lucas_hill
Joined: 28 Jan 2020
Posts: 6
|
 Posted: Thu Jan 30, 2020 8:37 pm Post subject: Response to Cronon's Essay |
 |
|
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.” (1 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. |
|
FAQ
Search
Memberlist
Usergroups
Register
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
