We all experience parenthood, if not as parents, then by way of having been parented or, in the face of ubiquitous images of idyllic family life, in the longing to be parents or to be parented. Thus, parenthood is one of the most powerful social constructs. This collection of essays gives evidence of the fact that families have never been "real;" that family, like gender or race, is not primarily based on biological criteria, but, above all, has to be performed and is a result of narratives. The relationship between these narratives - their variations in Irish, English, German, Mexican, and Chilean literature or film - and their material confinement is at the core of the essays gathered in this book. (Series: Cultural Studies / Kulturwissenschaft / Estudios Culturales / Etudes Culturelles - Vol. 40)

Since storytelling began, narratives of getting lost in the woods or of choosing to live in the heterotopian space of the woods have remained popular and are, at the time of writing, experiencing a new revival. The theory of ecopsychology supplies a productive paradigm for understanding mental well-being in a cultural landscape suffused with reimaginings of nature as 'unspoiled wilderness'. The eco-psychopathologies presented in the essays in this volume range in origin from medieval literature to contemporary films and online games. The classic romantic or gothic trope of getting lost in the forest, but also its recreational function (forest-bathing) reflect mental states humans develop when they step into the culturally constructed entity of the woodland. These ecocritical analyses present different facets of such encounters.