, environmental ideologies that inform ecocultural practices and identities. There has recently been a movement towards evidence-based conservation which calls for greater use of scientific evidence to improve the effectiveness of conservation efforts. As of 2018 15% of land and 7.3% of the oceans were protected. Many environmentalists set a target of protecting 30% of land and marine territory by 2030. In 2021, 16.64% of land and 7.9% of the oceans were protected. The 2022 IPCC report on climate impacts and adaptation, underlines the need to conserve 30% to 50% of the Earth's land, freshwater and ocean areas – echoing the 30% goal of the U.N.'s Convention on Biodiversity.
The Jesus movement was an evangelical Christian movement that began on the West Coast of the United States in the late 1960s and early 1970s and primarily spread throughout North America, Europe, Central America, Australia and New Zealand, before it subsided in the late 1980s. Members of the movement were called Jesus people or Jesus freaks.
Lifestyle is the interests, opinions, behaviours, and behavioural orientations of an individual, group, or culture. The term was introduced by Austrian psychologist Alfred Adler in his 1929 book, The Case of Miss R., with the meaning of "a person's basic character as established early in childhood". The broader sense of lifestyle as a "way or style of living" has been documented since 1961. Lifestyle is a combination of determining intangible or tangible factors. Tangible factors relate specifically to demographic variables, i.e. an individual's demographic profile, whereas intangible factors concern the psychological aspects of an individual such as personal values, preferences, and outlooks.
The pastoral genre of literature, art, or music depicts an idealised form of the shepherd's lifestyle – herding livestock around open areas of land according to the seasons and the changing availability of water and pasture. The target audience is typically an urban one. A pastoral is a work of this genre. A piece of music in the genre is usually referred to as a pastorale.
Simple living refers to practices that promote simplicity in one's lifestyle. Common practices of simple living include reducing the number of possessions one owns, depending less on technology and services, and spending less money. In addition to such external changes, simple living also reflects a person's mindset and values. Simple living practices can be seen in history, religion, art, and economics.
Sylvester Graham was an American Presbyterian minister and dietary reformer known for his emphasis on vegetarianism, the temperance movement, and eating whole-grain bread. His preaching inspired the graham flour, graham bread, and graham cracker products. Graham is often referred to as the "Father of Vegetarianism" in the United States of America.
Ernest William Callenbach was an American author, film critic, editor, and simple living adherent. He became famous due to his 1975 utopian novel Ecotopia.
A back-to-the-land movement is any of various agrarian movements across different historical periods. The common thread is a call for people to take up smallholding and to grow food from the land with an emphasis on a greater degree of self-sufficiency, autonomy, and local community than found in a prevailing industrial or postindustrial way of life. There have been a variety of motives behind such movements, such as social reform, land reform, and civilian war efforts. Groups involved have included political reformers, counterculture hippies, and religious separatists.
In social behavior, downshifting is a trend where individuals adopt simpler lives from what critics call the "rat race".
Bohemianism is a social and cultural movement that has, at its core, a way of life away from society's conventional norms and expectations. The term originates from the French bohème and spread to the English-speaking world. It was used to describe mid-19th-century non-traditional lifestyles, especially of artists, writers, journalists, musicians, and actors in major European cities.
An intentional community is a voluntary residential community which is designed to have a high degree of social cohesion and teamwork. The members of an intentional community typically hold a common social, political, religious, or spiritual vision, and typically share responsibilities and property. This way of life is sometimes characterized as an "alternative lifestyle". Intentional communities can be seen as social experiments or communal experiments. The multitude of intentional communities includes collective households, cohousing communities, coliving, ecovillages, monasteries, survivalist retreats, kibbutzim, Hutterites, ashrams, and housing cooperatives.
The Social Gospel is a social movement within Protestantism that aims to apply Christian ethics to social problems, especially issues of social justice such as economic inequality, poverty, alcoholism, crime, racial tensions, slums, unclean environment, child labor, lack of unionization, poor schools, and the dangers of war. It was most prominent in the early 20th-century United States and Canada. Theologically, advocates of the movement sought to put into practice the Lord's Prayer : "Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven". They typically were postmillennialist; that is, they believed the Second Coming could not happen until humankind rid itself of social evils by human effort. The Social Gospel was more popular among clergy than laity. Its leaders were predominantly associated with the liberal wing of the progressive movement and most were theologically liberal, although a few were also conservative when it came to their views on social issues. Important leaders included Richard T. Ely, Josiah Strong, Washington Gladden, and Walter Rauschenbusch.
English Dissenters or English Separatists were Protestants who separated from the Church of England in the 17th and 18th centuries. A dissenter is one who disagrees in opinion, belief and other matters. English Dissenters opposed state interference in religious matters and founded their own churches, educational establishments and communities.
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 ideas.
Anarcho-naturism, also referred to as anarchist naturism and naturist anarchism, appeared in the late 19th century as the union of anarchist and naturist philosophies. In many of the alternative communities established in Britain in the early 1900s, "nudism, anarchism, vegetarianism and free love were accepted as part of a politically radical way of life". In the 1920s, the inhabitants of the anarchist community at Whiteway, near Stroud in Gloucestershire, "shocked the conservative residents of the area with their shameless nudity". Mainly, it had importance within individualist anarchist circles in Spain, France, Portugal and Cuba.
Lebensreform is the German generic term for various social reform movements that started since the mid-19th century and originated especially in the German Empire and later in Switzerland. Common features were the criticism of industrialisation, materialism and urbanization combined with striving for the state of nature. Common practices included vegetarism, naturopathy, naturism, gymnastics and expressionist dance. The various movements did not have an overarching organization, but there were numerous associations.
The country life movement was an early 20th century American social movement which sought to improve the living conditions of America's rural residents. The movement focused on preserving traditional rural lifestyles while addressing poor living conditions and social problems within rural communities. Despite the movement's rural focus, many of its adherents were urbanites who sought to bring progressive changes and technological improvements to rural areas. The main goal was to improve education, with the professionally-run consolidated school replacing the many family-run one-room schools. The movement had little success in changing rural ways of life; its principal successes were the promotion of agricultural extension programs and the development of national organizations to improve rural living.
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