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Biodiversity and Native America
Exploring the relationship between Native Americans and the natural world, Biodiversity and Native America questions the widespread view that indigenous peoples had minimal ecological impact in North America. Introducing a variety of perspectives - ethnopharmacological, ethnographic, archaeological, and biological - this volume shows that Native Americans were active managers of natural ecological systems. The book covers groups from the sophisticated agriculturalists of the Mississippi River drainage region to the low-density hunter-gatherers of arid western North America.
This book allows readers to develop accurate restoration, management, and conservation models through a thorough knowledge of native peoples’ ecological history and dynamics. It also illustrates how indigenous peoples affected environmental patterns and processes, improving crop diversity and agricultural patterns.
This book allows readers to develop accurate restoration, management, and conservation models through a thorough knowledge of native peoples’ ecological history and dynamics. It also illustrates how indigenous peoples affected environmental patterns and processes, improving crop diversity and agricultural patterns.
- GenresIndigenous
310 pages, Paperback
First published July 1, 2000
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
August 3, 2015
Re-evaluating “wild” landscapes
There are many ethnobotanical texts detailing the edible, medicinal, or utilitarian properties of North American plants by Native Americans, yet little discussion of how those plants might have been managed in the ecosystem. It is often assumed that North America was a vast, untamed wilderness and native peoples simply utilized whatever they were lucky enough to find. However, there is a growing awareness that Native Americans were actually managing significant tracts of land to favor useful plant and animal species. Thus the “wilderness” documented by western observers often wasn’t true wilderness, but a carefully tended landscape.
Biodiversity and Native America offers a tantalizing glimpse of what some of these landscapes might have looked like and how native peoples managed them. The book is a compilation of scholarly papers, each one documenting a different culture and some of their land management practices. The consensus of the authors is that this area of study has been badly neglected by past ethnographers and that more awareness is needed to record and learn from Native American land management practices before that information is lost forever.
There are many ethnobotanical texts detailing the edible, medicinal, or utilitarian properties of North American plants by Native Americans, yet little discussion of how those plants might have been managed in the ecosystem. It is often assumed that North America was a vast, untamed wilderness and native peoples simply utilized whatever they were lucky enough to find. However, there is a growing awareness that Native Americans were actually managing significant tracts of land to favor useful plant and animal species. Thus the “wilderness” documented by western observers often wasn’t true wilderness, but a carefully tended landscape.
Biodiversity and Native America offers a tantalizing glimpse of what some of these landscapes might have looked like and how native peoples managed them. The book is a compilation of scholarly papers, each one documenting a different culture and some of their land management practices. The consensus of the authors is that this area of study has been badly neglected by past ethnographers and that more awareness is needed to record and learn from Native American land management practices before that information is lost forever.
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April 17, 2013I love having all these writers in a volume which delves into specific people and places all over North America. I get this incredible picture of people just doing their thing all over the continent, and encouraging all kinds of biodiversity at the same time. Read on the heels of Shepherd Kretch's Ecological Indian, this seems to be the argument to which he was reacting. Since both arguments are about the people => environment direction of influence, I'd say they're sort of on the same page in the end.
Some great articles and not-quite-so-great articles in here, but overall I wished the chapters were more powerful. The overviews are quite nice, but few of them approach a detailed argument for what they're suggesting--incorporating traditional Native land management strategies into modern U.S., Mexican and Canadian bureaucracy. That would be cool. But how to do it?
Some great articles and not-quite-so-great articles in here, but overall I wished the chapters were more powerful. The overviews are quite nice, but few of them approach a detailed argument for what they're suggesting--incorporating traditional Native land management strategies into modern U.S., Mexican and Canadian bureaucracy. That would be cool. But how to do it?
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews