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April 25 Conservation applications of forest history

4/25 Applied forest history  

David R. Foster, “Conservation lessons and challenges from ecological history,” Forest History Today

Foster, D. R., F. Swanson, J. D. Aber, I. Burke, N. Brokaw, D. Tilman, and A. Knapp. 2003. The Importance of Land-Use Legacies to Ecology and Conservation. BioScience 53: 77-88.

• Activity-Emily and Alev: explore the use of conservation biology sources in forest history.

BLOG Due 11:30:  QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER: For your blogs, you may consider the following: what do you think the most important lessons of history are for environmental policy? Specifically, how might an understanding of forest history change a Wisconsin forest planner's decision making?

April 11 Wild Life

For Monday, we're reading the novel that we didn't read when the troubles at the Capitol began: Molly Glass, Wild Life: entire

For your blog, you can discuss the ways that Glass's novel plays with the meanings of wild men (look back at Harrison's FORESTS, where he discusses the various meaning of wild men in forests, such as Sasquatch)

Or you can explore the ways that Glass uses deforestation and wildness in her novel. What is she conveying with the images of logging camps and deforestation, versus the wild forest where wild creatures hide?

Or you can explore Glass's central theme of a journey in the forest. What happens on the hero's main journeys in the forest? Why does she get lost? Why does she eventually get found?

Forest Dreams

For Monday, April 4th: read Nancy Langston, Forest Dreams, Forest Nightmares: The Paradox of Old Growth in the Inland West (U. of Washington Press, 1995), pp. 3-200, 247-264, and 296-306 (the first 6 chapters, the fire chapter, and the conclusion). 

• Activity--Hanna and Roxanne: explore the use of field data in forest history (we'll go for a walk in the woods, if the weather cooperates, so wear outdoors clothing).

BLOG Due 11:30: QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER:

How did different sides in the 1990s old growth debates deploy different versions of forest history to support their positions?


OR:


Explore the ways that ecological and social processes influenced each other in shaping landscape change in fire-adapted forests of the West. 

Soluri, Banana Cultures

Read Soluri, Banana Cultures, pp. 1-127 and 193-end.

For your blog post you may discuss the ways Soluri integrates agroecology, labor history, and medical history to explore the ways bananas transformed forests and people in Honduras.

Amazonia March 21

Dean, With Broadax and Firebrand, pp. 1-143, and final chapter, 348-364. For a global overview of deforesting the tropical world, Williams, Deforesting the Earth, 318-358 is valuable.

Then each of you will read ONE of the later chapters carefully (please skim the other). In class, you will have 3 minutes to summarize that chapter’s arguments for other students, so come prepared with an outline of the chapter’s central argument and supporting evidence. This will reduce the reading load for each of you, and it will also give you experience in teaching the main points of an argument to other students.

Chapter 11 (239-264):  Jo, Emily, Mallory, Diana, Roxanne
Chapter 12 (265-291): Hanna, Dee, Erin, Sam
Chapter 13 (292-318): Alev, Kendall, Katie, Cory
Chapter 14 (318-347): Amanda, Stevie, Matt, John, 

BLOG Due 11:30: QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER:

Discuss whether Dean seems to believe that the loss of the Atlantic rainforest is irrevocable, or whether the forest can be restored. How could conservationists use forest history to restore the rainforest? For more information about current restoration efforts in the Atlantic forest, you can visit the Nature Conservancy's website for their "plant a billion trees" campaign (all in the Mata Atlantica).

African forests March 7

3/7  African forests
Fairhead and Leach, selections, Misreading the African Landscape: Society and Ecology in a Forest-Savanna Mosaic (course mywebspace folder).

For your journal, you may consider: what sources of evidence do Fairhead and Leach use to support their central argument? How else might you interpret those same sources of evidence? 

PAPERS: bring to class one or two potential topics that interest you. In class, we will work in small groups to pose good questions about your potential topics. 

2/28: India

For 2/28, please read the Guha and Rangan articles (both in the mywebspace folder.) 

Williams will provide some helpful background information on the British role in Indian forest history: Michael Williams, Deforesting the Earth, 326-348.

Compare and contrast the two scholars' perspectives on the role of the state versus the role of the community in Indian forestry. 

