New Books In Environmental Studies

In Imperial Desert Dreams: Cotton Growing and Irrigation in Central Asia, 1860-1991 (V & R Unipress, 2017), Julia Obertreis explores the infrastructural, technical, and environmental aspects of the history of cotton agriculture and irrigation in Soviet Central Asia. Based on published sources and archival research conducted in Tashkent, Obertreis’ monograph offers new insights into the nature of Russian Imperial and Soviet statecraft, as well as the technical and ideological motivations behind the transformation of the Central Asian environment. This book is valuable reading for anyone interested in Russia and Central Asia, past or present. Nicholas Seay is a PhD student at The Ohio State University. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/environmental-studies

Brian Greene is a Professor of Mathematics and Physics at Columbia University in the City of New York, where he is the Director of the Institute for Strings, Cosmology, and Astroparticle Physics, and co-founder and chair of the World Science Festival. He is well known for his TV mini-series about string theory and the nature of reality, including the Elegant Universe, which tied in with his best-selling 2000 book of the same name. In this episode, we talk about his latest popular book Until the End of Time: Mind, Matter, and Our Search for Meaning in an Evolving Universe (Random House, 2020) Until the End of Time gives the reader a theory of everything, both in the sense of a “state of the academic union”, covering cosmology and evolution, consciousness and computation, and art and religion, and in the sense of showing us a way to apprehend the often existentially challenging subject matter. Greene uses evocative autobiographical vignettes in the book to personalize his famously lucid and accessible explanati

How are the far-away, invisible landscapes where materials come from related to the highly visible, urban landscapes where those same materials are installed? Reciprocal Landscapes: Stories of Material Movements traces five everyday landscape construction materials – fertilizer, stone, steel, trees, and wood – from seminal public landscapes in New York City, back to where they came from. Jane Hutton's new book Reciprocal Landscapes: Stories of Material Movements (Routledge, 2020) considers the social, political, and ecological entanglements of material practice, challenging readers to think of materials not as inert products but as continuous with land and the people that shape them, and to reimagine forms of construction in solidarity with people, other species, and landscapes elsewhere. Jane Hutton is a landscape architect and Assistant Professor in the School of Architecture at the University of Waterloo Ontario, Canada. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by bec

Landscape of Migration: Mobility and Environmental Change on Bolivia's Tropical Frontier, 1952 to the Present (UNC Press, 2020), traces the entwined histories of Andean, Mennonite, and Okinawan migrants to Amazonian Bolivia during the twentieth century, exploring how each of these communities forged and contested the landscape of agrarian citizenship in the country. The lowlands around Santa Cruz became a focal point for high modernist development projects in Bolivia, and as Ben Nobbs-Thiessen argues, such a vision of development was appealing to a broad range of actors: both the left(ish) Revolutionary Nationalist Movement, in power from 1952-1964, as well as the (often) right wing military governments that succeeded it, were deeply concerned with developing Bolivia through colonization of of the lowlands. Starting in the 1970s, however, as the state started to pull back from the day to day operations of such projects, it opened up space for NGOs and what Nobbs-Thiessen calls, "faith-based development practi

Adam M. Sowards is professor of history at the University of Idaho and a leading environmental historian. His new book, An Open Pit Visible from the Moon: The Wilderness Act and the Fight to Protect Miners Ridge and the Public Interest (University of Oklahoma Press, 2020), builds on his recent biography of Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas to describe what happened when a major copper corporation set out its plans to establish a massive mine in Washington state. With the Wilderness Act (1964) unable to protect this area of outstanding beauty, conservationists set out to apply moral rather than legal strategies of resistance. This excellent new book shows how ordinary citizens banded together to achieve what the law could not – and how market forces ultimately worked to save Miners Ridge. Crawford Gribben is a professor of history at Queen’s University Belfast. His research interests focus on the history of puritanism and evangelicalism, and he is the author most recently of John Owen and English Purita

Challenging the popular image of Buddhism as a religion intrinsically concerned with the environment, Dr. John Elverskog’s new monograph, The Buddha’s Footprint: An Environmental History of Asia (University of Pennsylvania Press 2020), demonstrates that Buddhist institutions across Asia have actually been intimately connected to the accumulation of wealth, the consumption and exploitation of natural resources, and urbanization. What drives these acts, Dr. Elverskog argues, is a prosperity theology that is central to the Buddha Dharma, which regards wealth as a sign of positive karma. Calling into question the stereotypical understanding of Buddhism as an ascetic, apolitical, and contemplative tradition, this book investigates not only monks but also how the laity and the Buddhist states participated in the generation of wealth for religious merit. Dr. Elverskog points out that The Buddha’s Footprint is not “arguing that Buddhism and environmental thought and action are antithetical or that Buddhism cannot be

In Political Fallout: Nuclear Weapons Testing and the Making of a Global Environmental Crisis (Stanford University Press, 2020), Toshihiro Higuchi presents a history of the 1963 Partial Test Ban Treaty, by which the then-nuclear powers, US, USSR, and UK, agreed to cease, among other things, the atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons, largely moving such tests underground (the Chinese and French continued atmospheric tests in subsequent decades). Higuchi examines the development of knowledge about nuclear fallout, the dissemination and often suppression (mostly by governments of the nuclear powers) of that knowledge during the eighteen years book-ended by the 1945 Trinity Test and the signing of the 1963 Treaty. Political Fallout also considers the legacy of the Partial Test Ban Treaty, which reduced fallout but was followed by an accelerated arms race and buildup of nuclear arsenals. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksn

In 2014, the cattle rancher Cliven Bundy entered the national spotlight after a showdown against federal officials over grazing rights on public lands. Two years later, his sons seized the Malheur Wildlife Refuge in Oregon and occupied it for forty days with militia and sovereign citizen groups. As journalists rushed to the scene, trying to make sense of the motivations behind their anti-government politics, Betsy Gaines Quammen, a historian working on her history Ph.D., knew something was amiss. She had spent hours at the Bundy home, interviewing them for her dissertation on Mormon settlement in the West. She knew the Bundy’s rooted their politics in their Mormon faith, but their religious attitudes made few popular headlines. In her new book, American Zion: Cliven Bundy, God & Public Lands in the West (Torrey House Press, 2020), Quammen situates the Bundy standoff within the long and convoluted history of Mormon migration into the American West—and provides an exciting new take on religion in modern America

Old-growth forests captivate and inspire us. Walking through them can transport us to a time before human domination of the natural world. This is especially the case with old-growth forests in the eastern part of the United States, a region with a long history of profound human disturbances of ecological regimes. Beyond their role as inspiration, old growth serves important ecological functions regionally and globally. These forests also provide several practical services to humans. How do scientists define old-growth forests? How can non-experts identify old forests and understand their importance locally and globally? These are some of the topics covered in Ecology and Recovery of Eastern Old-Growth Forests (Island Press, 2018) an anthology edited by Andrew Barton and William Keeton. Ecology and Recovery of Eastern Old-Growth Forests (Island Press, 2018) is a perfect book for readers who want to learn the fundamentals of forest ecology and old growth in the east. Over thirty experts contributed to the book

Your building has the potential to change the world. Existing buildings consume approximately 40 percent of the energy and emit nearly half of the carbon dioxide in the US each year. In recognition of the significant contribution of buildings to climate change, the idea of building green has become increasingly popular. But is it enough? If an energy-efficient building is new construction, it may take 10 to 80 years to overcome the climate change impacts of the building process. New buildings are sexy, but few realize the value in existing buildings and how easy it is to get to “zero energy” or low-energy consumption through deep energy retrofits. Existing buildings can and should be retrofit to reduce environmental impacts that contribute to climate change, while improving human health and productivity for building occupants. In The Power of Existing Buildings: Save Money, Improve Health, and Reduce Environmental Impacts (Island Press, 2019), academic sustainability expert Robert Sroufe, and construction and

