The chapter outlines the main assumptions of cultural ecology as a direction of ecocriticism and the environmental humanities. It contextualizes the approach first within general cultural ecology and subsequently within literary theory and aesthetics, tracing from these sources the specific model of cultural ecology as it has become relevant to ecocritical literary studies. In the concluding part, the chapter summarizes key features of the model that help to elucidate the value of literature for the environmental humanities and illustrates them by the example of Amitav Ghosh’s The Hungry Tide.