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HISTORY AND IMPORTENCE OF ENVIORNMENTAL STUDY

The term the environment comes from the French word environ and

means everything that surrounds us. Under such a broad umbrella, there is a host of

ways in which environmental studies can be understood. The Faculty of

Environmental Studies defines it as the study of a range of environments, from the

bodies we live, to the physical structures, institutions and industries we build, to

the politics, languages and cultural practices we use to communicate, and to the

earth and its complex multitude of animals, flora and bio-physical elements and

processes. The Faculty also adopts an inter-disciplinary approach to environmental

studies where the social sciences, humanities, arts and natural sciences meet and

inform each other. The Faculty encourages the use of different theoretical

approaches and disciplinary and interdisciplinary ideas to explore environmental

issues and options in their historical, comparative and current contexts, considering

ecological, political and economic constraints and possibilities. We encourage

exploration of how theoretical and practical matters intersect, and how reflexive,

rigorous, critical and creative thinking can inform interpretations and policies in

the wider society.

From such a definition of environmental studies flows the view that culture and

nature are deeply integrated and inseparable. Such seemingly artificial areas as

downtown Toronto and the York University campus are as profoundly natural as

apparently wild places as Algonquin Park in northern Ontario and Clayoquot

Sound in British Columbia are cultural. Another set of questions addresses

environmental justice and social and political equity. Who defines what constitutes

environmental issues? Who is included and excluded from environmental

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concerns? Who benefits and pays for environmental reform? Who suffers from

environmental degradation? And what is the role of non-human natures in

environmental experience and change? The roles and skills of environmental

professionals are important but not sufficient in asking such questions. The Faculty

thus seeks additional answers in the knowledge and views expressed by

environmental groups, citizens, First Nations, and marginalized groups whose

voices are often unheard in conventional deliberations Environmental history

The city ofMachu Picchu was constructed c. 1450 AD, at the height of the Inca

Empire. It has commanding views down two valleys and a nearly impassable

mountain at its back. There is an ample supply of spring water and enough land for

a plentiful food supply. The hillsides leading to it have been terraced to provide

farmland for crops, reduce soil erosion, protect against landslides, and create steep

slopes to discourage potential invaders.

Environmental history is the study of human interaction with the natural world

over time. In contrast to other historical disciplines, it emphasizes the active role

nature plays in influencing human affairs. Environmental historians study how

humans both shape their environment and are shaped by it.

Environmental history emerged in the United States out of the environmental

movement of the 1960s and 1970s, and much of its impetus still stems from

present-day global environmental concerns.[1] The field was founded on

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conservation issues but has broadened in scope to include more general social and

scientific history and may deal with cities, population or sustainable development.

As all history occurs in the natural world, environmental history tends to focus on

particular time-scales, geographic regions, or key themes. It is also a strongly

multidisciplinary subject that draws widely on both the humanities and natural

science.

The subject matter of environmental history can be divided into three main

components.[2] The first, nature itself and its change over time, includes the

physical impact of humans on the Earth's land, water, atmosphere and

biosphere. The second category, how humans use nature, includes the

environmental consequences of increasing population, more effective

technology and changing patterns ofproduction and consumption. Other key

themes are the transition from nomadic hunter-gatherer communities to

settled agriculture in the neolithic revolution, the effects of colonial

expansion and settlements, and the environmental and human consequences

of the industrial and technological revolutions.[3]

Finally, environmental

historians study how people think about nature - the way attitudes, beliefs

and values influence interaction with nature, especially in the form ofmyths,

religion and science.

Origin of name and early works

Main article: Roderick Nash

In 1967 Roderick Nash published "Wilderness and the American Mind", a work that

has become a classic text of early environmental history. In an address to the

Organization of American Historians in 1969 (published in 1970) Nash used the

expression "environmental history",[4] although 1972 is generally taken as the date

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when the term was first coined.[5] The 1959 book by Samuel P. Hays, Conservation

and the Gospel of Efficiency: The Progressive Conservation Movement, 1890-1920,

while being a major contribution to American political history, is now also

regarded as a founding document in the field of environmental history. Hays is

Professor Emeritus of History at the

Historiography

Main article: Historiography

Brief overviews of the field of environmental history have been given by John

McNeill in 1983,[7] Richard White in 1985,[8] and J. Donald Hughes in 2006.[9]

Definition

.

The World in 1897

British "possessions" are coloured in red

There is no universally accepted definition of environmental history. In general

terms it is a history that tries to explain why our environment is like it is and how

humanity has influenced its current condition, as well as commenting on the

problems and opportunities of tomorrow.[10] Donald Worster's widely quoted 1988

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notion of the cultural landscape. Worster also questioned the scope of the

discipline, asking: "We study humans and nature; therefore can anything human or

natural be outside our enquiry?"[17]

Environmental history is generally treated as a subfield of history, an established

discipline. But some environmental historians challenge this assumption, arguing

that while traditional history is human history the story of people and their

institutions,[18] "humans cannot place themselves outside the principles of nature."[19]

In this sense environmental history is a version of human history within a larger

context, one less dependent on anthropocentrism (even though anthropogenic

change is at the center of its narrative).[20]

Dimensions

General view of Funkville in 1864, Oil Creek, Pennsylvania, USA

J. Donald Hughes responded to the view that environmental history is " light on

theory" or lacking theoretical structure by viewing the subject through the lens of

three "dimensions": nature and culture, history and science, and scale.[21] This

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advances beyond Worster's recognition of three broad clusters of issues to be

addressed by environmental historians although both historians recognize that the

emphasis of their categories might vary according to the particular study[22] as,

clearly, some studies will concentrate more on society and human affairs and

others more on the environment.

