Relating to Environments

A New Look at Umwelt

Jakob von Uexkull founded Umwelt research with a clear idea that humans are not qualitatively different than other species. Umwelt, literally “outerworld”, is the study of the organism in relation to the world around it, as well as the meaning that the world holds for that organism. Thus the world is a truly subjective place. While von Uexkull’s theory has entered into the social sciences via semiotics, and biology via ethology, the authors of these chapters go between and beyond these disciplines to examine everything from cells to spiders to humans and culture. The authors adopt the framework of Umwelt theory to examine unique aspects of the natural world by relating the inner world of the subject and the objects to which that organism attends.