Title: The most hated tree in America: negative difference, the White imaginary, and the Bradford pear
Summary: Ryan Neville-Shepard and Casey Kelly argue that the calls to exterminate the infamous Bradford pear tree across the US function as a kind of nanoracism, or what Achilles Mbembe defines as the organisation of everyday affairs according to us–them logics which justify overt racist practices. Drawing also from Chávez, the authors point out that people characterise plant species as “foreign” and “invasive” in the same way that racist discourses characterise immigrants and racial minorities as “unwelcome”. The authors suggest race and borders have evolved as the ultimate and definitive system for comprehending and managing difference. As such, race and invasiveness are a rhetorical resource that supports a broader culture of hate, enmity, and violence towards unwanted people who depend on nature. Performing a close reading of the discourse about the so called 'invasive' tree, the paper shows how xenophobia and anti-Blackness lurk in the discourse about non-human biota, normalising racist language that attacks difference, expressing fears of racial impurity, and calling for exterminating the Other. The ritual of identifying invaders and calling for death replicates racial schemas that lead to violence against racial others. Referencing the recent White replacement fears of Republicans in the US, the authors suggest an anti-Black ideology has been lurking in public discourse on invasive species for much longer, building racist hatred into mundane conversations after such beliefs were considered antiquated. The rhetoric against the Bradford pear asks audiences to take a stand, to defend borders for the sake of 'purity', and participate in the construction of a biodiversity where outsiders are seen as a threat to a White dominance. [Ryan Neville-Shepard , Casey Ryan Kelly (2023). The most hated tree in America: negative difference, the White imaginary, and the Bradford pear, Communication, Culture and Critique. https://doi.org/10.1093/ccc/tcad005]
Keywords: anti-Blackness, environmental rhetoric, post-racialism, race, White supremacy
