The Oxford Handbook of Environmental History

出版者:Oxford University Press

作者:Andrew C. Isenberg

页数:800

出版时间:2014-10-16

价格:USD 160.00

装帧:Hardcover

isbn号码:9780195324907

具体描述

- Follows the evolution of environmental history from the periphery to the mainstream of academic studies.

- Authors both review past developments in environmental history and project future trends.

- Original articles by 27 authors.

The field of environmental history emerged just decades ago but has established itself as one of the most innovative and important new approaches to history, one that bridges the human and natural world, the humanities and the sciences. With the current trend towards internationalizing history, environmental history is perhaps the quintessential approach to studying subjects outside the nation-state model, with pollution, global warming, and other issues affecting the earth not stopping at national borders. With 25 essays, this Handbook is global in scope and innovative in organization, looking at the field thematically through such categories as climate, disease, oceans, the body, energy, consumerism, and international relations.

作者简介

Andrew C. Isenberg is Professor of History at Temple University. He is the author of The Destruction of the Bison: An Environmental History, 1750-1920, Mining California: An Ecological History, and Wyatt Earp: A Vigilante Life, and the editor of The Nature of Cities: Culture, Landscape, and Urban Space.

CONTRIBUTORS:

Thomas Andrews, University of Colorado at Boulder

Emily Brock, University of South Carolina

Kathleen A. Brosnan, University of Oklahoma

Mark Carey, University of Oregon

Connie Y. Chiang, Bowdoin College

Lawrence Culver, Utah State University

Diana K. Davis, University of California, Davis

William Deverell, University of Southern California

Kurk Dorsey, University of New Hampshire

Andrew R. Graybill, Southern Methodist University

Marcus Hall, University of Zurich

Andrew C. Isenberg, Temple University

Matthew Klingle, Bowdoin College

Nancy Langston, Michigan Technological University

Thomas Lekan, University of South Carolina

Michael Lewis, Salisbury University

Linda Nash, University of Washington

Sara B. Pritchard, Cornell University

Steven Stoll, Fordham University

Paul S. Sutter, University of Colorado at Boulder

James Morton Turner, Wellesley College

Nancy C. Unger, Santa Clara University

Brett Walker, Montana State University

Louis Warren, University of California, Davis

Frank Zelko, University of Vermont

Thomas Zeller, University of Maryland, College Park

目录信息

Acknowledgments
Contributors
Introduction: A New Environmental History, Andrew C. Isenberg
Part I: Dynamic Environments and Cultures
1. Beyond Weather: The Culture and Politics of Climate History, Mark Carey
2. Animals and the Intimacy of History, Brett L. Walker
3. Beyond Virgin Soils: Disease as Environmental History, Linda Nash
4. Deserts, Diana K. Davis
5. Seas of Grass: Grasslands in World Environmental History, Andrew C. Isenberg
6. New Patterns in Old Places: Forest History for the Global Present, Emily Brock
7. The Tropics: A Brief History of an Environmental Imaginary, Paul S. Sutter
Part II: Knowing Nature
8. And All Was Light? Science and Environmental History, Michael Lewis
9. Toward an Environmental History of Technology, Sara B. Pritchard
10. New Chemical Bodies: Synthetic Chemicals, Regulation, and Human Health, Nancy Langston
11. Rethinking American Exceptionalism: Toward a Trans-National History of Parks, Wilderness, and Protected Areas, James Morton Turner
12. Restoration and the Search for Counter-Narratives, Marcus Hall
13. Region, Scenery, and Power: Cultural Landscapes in Environmental History, Thomas Lekan and Thomas Zeller
Part III: Working and Owning
14. A Metabolism of Society: Capitalism for Environmental Historians, Steven Stoll
15. Owning Nature: Towards an Environmental History of Private Property, Louis Warren
16. Work, Nature, and History: A Single Question, that Once Moved Like Light, Thomas G. Andrews
17. The Nature of Desire: Consumption in Environmental History, Matthew Klingle
18. Law and the Environment, Kathleen Brosnan
19. Confluences of Nature and Culture: Cities in Environmental History, Lawrence Culver
Part IV: Entangling Alliances
20. Race and Ethnicity in Environmental History, Connie Y. Chiang
21. Women and Gender: Useful Categories of Analysis in Environmental History, Nancy C. Unger
22. Conquest to Convalescence: Nature and Nation in United States History, William Deverell
23. Boundless Nature: Borders and the Environment in North America and Beyond, Andrew R. Graybill
24. Crossing Boundaries: The Environment in International Relations, Kurk Dorsey
25. The Politics of Nature, Frank Zelko
Index
· · · · · · (收起)