Themes

Several themes are used to express these historical dimensions. A more traditional

historical approach is to analyse the transformation of the globes ecology through

themes like the separation of man from nature during the neolithic revolution

, imperialism and colonial expansion, exploration, agricultural change, the effects

of the industrial and technological revolution, and urban expansion. More

environmental topics include human impact through influences on forestry, fire,

climate change, sustainability and so on. According to Paul Warde, the

increasingly sophisticated history of colonization and migration can take on an

environmental aspect, tracing the pathways of ideas and species around the globe

and indeed is bringing about an increased use of such analogies and colonial

understandings of processes within European history..[23] The importance of the

colonial enterprise in Africa, the Caribbean and Indian Ocean has been detailed by

Richard Grove.[3] Much of the literature consists of case-studies targeted at the

global, national and local levels.[24]

Scale

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Although environmental history can cover billions of years of history over the

whole Earth, it can equally concern itself with local scales and brief time periods.

[25] Many environmental historians are occupied with local, regional and national

histories.[26] Some historians link their subject exclusively to the span of human

history "every time period in human history"[19] while others include the period

before human presence on Earth as a legitimate part of the discipline. Ian

Simmons'sEnvironmental History of Great Britain covers a period of about 10,000

years. There is a tendency to difference in time scales between natural and social

phenomena: the causes of environmental change that stretch back in time may be

dealt with socially over a comparatively brief period.[27]

Although at all times environmental influences have extended beyond particular

geographic regions and cultures, during the 20th and early 21st centuries

anthropogenic environmental change has assumed global proportions, most

prominently with climate change but also as a result of settlement, the spread of

disease and the globalization of world trade.

Development of the subject

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Nature preservationist John Muirwith US President Theodore Roosevelt (left) on

Glacier Point in Yosemite National Park

The questions posed and themes covered by environmental history date back to

antiquity: historians have always included the effects of natural phenomena on

human affairs.[29] Hippocrates, ancient Greek father of medicine, in his Airs,

Waters, Places, asserted that different cultures and human temperaments could be

related to the surroundings in which peoples lived. [30] However, the origins of the

subject in its present form are generally traced to the twentieth century.

In 1929 a group of French historians founded the journal Annales, in many ways aforerunner of modern environmental history since it took as its subject matter the

reciprocal global influences of the environment and human society. The idea of the

impact of the physical environment on civilizations was espoused by this Annales

School to describe the long term developments that shape human history [17] by

focusing away from political and intellectual history, toward agriculture,

demography, and geography. Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie, a pupil of the Annales

School, was the first to really embrace, in the 1950s, environmental history in a

more contemporary form.[31] One of the most influential members of the Annales

School was Lucien Febvre (18781956), whose bookA Geographical Introduction

to History is now a classic in the field.

The most influential empirical and theoretical work in the subject has been done in

the United States where teaching programs first emerged and a generation oftrained environmental historians is now active.[23] In the United States

environmental history as an independent field of study emerged in the general

cultural reassessment and reform of the 1960s and 1970s along with

environmentalism, "conservation history",[32] and a gathering awareness of the

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global scale of some environmental issues. This was in large part a reaction to the

way nature was represented in history at the time, which portrayed the advance of

culture and technology as releasing humans from dependence on the natural world

and providing them with the means to manage it [and] celebrated human mastery

over other forms of life and the natural environment, and expected technological

improvement and economic growth to accelerate.[33] Environmental historians

intended to develop a post-colonial historiography that was "more inclusive in its

narratives".[14]

Precursors to environmental historians include Henry Thoreau, Aldo Leopold, and

even Rachel Carson. Environmental history frequently promoted a moral and

political agenda although it steadily became a more scholarly enterprise.[14] Early

attempts to define the field were made in the United States by Roderick Nash in

The State of Environmental History and in other works by frontier historians

Frederick Jackson Turner, James Malin, John Muirand Walter Prescott Webb who

analysed the process of settlement. Their work was expanded by a second

generation of more specialized environmental historians such as Alfred Crosby,

Samuel P. Hays, Donald Worster, William Cronon, Richard White, Carolyn

Merchant, John McNeill, Donald Hughes, Chad Montrie, and Europeans Paul

Warde, Sverker Sorlin, Robert A. Lambert, T.C. Smout, Peter Coates and Jan

Oosthoek.

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Frontier historian

Frederick Jackson Turner(18611932)

Current practice

In the United States the American Society for Environmental History was founded

in 1975 while the first institute devoted specifically to environmental history in

Europe was established in 1991, based at the University of St. Andrews inScotland. In 1986, the Dutch foundation for the history of environment and

hygiene Net Werkwas founded and publishes four newsletters per year. In the UK

the White Horse Press in Cambridge has, since 1995, published the journal

Environment and History which aims to bring scholars in the humanities and

biological sciences closer together in constructing long and well-founded

perspectives on present day environmental problems and a similar publication

Tijdschrift voor Ecologische Geschiedenis (Journal for Environmental History) is a

combined Flemish-Dutch initiative mainly dealing with topics in the Netherlands

and Belgium although it also has an interest in European environmental history.

Each issue contains abstracts in English, French and German. In 1999 the Journal

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was converted into a yearbook for environmental history. In Canada the Network

in Canadian History and Environment facilitates the growth of environmental

history through numerous workshops and a significant digital infrastructure

including their website and podcast.[34]

Communication between European nations is restricted by language difficulties. In

April 1999 a meeting was held in Germany to overcome these problems and to co-

ordinate environmental history in Europe. This meeting resulted in the creation of

the European Society for Environmental History in 1999. Only two years after its

establishment, ESEH held its first international conference in St. Andrews,

Scotland. Around 120 scholars attended the meeting and 105 papers were

presented on topics covering the whole spectrum of environmental history. The

conference showed that environmental history is a viable and lively field in Europe

and since then ESEH has expanded to over 400 members and continues to grow

and attracted international conferences in 2003 and 2005. In 1999 the Centre for

Environmental History was established at the University of Stirling. Some history

departments at European universities are now offering introductory courses in

environmental history and postgraduate courses in Environmental history have

been established at the Universities of Nottingham, Stirling and Dundee and more

recently a Graduierten Kolleg was created at the University of Gttingen in

Germany.[35]

Related disciplines

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The 77 km long Panama Canal, opened in 1914, connects the Caribbean Sea to the

Pacific Ocean, replacing a long and treacherous shipping route passing via the

Drake Passage and Cape Horn at the tip of South America. Construction was

plagued by problems, including disease (particularly malaria and yellow fever) and

landslides. By the time the canal was completed, a total of 27,500 French and

American workmen are estimated to have died.

