The Fragile, Vibrant Earth: Ecological Posthumanism in Samantha Harvey's Orbital

Abstract

Ecological posthumanism is a way of thinking that asks us to stop treating humans as the center of everything and start seeing ourselves as one participant among many in a deeply interconnected ecological world. In Samantha Harvey's Orbital (2023), ecological posthumanism is not just a theme-it's the structuring consciousness of the novel. The book imagines life from the vantage point of astronauts circling Earth, and that allows Harvey to radically decenter the human and foreground a planetary, more-than human perspective. From orbit, Earth is not divided by nations, borders, or identities. It appears as a single, fragile, breathing entity. Human concerns- politics, conflicts, personal histories-shrink in scale. The astronauts themselves become almost posthuman figures-bodies sustained by machines, oxygen systems, gravity-defying technology- blurred boundaries between human, machine, and environment. Harvey repeatedly describes the earth as not static but active and dynamic, making the novel a reflection of examples of ecological posthumanism.