Volume V Special Issue IV October 2025

Name of Author : Rituraj Anand, Adyasha Anindita

Title of the paper : Ecological Lamentation and Collective Memory in Selected Flood Poetics on Uttarakhand

Abstract: Human societies are increasingly facing ecocrisis, and poetry has emerged as a medium for articulating environmental sorrow and safeguarding collective memory. This paper analyses three flood poems from Uttarakhand Ruskin Bonds Dirge for Dehradun, Prasoon Joshis Beh Gaye, and Neha Sens A Call to Uttarakhand to investigate the intersection of ecological lamentation and collective memory in contemporary disaster poetics. Ecocriticism Glotfelty, 1996 is employed to examine the ways in which these poems contest anthropogenic environmental degradation. Trauma studies Caruth, 1996 elucidate the recurrent depiction of loss and psychological disintegration embedded in flood imagery. Cultural memory theory Halbwachs, 1992 is utilised to illustrate the transformation of individual grief into collective remembrance. Lastly, Anthropocene and environmental justice frameworks Chakrabarty, 2009 are used to put these poems in the context of bigger conversations about development, the climate crisis, and human responsibility. The study posits that these poems transcend mere mourning they serve as moral testaments advocating for remembrance and ethical responsibility.

Keywords : Ecocriticism, Flood Literature, Uttarakhand, Trauma, Memory

DOI :

Page Number : 257-265