Environmental history prides itself in bridging the gap between the arts and natural

sciences although to date the scales weigh on the side of science. A definitive list

of related subjects would be lengthy indeed and singling out those for special

mention a difficult task. However, those frequently quoted include, historical

geography, the history and philosophy of science, history of technology and

climate science. On the biological side there is, above all, ecology and historical

ecology, but also forestry and especially forest history, archaeology and

anthropology. When the subject engages in environmental advocacy it has much in

common with environmentalism.

With increasing globalization and the impact of global trade on resource

distribution, concern over never-ending economic growth and the many human

inequities environmental history is now gaining allies in the fields of ecological

and environmental economics.[36][37]

Engagement with sociological thinkers and the humanities is limited but cannot be

ignored through the beliefs and ideas that guide human action. This has been seen

as the reason for a perceived lack of support from traditional historians.[23]

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Issues

The subject has a number of areas of lively debate. These include discussion

concerning: what subject matter is most appropriate; whether environmental

advocacy can detract from scholarly objectivity; standards of professionalism in a

subject where much outstanding work has been done by non-historians; the relative

contribution of nature and humans in determining the passage of history; the

degree of connection with, and acceptance by, other disciplines - but especially

mainstream history. For Paul Warde the sheer scale, scope and diffuseness of the

environmental history endeavour calls for an analytical toolkit "a range of common

issues and questions to push forward collectively" and a "core problem". He sees a

lack of "human agency" in its texts and suggest it be writtem more to act: as a

source of information for environmental scientists; incorporation of the notion of

risk; a closer analysis of what it is we mean by "environment"; confronting the way

environmental history is at odds with the humanities because it emphasises the

division between "materialist, and cultural or constructivist explanations for human

behaviour".[38]

Global sustainability

Achieving sustainability will enable the Earth to continue supporting human life as

we know it. Blue Marble NASA composite images: 2001 (left), 2002 (right)

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Main article: Sustainability

Many of the themes of environmental history inevitably examine the circumstances

that produced the environmental problems of the present day, a litany of themes

that challenge global sustainability including: population, consumerism and

materialism, climate change, waste disposal, deforestation and loss of wilderness,

industrial agriculture, species extinction, depletion of natural resources, invasive

organisms and urban development.[39] The simple message of sustainable use of

renewable resources is frequently repeated and early as 1864 George Perkins

Marsh was pointing out that the changes we make in the environment may later

reduce the environments usefulness to humans so any changes should be made

with great care[40] - what we would nowadays call enlightened self-interest. Richard

Grove has pointed out that "States will act to prevent environmental degradation

only when their economic interests are threatened".[41]

Advocacy

Main article: Advocacy

It is not clear whether environmental history should promote a moral or political

agenda. The strong emotions raised by environmentalism, conservation and

sustainability can interfere with historical objectivity: polemical tracts and strong

advocacy can compromise objectivity and professionalism. Engagement with the

political process certainly has its academic perils[42] although accuracy and

commitment to the historical method is not necessarily threatened by

environmental involvement: environmental historians have a reasonable

expectation that their work will inform policy-makers.[43]

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Environmental determinism

Further information: Environmental determinism and Cultural determinism

Ploughing farmer in ancient Egypt. Mural in the burial chamber of artisanSennedjem c. 1200 BCE

For some environmental historians "the general conditions of the environment, the

scale and arrangement of land and sea, the availability of resources, and the

presence or absence of animals available for domestication, and associated

organisms and disease vectors, that makes the development of human cultures

possible and even predispose the direction of their development"[49] and that "history

is inevitably guided by forces that are not of human origin or subject to human

choice".[50] This approach has been attributed to American environmental historians

Webb and Turner[51] and, more recently to Jared Diamond in his book "Guns,

Germs and Steel" where the presence or absence of disease vectors and resources

such as plants and animals that are amenable to domestication that may not only

stimulate the development of human culture but even determine, to some extent,the direction of that development. The claim that the path of history has been

forged by environmental rather than cultural forces is referred to as environmental

determinism while, at the other extreme, is what may be called cultural

determinism. An example of cultural determinism would be the view that human

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influence is so pervasive that the idea of pristine nature has little validity - that

there is no way of relating to nature without culture.[52]

Methodology

Main article: Historical method

Recording historical events

Useful guidance on the process of doing environmental history has been given by

Donald Worster,[53] Carolyn Merchant,[54] William Cronon[55] and Ian Simmons.[56]

Worster's three core subject areas (the environment itself, human impacts on the

environment, and human thought about the environment) are generally taken as a

starting point for the student as they encompass many of the different skills

required. The tools are those of both history and science with a requirement for

fluency in the language of natural science and especially ecology.[57] In fact

methodologies and insights from a range of physical and social sciences is

required, there seeming to be universal agreement that environmental history is

indeed a multidisciplinary subject.

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Key works

Chakrabarti, Ranjan (ed), DoesEnvironmental History Matter: Shikar,

Subsistence, Sustenance and theSciences (Kolkata: Readers Service, 2006)

Chakrabarti, Ranjan (ed.), Situating Environmental History (New Delhi:

Manohar, 2007)

Cronon, William (ed), Uncommon Ground: Toward Reinventing Nature

(New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1995)

Dunlap, Thomas R., Nature and the English Diaspora: Environment

andHistory in the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand

(NewYork/Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999)

Glacken, Clarence, Traces on the Rhodian Shore: Nature and Culture in

WesternThought From Ancient Times to the Endo of the Nineteenth Century

(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967)

Griffiths, Tomand Libby Robin (eds.), Ecology and Empire: The

Environmental Historyof Settler Societies (Keele: Keele University Press,

1997)

Grove, Richard, Green Imperialism: Colonial Expansion, Tropical

IslandEdens and the Origins of Environmentalism, 1600-1860

(CambridgeUniversity Press, 1995)

Hughes, J.D., An Environmental Historyof the World: Humankind's

Changing Role in the Community of Life (Oxford: Routledge, 2001)

Hughes, J.D., "Global Environmental History: The Long View",

Globalizations, Vol. 2 No. 3, 2005, 293-208.

