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rhirsch · Site Admin Joined: 13 Oct 2010 Posts: 74

Please actively read "Using Environmental History" by William Cronon and "Interpreting Environmental History" by Carolyn Merchant (pp.7-12). Also look through the quotes on pp.13-16.
Please post about these readings. You may post about whatever in the readings calls to you, but also please connect or contrast one of the quotes with the readings thus far and explain why and how you draw these ties.

Make sure to do the whole assignment tonight. We will revisit elements of it tomorrow night, too.

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Rachel S. · Joined: 28 Jan 2020 Posts: 7

1. The first connection I made while reading Cronon’s essay was to Winter’s comment yesterday. Cronon argues that “environmental history has always had an undeniable relation to the political movement that helped spawn it” (bottom right of the first page—page 15?). Cronon also refers to Worster himself as a historian with “unflinching moral vision” (16). I think this further validates Winter’s implied point that environmental history cannot be considered as separate from questions of morality and of politics.

2. One of the ideas in Cronon’s essay that I found to be most interesting, but also most confusing, was his discussion of natural “cyclical time” and human “linear time” (16). He argues that “the environmentalist affection for natural equilibrium and cyclical time… necessarily implies a not-so-disguised flight from history” (17). This might be partially because a sentence is cut off, but I don’t entirely understand how he arrived at this conclusion. Does anyone think they understand?

3. Merchant’s argument that “race, gender, and class are lenses through which to view history and interpret human interactions with the environment” (25) struck me as a very important aspect of the study of environmental history. Her focus is mostly on the differing tangible contributions made by separate social groups, but I found myself thinking about a quote from Worster’s essay: “Men and women… have arrived at different ways of regarding nature, sometimes radically so” (9, Worster). Similarly, Merchant notes, “American Indians and African Americans perceived wilderness in ways that differed markedly from those of white Americans” (21). I’m interested in learning more about how specifically their ideas differed. This could offer an opportunity to compare how different ideas about nature drive different behaviors regarding the environment.

4. The long paragraph in the middle of page 22 (Merchant) made me wonder—to what extent is food and the culture surrounding it a part of environmental history?

mlevine · Joined: 28 Jan 2020 Posts: 4

In response to Rachel, I think he is saying that while we do not think of there being one true state of existence for society/humans, we have the concept of "true nature" which implies there is a certain state nature is trying to return to rather than acknowledging nature as continually evolving. I could be totally wrong but that is how I interpreted it.

mlevine · Joined: 28 Jan 2020 Posts: 4

“We may be entering a new phase of history, a time when we begin to rediscover… the traditional teaching that power must entail restraint and responsibility, the ancient awareness that we are interdependent with all of nature and that our sense of community must take in the whole of creation” (Worster). I fell that this quote is deeply connected to the origin of environmental history. In the first reading, Worster points out that environmental history was born during the early environmental movement. It was born out of a time when people increasingly saw the dangers of industrialization and the increasing distance between the earth and people, especially those in power. Through studying environmental history, perhaps we can reclaim some of that connection and morality. This also connects with what Carolyn Merchant says about how “deities mediated between nature and humans, inspiring rituals and behaviors that helped regulate environmental use and exploitation” (24). As society grows more secular and removed from the earth, we need a new guide in how to relate to the environment. Environmental history fills this need.

In “Doing Environmental History” Worster states “When we step beyond the self-reflecting world of humankind to encounter the nonhuman sphere, environmental history finds its main theme of study.” Both Cronan and Merchant push back on this idea and highlight how environmental history is a construction of society. Especially with the long history and continued practice of environmental racism, those in power deeply shape the environment and how it is perceived. As a result, “all environmental history is culturally constructed” (Cronan) to benefit those in power. Maybe I misunderstood what Worster is saying, but I feel that he is being rather naive in terms of how much social biases influence our perception of the world.

Eliza A · Joined: 28 Jan 2020 Posts: 4

When we were discussing Diamonds writing today in class, I kept thinking about his conclusion that “history has been moulded by our environment” (13). I felt like his examples justified the destructive actions of those before us. While this might not have been his intention in the reading...it did get me thinking. In “Using Environmental History,” Cronon writes that sometimes environmentalists, “regard nature as a source of absolute authority for their vision of how people ought to behave in the world” (17). Honestly, I am still struggling to understand this quote, though it seems to relate to how I interpreted Diamonds words. Does nature control our behavior? And if so, does the environment we are raised in excuse some of our wrong actions? I again wonder how much control humans really have! Merchant says that “the human relationship to the land is intimately connected to daily survival” (24). All humans know to do is survive. If our form of survival is morally wrong (colonization might be an example of this), then how do we shift a culture or environment to better our behavior? I’m not sure how to answer these questions, but I was frustrated by the idea that we can blame our bad actions on nature. Would love to hear some other perspectives!