During the early 1970s, a movement of rank-and-file coal miners rose up in Appalachia to challenge mine bosses and stodgy union officials. They sought greater control over the workplace and a broadened vision of industrial power. Calling themselves the “Miners For Democracy,” these reformers gained short-lived control over the union’s top leadership and earned a legacy for militant unionism. But what about coal miners in the expanding coalfields of the American West? In his new book Carbon County, USA: Miners for Democracy in Utah and the West (University of Utah Press, 2020), Christian Wright recovers the story of western miners who joined the Miners For Democracy and challenged their anti-union employers in Utah’s historic mining communities. These struggles, he says, provide an object lesson for us all about the frontlines of labor and climate justice. Ryan Driskell Tate is a Ph.D. candidate in United States history at Rutgers University. He is completing a book on fossil-fuels and energy development in th

How we design our cities over the next four decades will be critical for our planet. If we continue to spill excessive greenhouse gas into the atmosphere, we will run out of time to keep our global temperature from increasing. Since approximately 80% of greenhouse gases come from cities, it follows that in the design of cities lies the fate of the world. As urban designers respond to the critical issue of climate change they must also address three cresting cultural waves: the worldwide rural-to-urban migration; the collapse of global fertility rates; and the disappearance of the middle class. In Five Rules for Tomorrow's Cities: Design in an Age of Urban Migration, Demographic Change, and a Disappearing Middle Class (Island Press, 2020) planning and design expert Patrick Condon explains how urban designers can assimilate these interconnected changes into their work. Condon shows how the very things that constrain cities—climate change, migration, financial stress, population change—could actually enable the

Slavery and the University: Histories and Legacies (University of Georgia Press, 2019), edited by Leslie M. Harris, James T. Campbell, and Alfred L. Brophy, is the first edited collection of scholarly essays devoted solely to the histories and legacies of this subject on North American campuses and in their Atlantic contexts. Gathering together contributions from scholars, activists, and administrators, the volume combines two broad bodies of work: (1) historically based interdisciplinary research on the presence of slavery at higher education institutions in terms of the development of proslavery and antislavery thought and the use of slave labor; and (2) analysis on the ways in which the legacies of slavery in institutions of higher education continued in the post–Civil War era to the present day. The collection features broadly themed essays on issues of religion, economy, and the regional slave trade of the Caribbean. It also includes case studies of slavery’s influence on specific institutions, such as P

For somewhat unfortunate reasons, many more people in the world now know about the existence and location of a city called Wuhan than was the case at the start of 2020. But most of these likely remain unaware of just how pivotal a role Wuhan has played in many events in China’s recent history. Almost 90 years ago the city was at the epicentre of a major flood which, while being quite a different kind of disaster from today’s pandemic, similarly laid bare the complexities of the society which sought to deal with it. Chris Courtney’s The Nature of Disaster in China: The 1931 Yangzi River Flood (Cambridge University Press, 2018) takes us deep into the world of Wuhan during this cataclysmic period, exploring the flood from numerous different angles – environmental, social, cultural and institutional to name a few. These different perspectives on an event of such vast scale are revelatory in their own right, but also shed light on Chinese and global affairs at a fascinating and important juncture of history, and o

Emerging out of a 2016 conference, Andra Chastain and Timothy Lorek have brought together Environmental History, Latin American Studies, and Science and Technology Studies in a single volume that reshapes scholarly understandings of Latin America’s Long Cold War. Rather than emphasize diplomatic, social or cultural histories of conflict, this volume emphasizes the roles of “experts” who cast themselves as apolitical technocrats just working on the ground. Chastain and Lorek’s book argues that experts and the networks in which they traveled significantly shaped geopolitical agendas, local cultures, and were in fact central to the history of the Cold War. The essays in Itineraries of Expertise: Science, Technology, and the Environment in Latin America (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2020) focus on Chile, Mexico, Cuba, and Peru, in order to explore how knowledge circulated regionally as well as locally and globally. Essay topics vary from the space race to the Green Revolution, and from the Santiago Metro to Ub