MacKenzie, John M., Imperialism and the Natural World (Manchester

University Press, 1990)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_M._MacKenziehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_M._MacKenziehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_M._MacKenzie

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McCormick, John, Reclaiming Paradise: The Global Environmental

Movement (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989)

Rajan, Ravi S., Modernizing Nature: Forestry and Imperial Eco-

Development 1800-1950 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006)

Redclif, Michael R., Frontier: Histories of Civil Society and Nature

(Cambridge, MA.: The MIT Press, 2006).

Stevis, Dimitris, "The Globalizations of the Environment", Globalizations,

Vol. 2 No. 3, 2005, 323-334.

Williams, Michael, Deforesting the Earth: From Prehistory to GlobalCrisis.

An Abridgement (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006)

White, Richard, The Organic Machine: The Remaking of the Columbia

River (Hill and Wang, 1996)

Worster, Donald, Nature's Economy: A Study of Ecological Ideals

(Cambridge University Press, 1977)

Zeilinga de Boer, Jelle and Donald Theodore Sanders, Volcanoes in

HumanHistory, The Far-reaching Effects of Major Eruptions

(Princeton:Princeton University Press, 2002)

Seminal works by region

In 2004 a theme issue ofEnvironment and History 10(4) provided an overview of

environmental history as practiced in Africa, the Americas, Australia, New

Zealand, China and Europe as well as those with global scope. David Hughes

(2006) has also provided a global conspectus of major contributions to the

environmental history literature.

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George Perkins Marsh, Man and Nature; or, Physical Geography as

Modified by Human Action, ed. David Lowenthal (Cambridge, MA:

Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1965 [1864])

Africa

African landscape: Lesotho

Adams, Jonathan S. and Thomas McShane, The Myth of Wild Africa:

Conservation without Illusion (Berkeley: University of California Press,

1996)

Cock, Jacklyn and Eddie Koch (eds.), Going Green: People, Politics, and the

Environment in South Africa (Capetown: Oxford University Press, 1991)

Dovers, Stephen, Ruth Edgecombe, and Bill Guest (eds.), South Africa's

Environmental History: Cases and Comparisons (Athens: Ohio University

Press, 2003)

Green Musselman, Elizabeth, Plant Knowledge at the Cape: A Study in

African and European Collaboration, International Journal of African

Historical Studies, Vol. 36, 2003, 367-392

Jacobs, Nancy J., Environment, Power and Injustice: A South African

History (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003)

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Maathai, Wangari, Green Belt Movement: Sharing the Approach and the

Experience (New York: Lantern Books, 2003)

McCann, James, Green Land, Brown Land, Black Land: An Environmental

History of Africa, 1800-1990 (Portsmouth: Heinemann, 1999)

Steyn, Phia, "The lingering environmental impact of repressive governance:

the environmental legacy of the apartheid-era for the new South Africa",

Globalizations, Vol. 2, No. 3, 2005, 391-403

Antarctica

Palmer Station, located on Anvers Island, is the smallest of the three stations

operated by the US Antarctic Program

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Pyne, S.J., The Ice: A Journey to Anatarctica. (University of Iowa Press,

1986). Americas s

Artistic impression of the first landing of Columbus and the pilgrim fathers on the

shores of the New World: at San Salvador, West Indies, on 12 October 1492.

Andrews, Richard N.L., Managing the Environment, Managing Ourselves:

A History of American Environmental Policy (New Haven: Yale University

Press, 1999)

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Carson, Rachel, Silent Spring (Cambridge, Mass. : Riverside Press, 1962)

Cronon, William, Changes in the Land: Indians, Colonists and the Ecology

of New England (New York: Hill and Wang, 1983)

Cronon, William, Nature's Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West (New

York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1991)

Dean, Warren, With Broadax and Firebrand: The Destruction of the

Brazilian Atlantic Forest. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995)

Dorsey, Kurkpatrick, The Dawn of Conservation Diplomacy: U.S.-Canadian

Wildlife Protection Treaties in the Progressive Era (Washington: University

of Washington Press, 1998)

Gottlieb, Robert, Forcing the Spring: The Transformation of the American

Environmental Movement (Washington: Island Press, 1993)

Hays, Samuel, Conservation and the Gospel of Efficiency: The Progressive

Conservation Movement1890-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University

Press, 1959)

Melosi, Martin V., Coping with Abundance: Energy and Environment in

Industrial America (Temple University Press, 1985)

Melville, Elinor, A Plague of Sheep: Environmental Consequences of the

Conquest of Mexico (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994)

Merchant, Carolyn, The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology and the

Scientific Revolution (New York: Harper & Row, 1980)

Nash, Roderick, The Rights of Nature: A History of Environmental Ethics

(Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1989)

Nash, Roderick, Wilderness and the American Mind (New Haven: Yale

University Press, 2001)

Raffles, Hugh, WinklerPrins, Antoinette, M. G. A., "Further Reflections on

Amazonian Environmental History: Transformations of Rivers and

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_V._Melosihttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_V._Melosihttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_V._Melosi

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Streams", Latin American Research Review, Vol. 38, Number 3, 2003,

pp. 165187

Reisner, Marc, Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing

Water (Penguin Books, 1986, 1993)

Simonian, Lane, Defending the Land of the Jaguar: A History of

Conservation in Mexico (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1995)

Steinberg, Ted, Down to Earth: Nature's Role in American History (Oxford

University Press, 2002)

Stradling, David (ed), Conservation in the Progressive Era: Classic Texts

(Washington: University of Washington Press, 2004.

