Irrigated Eden: The Making of an Agricultural Landscape in the American West, Mark Fiege

Автор: Fiege Mark
Название: Republic of Nature
ISBN: 0295993294 ISBN-13(EAN): 9780295993294
Издательство: Wiley EDC
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Цена: 26300.00 T
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Описание:

In the dramatic narratives that comprise The Republic of Nature, Mark Fiege reframes the canonical account of American history based on the simple but radical premise that nothing in the nation's past can be considered apart from the natural circumstances in which it occurred. Revisiting historical icons so familiar that schoolchildren learn to take them for granted, he makes surprising connections that enable readers to see old stories in a new light.

Among the historical moments revisited here, a revolutionary nation arises from its environment and struggles to reconcile the diversity of its people with the claim that nature is the source of liberty. Abraham Lincoln, an unlettered citizen from the countryside, steers the Union through a moment of extreme peril, guided by his clear-eyed vision of nature's capacity for improvement. In Topeka, Kansas, transformations of land and life prompt a lawsuit that culminates in the momentous civil rights case of Brown v. Board of Education.

By focusing on materials and processes intrinsic to all things and by highlighting the nature of the United States, Fiege recovers the forgotten and overlooked ground on which so much history has unfolded. In these pages, the nation's birth and development, pain and sorrow, ideals and enduring promise come to life as never before, making a once-familiar past seem new. The Republic of Nature points to a startlingly different version of history that calls on readers to reconnect with fundamental forces that shaped the American experience.

For more information, visit the author's website: http://republicofnature.com/

Автор: Howkins Adrian, Orsi Jared, Fiege Mark
Название: National Parks Beyond the Nation: Global Perspectives on "America`s Best Idea "
ISBN: 0806152257 ISBN-13(EAN): 9780806152257
Издательство: Mare Nostrum (Eurospan)
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Цена: 29220.00 T
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Описание: The idea of a national park was an American invention of historic consequences marking the beginning of a worldwide movement,"" the U.S. National Park Service asserts in its 2006 Management Policies. National Parks beyond the Nation brings together the work of fifteen scholars and writers to reveal the tremendous diversity of the global national park experience - an experience sometimes influencing, sometimes influenced by, and sometimes with no reference whatever to the United States. Writer and historian Wallace Stegner once called national parks ""America's best idea."" The contributors to this volume use that exceptionalist claim as a starting point for thinking about an international history of national parks. They explore the historical interactions and influences - intellectual, political, and material - within and between national park systems in Canada, New Zealand, South Africa, Indonesia, Antarctica, Brazil, and other countries. What is the role of science in the history of these preserves? Of politics? What purposes do they serve: Conservation? Education? Reverence toward nature? Tourist pleasure? People have thought differently about national parks at different times and in different places; and neat physical boundaries have been disrupted by wandering animals, human movements, the spread of disease, and climate change. Viewing parks around the world, at various scales and across national frontiers, these essays offer a panoptic view of the common and contrasting cultural and environmental features of national parks worldwide. If national parks are, as Stegner said, ""absolutely American,"" they are no less part of the world at large. National Parks beyond the Nation tells us as much about the multifarious and changing ideas of nature and culture as about the framing of those ideas in geographic, temporal, and national terms.