Jacob Blanc’s Before the Flood: The Itaipu Dam and the Visibility of Rural Brazil (Duke University Press, 2019) tells the story of the the Itaipu dam, a massive hydroelectric complex built on the Brazil-Paraguay border in the 1970s and 1980s. The book is structurally and conceptually ambitious, but so readable that it will fit well in both graduate and advanced undergraduate classrooms. Blanc uses this story of a single megaproject to open up new questions about dictatorship, democracy, and the environment in Brazil through the analytic of rural visibility. Since Itaipu was the largest dam in the world and a physical embodiment of the military’s geopolitical ambitions, rural protests against the dam became a referendum on a dictatorship itself in ways that made rural Brazilians important political actors. But, as Blanc argues, the dam project not only displaced forty thousand rural inhabitants, it made those inhabitants invisible as members of the national community. Blanc follows the stories of those displac

Phoebe Lickwar and Roxi Thoren's book Farmscape: The Design of Productive Landscapes (Routledge, 2020) situates agriculture as a design practice, using a wide range of international case studies and analytical essays to propose lessons for contemporary landscape architects who are interested in integrating agriculture into their designs. Agricultural processes, technologies, and cycles have long shaped landscape architectural projects, from the ornamented farm of the eighteenth century, to contemporary projects that integrate agriculture and ecological restoration. The book describes the history of agriculture within landscape architecture and reveals the diversity of current design practices that use the rhythms and forms of agriculture to create productive farms that are also sites of beauty, community, ecological conservation, remediation, and pleasure. Highly illustrated in full colour, this book provides essential context, resources, and best practice examples of rural and periurban designed sites for pr

In Corridor Ecology: Linking Landscapes for Biodiversity Conservation and Climate Adaptation, 2nd Edition (Island Press, 2019), Dr. Jodi Hilty and her co-authors expand on concepts and practices important to maintaining and restoring land connectivity. In the book and during the interview, Dr. Hilty discusses how the field as evolved over the last 15 years. She highlights a newer part of the field, Climate-wise connectivity. Climate-wise connectivity considers the effects of climate change on habitat and offers recommendations on designing effective corridors as landscapes change with shifting climate conditions In this lively interview, Dr. Hilty describes the consequences of fragmented landscapes and defines corridors. We talk about the biological and human benefits of corridors as well as the design objectives of practitioners like herself. As she tasks listeners travelling through successful projects connecting landscapes, Dr. Hilty also speaks honestly about potential pitfalls or disadvantages of linking

Wenfei Tong's Bird Love: The Family Life of Birds (Princeton University Press, 2020) looks at the extraordinary range of mating systems in the avian world, exploring all the stages from courtship and nest-building to protecting eggs and raising chicks. It delves into the reasons why some species, such as the wattled jacana, rely on males to do all the childcare, while others, such as cuckoos and honeyguides, dump their eggs in the nests of others to raise. For some birds, reciprocal promiscuity pays off: both male and female dunnocks will rear the most chicks by mating with as many partners as possible. For others, long-term monogamy is the only way to ensure their offspring survive. The book explores the wide variety of ways birds make sure they find a mate in the first place, including how many male birds employ elaborate tactics to show how sexy they are. Gathering in leks to display to females, they dance, pose, or parade to sell their suitability as a mate. Other birds attract a partner with their buildi

Carlo Caduff’s The Pandemic Perhaps: Dramatic Events in a Public Culture of Danger (University of California Press, 2015) is an ethnographic inquiry into pandemic anxieties in the mid-2000s when such an event was widely anticipated by experts. Examining how experts in the United States framed a catastrophe that has not happened yet, the book trains a lens on the many generative ways in which the absence of a disease made preparedness a permanent project. Drawing on fieldwork among scientists and public health professionals in New York City, the book investigates how experts, government actors and institutions co-produced pandemic prophecies that were made meaningful to communities on the ground through the framework of catastrophe. Centered on the question how to engage a disease such as influenza in anticipation of potential crisis, this monograph analyses the infelicities of failure and the limits of planning. The pandemic - past, present and future – is arguably always with us, even in its absence. In this