Readings in Environmental History

” Wherefore I perceive that their is nothing better than that a man should rejoice in his own works…”  Ecclesiastes 9:10

Environmental History. How does it differ from other historic subdisciplines? If the essence of historical studies is to synthesize eons of human activity into categories of sensible scholarship, then environmental historians must differentiate themselves from other scholars by implementing  methods which produce a unique perspective. After nearly 5 months of in depth study and reading, I still haven’t figured out the environmental historian method. Perhaps, the dual hurdles employed by our esteemed professor of a furious pace and disparate topics were simply too much for me to overcome. More than likely, though, my own unfamiliarity with environmental history is the main reason why I haven’t developed a more holistic vision of the discipline.  Nevertheless, numerous themes did emerge through the interesting and thought provoking classroom discussions as well as from the 13 assigned books (but who’s counting) and ancillary readings.

Past and present human views of the environment and nature were common topics of consideration in many of this semester’s assigned works. In the first essay of Uncommon Ground, Cronon outlined what he referred to as the “humanities approach” to nature, recognizing two key insights by scholars into the essence of nature. These two ideas, that nature is dynamic and changeable–not holistic and capable of pre-detetermined balance, along with the position that nature, as a human construct, cannot be understood outside of humanity’s influence, were both heavily considered in the literature under study. The Columbian Exchange, Crosby’s seminal work, addressed nature’s changeability repeatedly, demonstrating how environmental factors such as disease, climate , landscape, etc. could radically change the course of history, yet attesting to the adaptabilty of the environment to these many changes. Other works also thoroughly detailed nature’s adaptablilty . In The Shadow of Slavery, The People and the Park and We Are What We Eat all highlight the movements of foods, peoples, non-food plants and human cultural practices into new environments, culminating in the development of altered ecosystems and capable of integrating outside influences.

Cronon’s second accepted tenet of nature, the inescapability of humanity’s influence on environmental history, is ubiquitous throughout the literature. Despite the attempts by people to romanticize nature as either an edenesque construct awaiting renewal towards originality or a hostile wilderness to be avoided by civilization, environmental historians have traced the human imprint on nature dating back to pre-historic times. Krech’s Ecological Indian considered the role of the paleo-indians in the extinctions of the America’s mega fauna; and Beinart and Hughes made references to the ecological practices of indigenous people’s stone age ancestors in Environment and Empire. But the most prescient idea expressed by a number of authors was the fact that humanity can only realize the intimate relationship which exists between man and nature through work. Just how can a post-modernist people get back into working with nature?