用户评价

这本书的叙事节奏和语言风格，与其说是严谨的学术论著，不如说更像是一场精心编排的、跨越时空的田野考察报告。我尤其欣赏作者在处理不同地理区域案例时的那种细腻入微的笔触。比如，关于热带雨林被开垦的历史叙事，就与探讨北美大平原牧场化过程的叙述方式截然不同，前者充满了对生物多样性流失的痛惜与反思，后者则着重探讨了土地产权制度和移民文化对生态格局的决定性影响。我感觉自己仿佛跟随作者的脚步，穿梭在亚马逊的密林与中原的黄土地之间，亲眼见证着人类工具的进步如何同时成为自然界枷锁的加重。书中那些关于“地方性知识”如何被宏大叙事所压制和遗忘的论述，让我深有感触。这不仅仅是关于树木和河流的故事，更是关于权力、文化和身份认同如何在地理空间上刻下烙印的深度解读。

读完这部作品，我感觉自己对“进步”这个概念产生了深刻的怀疑。书中对近代以来，尤其是在欧洲中心主义视角下所推崇的那些“征服自然”的叙事进行了无情的解构。作者通过一系列令人不安的案例研究，揭示了技术爆炸式发展背后隐藏的生态代价，这些代价往往由那些没有发言权的群体承担。例如，关于特定矿产资源开采的历史，清晰地展示了环境退化是如何与阶级压迫和殖民扩张交织在一起的。这种将环境问题与社会正义紧密捆绑的写作手法，极大地拓宽了我的视野，让我意识到，环保议题绝不只是保护几只濒危动物那么简单，它本质上是对我们社会结构和价值体系的一次深刻反思。这种批判性的力量，使得这本书不仅具有学术价值，更具有强烈的现实意义和道德召唤力。

坦白说，这本书的学术密度极高，阅读起来需要极大的专注力，但正是这种挑战性，带来了知识的密集回馈。不同于那些只聚焦于气候变化或污染议题的通俗读物，它提供了一个极其坚实的理论框架，将环境史置于更广阔的社会学、经济学和哲学语境中进行定位。书中关于“人地关系”理论的梳理和批判，堪称教科书级别。我特别留意了其中对于“环境决定论”的辩驳，作者没有简单地将环境视为塑造人类命运的唯一力量，而是强调了人类主体性在应对环境压力时的能动作用。这种辩证的视角，避免了将历史简化为简单的因果链条。每一次当我以为我已经理解了某个历史阶段的环境压力时，作者总能引出一个新的变量——比如瘟疫的爆发、新的贸易路线的开辟——来证明环境史的复杂性和多重驱动性。

翻开这本厚重的著作，我首先被它宏大的叙事视野所震撼。作者仿佛是一位手持望远镜的史学家，从人类文明的黎明时分就开始审视我们与自然界错综复杂的关系。书中对早期农业社会如何重塑了地貌，以及工业革命如何以前所未有的速度改变了生态系统的描述，都展现出一种深沉的历史洞察力。阅读过程中，我不断地停下来思考，原来我们习以为常的“自然环境”，本身就是人类历史活动的结果，而非一个静止不变的背景板。特别是关于水资源管理的历史演变那一部分，作者细致地剖析了不同文明在应对干旱与洪涝时的智慧与失败，那些古老的灌溉系统和水利工程的兴衰史，读来简直就是一部部关于人类韧性与傲慢的史诗。这本书的价值在于，它强迫你跳出当下的、碎片化的环境问题，将其置于漫长的时间轴上进行审视，从而明白许多当代的环境挑战，其根源可以追溯到几个世纪乃至几千年前的决策与生活方式。

全书的结构安排也体现了一种精妙的平衡艺术。它既有宏观的理论建构，又有微观的个案分析，使得抽象的理论不再悬浮于空中，而是扎根于具体的、可感知的历史场景之中。我尤其喜欢它在章节末尾常常设置的引人深思的开放性问题，这不像是在做一个总结，更像是在邀请读者参与到这场持续进行中的历史对话中去。对我个人而言，最受触动的是作者对“时间尺度”的处理——我们习惯于用十年或二十年来衡量变化，而环境史则要求我们用世纪甚至千年为单位去感受生态系统的惰性和韧性。这种时间观的转变，让我对当下那些看似刻不容缓的环境危机，有了一种更为冷静和长远的应对心态，它没有提供简单的解决方案，但提供了理解问题的最佳透镜。