A theory of social nature has proliferated and is becoming widely accepted among social researchers, especially within critical geography. This states that our encounters with the non- human world are always mediated. Whether we engage the outdoors using the park system, television, outdoor outfitters, or political organizations, the rhetoric of race, gender, economics, and politics are always at work on how we interact with landscapes. Three goals for this research include: 1) To outline the discursive constructions of wilderness and gender in connection with the social, and political work they do modern society 2) To outline the lived gender experience among wilderness advocates, highlighting moments when this experience resonates with the dominant discourse as well as moments of dissonance. 3) To use the subsequent categories of experience to arrive at a theories of dominant and subversive wilderness discourse