Harrison Feb. 21, 2011

For Feb. 21, read: Robert Pogue Harrison, Forests: The Shadow of Civilization: 19-30, 46-58, 107-124  my webspace 


We will NOT discuss Molly Gloss, Wild Life, this week--because everyone is focusing right now  on the political situation, we'll save the novel discussion for April 14th.

• Activity--Erin and Joelle: explore the use of literary sources in forest history.

BLOG Due 11:30: QUESTIONS YOU MAY CONSIDER:
Discuss the complex meanings of Wild Men in Forests. Or explore connections between the current political situation and Harrison's discussion of William the Conqueror and Forest Law in England.

James Scott, Seeing Like A State

James C Scott, Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed, selections

Robert Pogue Harrison, Forests, pp. 61-81. 

Harrison and Scott are in the  my webspace  folder: https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/xythoswfs/webui/_xy-39180961_1-t_Re9njwuK

optional background: Michael Williams, Deforesting the Earth, pp 87-149 (background information--you may skim this).

• QUESTIONS YOU MAY CONSIDER:

What is Scott's central argument about the ways the needs of the state affected land tenure and forest diversity? What evidence does Scott use to support his argument? Do you find it compelling

To help guide your reading, here are several critical  concepts we'll consider from Scott. 

• land tenure
• cadastral survey 
• growing power of the state
• common property

If you're not certain what land tenure means, the FAO has a useful definition on its website (http://www.fao.org/DOCREP/005/Y4307E/y4307e05.htm). 

Amanda and Cory will be leading the class discussion activity next Monday, focusing on Picnic Point. If you want to learn more about cadastral surveys and other types of records that are discussed in Scott's Seeing Like A State, the website for the Lakeshore Preserve has some great resources: 

http://www.lakeshorepreserve.wisc.edu/landscape/landscape.htm

Deep History

Michael Williams, Deforesting the Earth, pp 3-86

Charles Mann, “1491,” The Atlantic Monthly March 2002 http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2002/03/1491/2445/ 

Mertens, "Can't See the Forests for the Trees,"  

QUESTIONS YOU MAY CONSIDER:

1. According to Williams, what are the most important processes shaping forest change before the Christian era?

2. What sources of evidence do we use to construct our understandings of the distant past? What sources of evidence do we tend to overlook?

3. If Mann and Mertens are correct, what are some implications of their arguments for environmental policy?

Eaarth Discussion

Bill McKibben's EAARTH explores climate change, the reasons for our inaction, and possible responses that might prevent social and ecological disaster.  While there are many possible responses to his arguments, our discussion in class will focus on the intersections between climate change, political action, and forest history. We will discuss: How can an understanding of forest history help us grapple with the issues McKibben raises? Does history make us more hopeful, or less?  

Please post your thoughts about Eaarth as comments to this post, by 11:30 Monday morning before our meeting. Thanks!
Prof. Langston

Welcome to the Blog for World Forest History 452

You will be expected to keep a weekly blog on the course readings. Aim for 400 to 500 words per week. Please date each entry. I will create a blog template for each of you at this course website, and then you can alter the blog as you like. The reading schedule and suggested questions for your blog are posted here.

Three times during the course of the semester I will read and comment on these blogs, but you should write each week. I encourage you to comment on each other's blog entries and to use your peers' reflections as stimuli for your own thoughts.

This website [click here] contains starting questions that you may use for your blog entries, but you may also write on any specific topic of your choice. Your entries may contain your own reading notes and ideas about the works we read, questions for future research that arise from your reading, and responses to posted questions and suggestions.

Writing about what you've read has several benefits: it enables you to remember what you've read; it helps you make connections and ask questions of your own; it raises questions you might not otherwise think about; it helps you engage with a community of scholarship; and it improves the quality of class discussion.

Reading journals are a key component of your intellectual development. Most scholars refer back to them often throughout their careers. You'll have a much better chance of enjoying and succeeding with your journal if you get into the habit of working on it regularly. In many ways, your journal entries should be the easiest and most enjoyable part of the course, especially if you avoid falling behind and having to cram all your entries in right before the dates I collect them. Posting these entries as blogs will allow you to turn a private reading journal into a broader conversation.

I will not be grading your journals on grammar, style, or length, or how similar your ideas about the reading are to my own impressions of the reading. Instead, I will be looking for signs of intellectual engagement with the course material.

Prof. Langston