Introduction

In this introductory chapter, we develop naturecultural imagination for grasping the social and ecological aspects of the ongoing environmental emergency. By building on a lineage of naturecultural thought, we propose that analyzing dwelling within the complex web of infrastructures enables us to address the intrinsic embeddedness of humans—even urban dwellers—within the natural environment. We suggest that apocalyptic visions of the world coming to an end are not productive, as they tend to paralyze and alienate. Rather, it is necessary to re-imagine the ordinariness of the everyday life in order to strive for a different future. Turning our attention to infrastructures allows us to address the politics inscribed in the ordinariness of everyday life.