Sale, Kirkpatrick. The Green Revolution: The American Environmental

Movement, 1962-1999 (New York: Hill & Wang, 1993)

Worster, Donald, Under Western Skies: Nature and History in the American

West (Oxford University Press, 1992)

Wynn, Graeme, Canada and Arctic North America: An Environmental

History (Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO, 2007)

Asia

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Banaue rice terraces in the Philippines where traditional landraces have been

grown for thousands of years

Boomgaard, Peter, ed. Paper Landscapes: Explorations in the Environment

of Indonesia. (Leiden: KITLV Press, 1997)

Burke III, Edmund, "The Coming Environmental Crisis in the Middle East:

A Historical Perspective, 1750-2000 CE" (April 27, 2005). UC World

History Workshop. Essays and Positions from the World History Workshop.Paper 2. http://repositories.cdlib.org/ucwhw/ep/2

David, A. & Guha, R. (eds) 1995. Nature, Culture, Imperialism: Essays on

the Environmental History of South Asia. Delhi, India: Oxford University

Press.

Elvin, Mark & Ts'ui-jung Liu (eds.), Sediments of Time: Environment and

Society in Chinese History (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998)

Elvin, Mark, The Retreat of the Elephants: An Environmental History of

China (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004)

Gadgil, M. and R. Guha, This Fissured Land: An Ecological History of India

(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landracehttp://repositories.cdlib.org/ucwhw/ep/2http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Rice_terraces.pnghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landracehttp://repositories.cdlib.org/ucwhw/ep/2

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Grove, Richard, Vinita Damodaran, and Satpal Sangwan (eds.) Nature & the

Orient: The Environmental History of South and Southeast Asia (Oxford

University Press, 1998)

Hill, Christopher V., South Asia: An Environmental History (Santa Barbara:

ABC-Clio, 2008)

Menzie, Nicholas, Forest and Land Management in Late Imperial China

(London, Macmillan Press. 1994)

Mahong, Bao, "Environmental History in China", Environment and History,

Volume 10, Number 4, November 2004, pp. 475499

Marks, R. B., Tigers, rice, silk and silt. Environment and economy in late

imperial South China (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998)

Perdue, Peter C., "Lakes of Empire: Man and Water in Chinese History,

Modern China, 16 (January 1990): 119 - 29

Shapiro, Judith, Mao's War against Nature: Politics and the Environment in

Revolutionary China (New York: Cambridge University Press. 2001)

Shiva, Vandana, Stolen Harvest: the Hijacking of the Global Food Supply

(Cambridge MA: South End Press, 2000)

Tal, Alon, Pollution in a Promised Land: An Environmental History of Israel

(Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002)

Totman, Conrad D., The Green Archipelago: Forestry in Preindustrial Japan

(Berkely: University of California Press, 1989)

Totman, Conrad D., Pre-industrial Korea and Japan in Environmental

Perspective (Leiden: Brill, 2004)

Ts'ui-jung Liu, Sediments of Time: Environment and Society in Chinese

History (Cambridge University Press, 1998)

Tull, Malcolm, and A. R. Krishnan. "Resource Use and Environmental

Management in Japan, 1890-1990", in: J.R. McNeill (ed), Environmental

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History of the Pacific and the Pacific Rim ( Aldershot Hampshire: Ashgate

Publishing, 2001)

Yok-shiu Lee and Alvin Y. So, Asia's Environmental Movements:

Comparative Perspectives (Armonk: M.E. Sharpe, 1999)

Australasia

Aboriginal Art, Anbangbang Rock Shelter, Kakadu National Park, Australia

Carron, L.T., A History of Forestry in Australia (Canberra, 1985).

Dargavel, John (ed.), Australia and New Zealand Forest Histories. Short

Overviews, Australian Forest History Society Inc. Occasional Publications,

No. 1 (Kingston: Australian Forest History Society, 2005)

Dovers, Stephen (ed), Essays in Australian Environmental History: Essays

and Cases (Oxford: OUP, 1994).

Dovers, Stephen(ed.), Environmental History and Policy: Still Settling

Australia (South Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 2000).

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Flannery, Tim, The Future Eaters, An Ecological History of the Australian

Lands and People (Sydney: Reeed Books,1994).

Garden, Don, Australia, New Zealand, and the Pacific. An Environmental

History (Santa Barbara: ABC-Clio, 2005)

Pyne, Stephen, Burning Bush: A Fire History of Australia (New York,

Henry Holt, 1991).

Robin, Libby, Defending the Little Desert: The Rise of Ecological

Consciousness in Australia (Melbourne: MUP, 1998)

Robin, Libby, The Flight of the Emu: A Hundred Years of Australian

Ornithology 1901-2001, (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2000)

Robin, Libby, How a Continent Created a Nation (Sydney: University of

New South Wales Press, 2007)

Smith, Mike, Hesse, Paul (eds.), 23 Degrees S: Archaeology and

Environmental History of the Southern Deserts (Canberra: National Museum

of Australia Press, 2005)

Young, Ann R.M, Environmental Change in Australia since 1788 (Oxford

University Press, 2000)

Europe

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Roman aqueduct and plaza, Segovia, Spain

Brimblecombe, Peter and Christian Pfister, The Silent Countdown: Essays in

European Environmental History (Berlin: Springer-Verlag, 1993)

Crosby, Alfred W., Ecological Imperialism: The Biological Expansion of

Europe, 900-1900 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986)

Christensen, Peter, Decline of Iranshahr: Irrigation and Environments in the

History of the Middle East, 500 B.C. to 1500 A.D (Austin: University of

Texas Press, 1993)

Ditt, Karl, 'Nature Conservation in England and Germany, 1900-1970:

Forerunner of Environmental Protection?', Contemporary European History

5:1-28.