Another quote that stuck out to me is, “stories about the past lives of such people teach us how difficult it is to act in ways that benefit humanity and nature both—and yet how crucial it is to try” (20). I thought this was interesting and connects well with issues we face today. How do we effectively fix our environmental mistakes while also trying to create a more just society? These are such huge issues to solve and sometimes I wonder if the world will destroy itself before we can ever reach these desired goals. Scary stuff!

srothstein2020 · Joined: 28 Jan 2020 Posts: 2

From William Cronon’s writing, the biggest thing I took away was information about the emotions and feelings that go along with environmental history. He talked about the way his students “seemed profoundly depressed by what they had learned” (5), which is a reaction I can understand given what I know about human interaction with the environment. A lot of it seems to indicate that we should be hopeless about our future, considering the damage we have done and continue to do to the planet. He then begins to talk about the interaction of environmental history with environmentalism, and although environmentalism inspired the study of environmental history, there are areas where the two go against each other. He also explains some of the fundamental beliefs of environmental history, which are reflected in other readings: nature has affected all of human history, nature and culture are not static, environmental knowledge is culturally constructed (not sure what this one means), and historical wisdom comes from parables. I am also confused by what he continues to say, but I understand his argument that parables are the best way to learn from history, rather than politics. I personally feel little to no despair regarding the environment, because it is beyond the scope of what I usually worry about. I have accepted my death as a certain eventuality, and can only wish it to be as painless as possible. I have abandoned the idea that I can change anything anyway, because the level of effort it would take to make the slightest difference is far beyond what I care to put into something that is not an immediate part of my life.

I connected this essay to the quote “It is in the midst of this compromised and complex situation--the reciprocal influences of a changing nature and changing society--that environmental history must find its home” from Richard White, because one of Cronon’s main points is about the way environmental history has separated from environmentalism, the political movement that started the study.

ndolny · Joined: 29 Jan 2020 Posts: 2

Cronon makes a point that leaves me somewhat skeptical; the idea that nature is balanced, unchaotic and 'cyclical', and only becomes not so with the introduction of humans. Basically saying that nature is without history, and humans are not. While yes, humans have sped up the process of history, events occur in the natural world which are significant and irreversible enough to constitute history; natural disasters, land formation, the splitting of the continents, and evolution. Nature is exactly as wild and chaotic as civilization, it is just on a larger timeframe.

This disconnect between nature and history connects me to a quote by worster:
"There is little history in the study of nature, and little nature in the study of history. I want to show how we can remedy that cultural lag by developing a new perspective on the historians enterprise, one that will make us Darwinians at last." This highlights my feeling that these two things should not be as separate as they are, as I agree deeply that environment shapes history and provides ever-essential but always rare context. This is highlighted perfectly in Merchants writing and its dissection of gender and race in an environmental context.

Eliza A · Joined: 28 Jan 2020 Posts: 4

mcanning · Joined: 28 Jan 2020 Posts: 3

William Cronon shares his 4 core lessons on environmental history. The first is about recognizing the environmental consequences that stem from human activities and the second is explaining that the relationship between nature and humanity is always changing at different paces. Both of these lessons deal with the direct intertwining between humans and the environment. However, the 4th lesson--which explores the concept of time and the importance of the past, present, and future--stuck with me the most. Within the 4th lesson, Cronon points out the variability of the future. The future is an unknown force without answers (unlike the past and present): “When speaking about the past, we can at least pretend that we know the end of the story. Doing so enables us to make our arguments and narratives point toward the present… this sense of narrative closure is never available to us for the future” (19). The unknown is terrifying to think about, there is a factor of endless possibility and unexplained/unexplored outcomes. Reading Cronon’s idea about how the past, present, and future meet to help find “parables” for how to best make predictions for the future reminded me of cycles. Cycles are everywhere. We talked about the cycle of the bible, light, beginning/end, and colonization in class and we see Cronon directly state that “natural time is cyclical” (16).
I overall, find this concept of patterns, cycles, balance, and interconnection extremely interesting. It makes me wonder where else do we have endless cycles in our lives, how do they intertwine with each other and with the environment around us?

The quote on page 2/4 directly falls into line with balance: “We may be entering a new phase of history, a time when we begin to rediscover… the traditional teaching that power must entail restraint and responsibility, the ancient awareness that we are interdependent with all of nature and that our sense of community must take in the whole of creation.” (Donald Worster “The Vulnerable Earth”). I am particularly drawn to restraint and responsibility that comes with power. Who holds power over another? Does the environment or do people decide the outcome of culture and societal values?

Sorry, I know my writing is kind of one giant brain dump, but I am particularly fascinated by the different cyclical processes that show up throughout life and the concept of balance.

lucas_hill · Joined: 28 Jan 2020 Posts: 6

Here are some of my thoughts!

