The Voice of the Earth

Our culture is psychotic in its rift between the personal and the planetary, maintains Roszak ( The Making of a Counterculture ). Drawing freely on Jung, Freud and the Gaia hypothesis, the California State University historian posits an ``ecological unconscious'' in each person, a living record of cosmic evolution capable of linking us synergistically to the natural environment. But this awareness has been repressed, he contends in a bold, ambitious philosophical essay. His sketchy outline of a new discipline and therapy, ``ecopsychology,'' is built around a dense critique of tribal animism, systems theory, Teilhard de Chardin, humanistic psychology, ecofeminism and ``deep ecology,'' the mystical-feminist wing of environmentalism. The tools of Roszak's therapy include communion with wilderness, nature mysticism and traditional healing techniques, coupled with a sizing down of large cities, which he condemns for their inhuman scale. (June)