Hughes, J. Donald, Pan's Travail: Environmental Problems of the Ancient

Greeks and Romans (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins, 1994)

Hughes, J. Donald, The Mediterranean. An Environmental History (Santa

Barbara: ABC-Clio, 2005)

Lancaster, Julia H., Marat Fidarov. An Environmental History of the

Russian North Caucasus (New York: HHN Media, 2009)

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Mart Escayol, Maria Antnia. La construcci del concepte de natura a la

Catalunya moderna (Barcelona: Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona, 2004)

[1]

Netting, Robert, Balancing on an Alp: Ecological Change and Continuity in

a Swiss Mountain Community (Cambridge University Press, 1981)

Stephen J. Pyne, Vestal Fire. An Environmental History, Told through Fire,

of Europe and Europe's Encounter with the World (Seattle, University of

Washington Press, 1997)

Richards, John F., The Unending Frontier: Environmental History of the

Early Modern World (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003

Whited, Tamara L. (ed.), Northern Europe. An Environmental History

(Santa Barbara: ABC-Clio, 2005)

New Zealand & Oceania

Polynesian outrigger canoe

Bennett, Judith Ann,Pacific Forest: A History of Resource Control and

Contest in Solomon Islands, c. 1800-1997 (Cambridge and Leiden: White

Horse Press and Brill, 2000)

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Bennett, Judith Ann, Natives and Exotics: World War II and Environment in

the Southern Pacific (Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2009)

Brooking, Tom and Eric Pawson, Environmental Histories of New Zealand

(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002).

James Beattie, "Environmental Anxiety in New Zealand, 1840-1941:

Climate Change, Soil Erosion, Sand Drift, Flooding and Forest

Conservation", Environment and History 9(2003): 379-392

Cassels, R., "The Role of Prehistoric Man in the Faunal Extinctions of New

Zealand and other Pacific Islands", in Martin, P. S. and Klein, R. G. (eds.)

Quaternary Extinctions: A Prehistoric Revolution (Tucson, The University

of Arizona Press, 1984)

D'Arcy, Paul, The People of the Sea: Environment, Identity, and History in

Oceania (Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2006)

Young, David, Our Islands, Our Selves: A History of Conservation in New

Zealand ( Dunedin: Otago University Press, 2004)

Star, Paul, "New Zealand Environmental History: A Question of Attitudes",

Environment and History 9(2003): 463-475

Hughes, J. Donald, "Nature and Culture in the Pacific Islands", Leidschrift,

21 (2006) 1, 129-144.

Hughes, J. Donald, "Tahiti, Hawaii, New Zealand: Polynesian impacts on

Island Ecosystems", in: An Environmental History of the World.

Humankind"s Changing Role in the Community of Life, (London & New

York, Routledge, 2002)

McNeill, John R., "Of Rats and Men. A Synoptic Environmental History of

the Island Pacific", Journal of World History, Vol. 5, no. 2, 299-349

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Bridgman, H. A., "Could climate change have had an influence on the

Polynesian migrations?", Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology,

Palaeoecology, 41(1983) 193-206.

United Kingdom

Beinart, William and Lotte Hughes, Environment and Empire (Oxford,

2007).

Clapp, Brian W., An Environmental History of Britain Since the Industrial

Revolution (London, 1994).

Grove, Richard, Green Imperialism: Colonial Expansion, Tropical IslandEdens and the Origins of Environmentalism, 16001860 (Cambridge, 1994).

Lambert, Robert, Contested Mountains (Cambridge, 2001).

Mosley, Stephen, The Chimney of the World: A History of Smoke Pollution

in Victorian and Edwardian Manchester (White Horse, 2001).

Porter, Dale, The Thames Embankment: Environment, Technology, and

Society in Victorian London, (University of Akron, 1998).

Simmonds, Ian G., Environmental History of Great Britain from 10,000

Years Ago to the Present (Edinburgh, 2001).

Sheail, John, An Environmental History of Twentieth-Century Britain

(Basingstoke, 2002).

Thorsheim, Peter, Inventing Pollution: Coal, Smoke, and Culture in Britain

since 1800 (Ohio University, 2006).

Future

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Old and new human uses of the atmosphere

Environmental history, like all historical studies, shares the hope that through an

examination of past events it may be possible to forge a more considered future. In

particular a greater depth of historical knowledge can inform environmentalcontroversies and guide policy decisions.

The subject continues to provide new perspectives, offering cooperation between

scholars with different disciplinary backgrounds and providing an improved

historical context to resource and environmental problems. There seems little doubt

that, with increasing concern for our environmental future, environmental history

will continue along the path of environmental advocacy from which it originated as

human impact on the living systems of the planet bring us no closer to utopia, but

instead to a crisis of survival[58] with key themes being population growth, climate

change, conflict over environmental policy at different levels of human

organization, extinction, biological invasions, the environmental consequences of

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technology especially biotechnology, the reduced supply of resources - most

notably energy, materials and water. Hughes comments that environmental

historians will find themselves increasingly challenged by the need to explain the

background of the world market economy and its effects on the global environment.

Supranational instrumentalities threaten to overpower conservation in a drive for

what is called sustainable development, but which in fact envisions no limits to

economic growth.[59] Hughes also notes that "environmental history is notably

absent from nations that most adamantly reject US, or Western influences".[60]

Michael Bess sees the world increasingly permeated by potent technologies in a

process he calls artificialization which has been accelerating since the 1700s, but

at a greatly accelerated rate after 1945. Over the next fifty years, this

transformative process stands a good chance of turning our physical world, and our

society, upside-down. Environmental historians can play a vital role in helping

humankind to understand the gale-force of artifice that we have unleashed on our

planet and on ourselves.[61]

Against this background environmental history can give an essential perspective,

offering knowledge of the historical process that led to the present situation, give

examples of past problems and solutions, and an analysis of the historical forces

that must be dealt with[62] or, as expressed by William Cronon, "The viability and

success of new human modes of existing within the constraints of the environment

and its resources requires both an understanding of the past and an articulation of a

new ethic for the future."[63]

DEFINITION OF ENVIORNMENTAL STUDIES

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Environmental Studies is the interdisciplinary study of how humans interact with

their environment. This field examines all aspects of the natural environment,

social environments, politics, ecology, etc., and how they all work together.