One concept that stood out to me in Cronon’s essay was how deeply he discussed the idea of the connection and contrast of humanity and nature and how Environmental History is based in asking the question “‘Whats the story?’” (20). The comparison of the difference in the time, explained as “natural time is cyclical time, while the time of modern humanity is linear” (16) made me think about how history tracks humanity in a linear way. The complexity behind this idea confuses me, I’m not sure how to think about comparing time scales and also the future of humanity and nature, “humanity’s arrow is the fall, while nature’s cycle is salvation” (16).

Similarly to our first reading, in Worster’s essay we discussed how his essay was conceptually focused. I felt a similar way with Cronon’s essay where he discussed the idea of the goal of Environmental Historians and the complexity of dealing with nature ideology and making the connection between those ideas and human history. One quote on this idea that stood out to me was on page 17, he writes: “Our tasks, after all, far from trying to escape from history into nature, is to pull nature itself into the stream of human history.”

One last idea I’ll put out there is the concept of change that comes up in Cronon’s essay. “Our work suggests that nature and culture change all the time, but that the rate and scale of such change can vary enormously.” (1Cool Although there is difference (like I talked about in the paragraph before) between humanity and nature or all ecosystems also talked about in Worster’s essay, there is a connection and Environmental Historians are making that connection a reality and studying it, and making it happen.

adostie3 · Joined: 29 Jan 2020 Posts: 2

Merchant points out that "women's outdoor production, like men's, had immediate impact on the environment" (23) in colonial times She continues, " as agriculture became more specialized and oriented towards market production, men took over dairying, poultry-raising, and truck-farming, resulting in a decline of women's outdoor production". This paradigm shift was a form of primitive accumulation necessary for the inception of capitalism. In "Caliban and The Witch", Frederick Silvia argues that colonial witch hunts were complicit in the "subjugation of women to the reproduction of the work-force" (63). It was through this very mechanism that "colonial Americans encouraged high numbers of births" to compensate for "a scarcity of labor in new lands" (24). This dynamic seems emblematic to me of the nexus of complex interrelationships between societies and the environments in which they evolve, whereby cultures exist as products of a given environment and result in forms of production that alter that environment.

levg · Joined: 28 Jan 2020 Posts: 3

I was especially struck by the John Opie quote “The environmental historian participates in the gulf between the ecological ideal and historical reality, between the two cultures of science and the humanities, and between disinterested objectivity and the ethical obligation of advocacy.”

To me, this addressed much of what we had been discussing about the borders of science and history, as well as Cronon’s point about predicting the future. The gulf is where the tension of the different scales of time meet, with both sides (as Cronon’s second point states) constantly shifting. I will return to the last line of the quote now, because it is by far the most interesting to me.

Irony aside, it makes some amount of sense that someone who studies the past would be asked to predict the future, although Cronon’s misgivings about doing so are certainly reasonable. If the way that nature and societies move were completely cyclical or linear, it would be easy to predict the future. However, neither is really as simple as it seems, and their “mutual interdependence” (pg. 17) further complicates matters. But I suppose my question really boils down to this: do environmental historians have some kind of duty to help predict the future? What is the “ethical obligation of advocacy”? Environmental history, as noted on what appears to be page 17 and in previous readings, was born partially out of the environmentalist political movement. I think those involved with that movement would argue that it is vital to attempt to change the future through historical knowledge, and I am instinctively inclined to agree. Who else would you want to be setting and shaping that future. In some ways, this returns to the tension between idealistic academic pursuits and the urgent relevance of this topic. Perhaps the two aren’t mutually exclusive. Maybe the work of advocacy could be outsourced in some way using Cronon’s parables, a sort of compromise for the historians. Either way, this is where the Opie quote brought me.

Rachel S. · Joined: 28 Jan 2020 Posts: 7

mcanning · Joined: 28 Jan 2020 Posts: 3

Nathan stated: "Cronon makes a point that leaves me somewhat skeptical; the idea that nature is balanced, unchaotic and 'cyclical', and only becomes not so with the introduction of humans. Basically saying that nature is without history, and humans are not."

side note: I am not sure how to directly respond to a post

My response:
I am not sure if Cronon is trying to say that nature has no history, but instead is saying that nature itself works to maintain a constant equilibrium. Plants, animals, and organisms in a plant-based ecosystem go through cycles of growth and rebirth. They have a history it is just balanced and follows a pattern/route.
I do agree with you in questioning that nature is "unchaotic". Yes, nature's process and our environment face much more difficulty with human-made pollution, infrastructure, etc, but I still believe that an ecosystem without humans does not lack chaos. There are still invasive species, uncontrollable weather patterns, habitat loss, conflict among animals, and many more factors that can create disorder.

Rachel S. · Joined: 28 Jan 2020 Posts: 7

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