NATURE, SCOPE AND IMPORTANCE OF ENVIRONMENTAL

STUDIES-

Environment is sum total of water, air and land, inter-relationships

among themselves and also with the human beings, other living organisms and

property. In order to study environment one needs knowledge inputs from various

disciplines.At the threshold of the 21st century, we are confronted with two conflicting

scenario for the future of human kind. On one hand, there are possibilities of a

bright future with press button living, space shuttles, information technology,

genetic engineering and such other advances in science and technology. On the

other hand, a grim scenario is looming large with burgeoning population, starved

of resources and choked by pollution. Faced with such imminent threat, there is a

growing realization that rational utilization of environmental endowments of life

support systems like water, air and soil is a must for sustainable development.

Academic disciplines are created to help us understand the universe better. While

nature can be understood using the disciplines, it not divided into disciplines. For

instance, a certain phenomenon may be referred to as a chemical change while

another as a physical one. But these categories are only perceptions.

Environmental studies is about the environment. Not the environment from the

point of view of any one particular discipline, but a study and understanding of the

interlink-ages- the complex ways in which one phenomenon, one action, is

connected to another, how the same thing can be understood from different

perspectives, perspectives often rooted in different disciplines.

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The problems of pollution and wanton degradation of environmental resources

cannot be solved without proper understanding of their causes and effects.

Alongside, it is necessary to build up professional capabilities to develop and adopt

policies, measures and programs for environmental studies.

For the students of management schools, who are future managers of business in

different sectors of economic growth and social welfare, it is appropriate to have

an introduction to environmental studies.

It is absolutely the truth that environmental degradation is increasingly

undermining over lives. One of the most urgent tasks of our times to understand

the implications of environmental damage and resource depletion that we witness

today. We cannot ignore study of relationship between ecological devastation and

deteriorating human conditions.

We must learn how to manage our environment, resource utilization and

ecosystem. The students, teachers, general public and leaders, workers and

executives and government as well as non-governmental organizations, all have to

be sensitive to environmental issues. Not only that, they have to be fully aware of

environmental consequences, of their actions, habits and attitudes. In such a

scenario, it is difficult to think of a timelier introduction of this subject in the

matter of study for modern management courses. Environmental studies not only

represents but also promotes the principles of environmental management.

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Some of the environmental issues are perplex. It is through this perplexity, we need

to bring out a comprehensive study which would be useful both for educational

institutions and corporate world.

ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE OR STUDIES?

Environmental science in its broadest sense is the science of complex interactions

that occurs among the terrestrial, atmospheric, living and anthropological

environments. It includes all the disciplines, such as chemistry, biology, sociology

and government that affect or describe these interactions.

In broadest sense, environmental science may be defined as the study of the earth,

air, water and living environments and the effects of technology thereon. To a

significant degree, environmental science has evolved from investigations of the

ways by which, and place in which living organisms carry out their life cycles.

This is the discipline of natural history, which in recent time has evolved into

ecology, the study of environmental factors that affect organisms and how

organisms interact with these factors and with each other.

Traditionally, environmental science is divided among the study of the atmosphere,

the hydrosphere, the geosphere and the biosphere.

Environmental science is now a mature, viable discipline. The past three decades

have witnessed a growing awareness of the affects of human activity upon our

earths resources and during this period environmental study has emerged as a

multi-disciplinary field of study to examine the interaction of the people and their

environments

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SCOPE:

A study of environmental science is getting lot of attention not only in the field of

pollution control but also to sustain the life and nature.

It helps us to understand the nature of environment and its components, nature of

disturbing factors and the various methods to overcome disturbing factors. The

disturbing factors pressurize sustainability and natural living.

The scope of environmental science and its management has increased from

manufacturing pollution control equipment, sewage and effluent treatment plants,

biomedical waste treatment and fly ash management.

The subject is multidisciplinary in nature. It unfolds environmental issues for those

who are directly or indirectly concerned with this discipline. The corporate leaders,

the students of universities and colleges and the student-managers realize that

environmental protection and resource conservation have to be considered as a

normal part of conducting business and understanding nature. Similarly

environmental concern has to a part of policy for the various governmental

organizations. And same is true for public leaders whose sensitization is vital in

this regard. Issues of environmental protection and Right for Clean Environment

have already trickled down from educated and affluent people to the general

public. Those who are not economically well off are equally affected, if not more

due to environmental problems. Thus environmental concerns have to be on the

agenda of all organizations.

In India, we have been witnessing significant environmental degradation during the

last few decades. Increasing industrialization, high-intensity agriculture, (use of

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fertilizers and pesticides) deforestation, soil erosion, urbanization, transportation

and population growth are the major environmental problems and these are likely

to increase. If the desire to lead higher living standard also increases, then problem

would be too acute to be manageable.

Industry has significant role in environmental protection. More and more business

executives have now identified environment as issue that affect their companies.

It is believed by the scientists and the leaders in industry that if we do not come to

grip with environmental issues, irreversible process would have been set in that

would ultimately lead to human suffering not in the countries of South but also the

North. Most of the environmental problems are well known though we may not

have found solution for all. The problems are both global and national and all these

pose serious challenges not only to our planet but also to our way of life. Human

beings are not separate entity. They are part of the surrounding, our ecosystem- air,

water, land, not only that but one cannot think of human survival if the services

provided by the environment dont become available. Without a suitable habitat

neither animals nor plants nor human can survive. If the habit is

degraded/damaged, life would be adversely affected. Since the environment

provides all the resources that are used in the process of production of goods or

services, the responsibility of industry is of paramount consideration. Industry not

only has to consider issues like profit, quality standards, legislation and regulatory

controls but has to go a step beyond.

Our natural resources are either renewable or non-renewable, the later have to be

conserved and the use of former to be judicious. Besides the issue of resources, our

living style, rate of consumption and disposal of waste have created problems for

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manufacturing, marketing and management of landfills for wasters, air quality,

water table and many other environmental problems.

In short scope of environmental studies is broad based and it encompasses a large

number of areas and aspects, broadly listed below:

Natural Resources- their conservation and management

Ecology and biodiversity

Environmental pollution and control

Social issues in relation to development and environment

Human population and environment

IMPORTANCE:

There is a proverb If you plan for one year, plant rice, if you plan for 10 years,

plant trees and if you plan for 100 years, educate people. If we wish to manage

our planet earth, we have to make all the persons environmentally educated.

The study of environmental science makes us understand the scientific basis for

establishing a standard which can be considered acceptably safe, clean and healthy

for man and natural ecosystem. Natural ecosystem includes both physical and

natural science.

Most environmental scientists agree that if pollution and other environmental

deterrents continue at their present rates, the result will be irreversible damage to

the ecological cycles and balances in nature upon which all life depends.

Environmental scientists warn that fundamental, and perhaps drastic, changes in

human behaviour will be required to avert an ecological crisis.

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To safeguard the healthful environment that is essential to life, humans must learn

that Earth does not have infinite resources. Earths limited resources must be

conserved and, where possible, reused. Furthermore, humans must devise new

strategies that mesh environmental progress with economic growth. The future

growth of developing nations depends upon the development of sustainable

conservation methods that protect the environment while also meeting the basic

needs of citizens.

An environmental study is the subject in which we examine important issues

relating to environment as they affect our lives. It is an exploratory description of

issues. Each issue can be probed more deeply.

Environmental studies is very important but most neglected body of knowledge. It

concerns itself with life support system and is very closely related with

development and economic growth. Many a time both development and economic

growth are not easily reconciled. We have to choose between environment and

development.

It has been the reality that the industrial countries have high level of development

and decent standard of living at the expense of environment and depletion of

natural resources. The real question is how long is the Mother Earth likely suffer

and how long this kind of development will be sustainable? Developing countries

on the other hand are still struggling to achieve a minimum standard of living

though they are also equally contributing to environmental damage.

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Both, industrialized and underdeveloped or developing countries, damage, deplete

and pollute the environment. Developing countries want accelerated growth to

fulfill their basic needs and real question is should they follow footsteps are

their big brothers, yes Developed countries? This is a bear fact that both the

consumption and life-style of people have direct relations to environmental

problems. Therefore, living habits and attitudinal and ethical questions have

now cropped up which are main concerns for Environmental Studies. These

issues are controversial and need deep study to help us understand the

environmental problems.

The most important questions that bother every developing country is what should

be the ideal combination of pattern of growth and development, which Model

of development as well as of business should be followed so that we do not

ignore the principle that underlie sustainability. For the above, we need change at

local, national, regional and global levels together with an economic and social

transformation at the levels of individuals and communities.

This subject forms part of Business Environment. Business Environment is divided

into two categories viz. External and Internal Environment. External environment

include political, economic, social, legal, technological, international and natural

environment. On the other hand, Internal Environment includes people, culture,

work ethics and attitudes.

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Weather cycles erratic, rising temperatures, towns flooded and depletion of natural

resources. With unorganisiert growing and uncontrolled development,

environment, science has become an important channel for students today.

In recent years, the environment, science as an important discipline, offer

solutions to environmental problems, said Associate Professor in the Department

of Environmental Sciences at the University of Andhra, Byragi Reddy. Several

scientific disciplines as biochemistry, physics, mathematics, biotechnology,

chemistry, botany, toxicology, remote sensing and engineering have an inter-face

with the scientific environment.

Environmental science is important for economy and welfare of human society.

It helps us in careful handling of the issues like pollution, overexploitation of

natural resources, food security and sustainable development.

Excessive use of agrochemicals has degraded the environment and has disturbed

the ecological balance.

Environmental science helps us to find ways and means to maintain the ecological

balance.

It demonstrate how man can derive benefits from environment without destroying

It trains us to conserve ours fast depleting natural resources.

It helps to understand different food chain and ecological balance in nature.

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It directs attention towards the problems of population explosion, depletion of

natural resources Importance of Environmental Science

I

Photo: K.R. Deepak

SHOW SOME CONCERN: Take care of the environment and it will take

care of you.

Erratic weather cycles, increasing temperatures, flooded cities and depleting

natural resources. With increasing unorganised and uncontrolled development,

environmental science has become an important course of study for students today.

"In recent years environmental science has emerged as an important discipline that

can offer solutions to many environmental problems," said Associate Professor at

the department of environmental sciences in Andhra University, Byragi Reddy.

Several scientific disciplines like biochemistry, physics, mathematics,biotechnology, chemistry, botany, toxicology, remote sensing and engineering

have an inter-face with environmental science.

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of urban planning including the construction of houses, sanitation, water

management and waste disposal. Apart from the routine study and research options

environmental science students today can secure jobs in pollution control boards,

public health laboratories, irrigation and agriculture department, chemical

industries, research industries such as Central Drug Research Institute, Central

Institute for Medicinal and Aromatic Plants, Industrial Toxicology Research

Centre, National Environmental Engineering Research Institute, Environment

Protection and Training Research Institute and Tata Energy Research Institute and

students can also develop their own laboratories for analytical work in non-

governmental sectors. "The Supreme Court judgement has made the study of

environmental science compulsory for all students from school to postgraduate

level," he said. This has also opened numerous teaching options for environmental

science students. Students also have avenues in wildlife conservation.

The `green' science has also found its way into engineering programmes and

institutions such as Andhra University College of Engineering, Delhi College of

Engineering and L.D. College of Engineering, Gujrat University offer

specialisation in environmental science engineering.