Shades of Darkness: Race and Environmental History

Merchant, Carolyn

doi:10.2307/3986200

Cited by 78 publications

(24 citation statements)

References 10 publications

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“…As Cronon argues, and numerous ecocritics and environmental historians have shown in case studies, the nineteenth century marked a convergence of a reframing of wilderness from wasteland to something sacred, and of urbanites' desire to find or create spaces uncontaminated by the effects of early modernity (cf. Byerly 1996, Spence 1996, Kerbs & Reulecke 1998, DeLuca & Demo 2001, Sayre 2001, Merchant 2003, Coates 2005, West & Igoe & Brockington 2006, and Young 2010). Yet in contrast to the pastoral longings of elites in earlier centuries, and clearly influenced by the sublime's privileging of an individual experience of awe, these spaces were now ideally 'clean' in the sense of being 'untouched,' that is, wild.…”

Section: Sublime Wildernessmentioning

confidence: 99%

Taking a Hike and Hucking the Stout: The Troublesome Legacy of the Sublime in Outdoor Recreation

Drennig

2013

Cult. Unbound

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As Henry Thoreau noted in the 1850s, the simple act of walking can be loaded with political and spiritual meaning. Today, taking a hike as an act of engaging in outdoor recreation is equally non-trivial, and therefore subject of the following analysis. As this paper argues, outdoors recreation is still influenced by the legacy of the Sublime and its construction of wilderness. This troublesome legacy means that the cultural self-representation of outdoor sports -and the practice itselflays claim to the environment in ways that are socially and sometimes even ethnically exclusive.This essay uses William Cronon's critique of the cultural constructedness of wilderness as a point of departure to see how Western notions of sublime nature have an impact on spatial practice. The elevation of specific parts of the environment into the category of wilderness prescribes certain uses and meanings as nature is made into an antidote against the ills of industrial civilization, and a place where the alienated individual can return to a more authentic self. This view then has become a troublesome legacy, informing the cultural self-representation of those uses of "wilderness" that are known as outdoor recreation.In its cultural production, outdoors recreation constructs "healthy" and "athletic" bodies exercising in natural settings and finding refuge from the everyday alienation of postmodern society. Yet these bodies are conspicuously white, and the obligatory equipment and fashion expensive. Outdoor recreation is a privileged assertion of leisure, often denoting an urban, affluent, and white, background of the practitioner. These practitioners then lay exclusive claim on the landscapes they use.As trivial as taking a hike or any other form of outdoors recreation may thus seem, they put a cultural legacy into practice that is anything but trivial.

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Section: Sublime Wildernessmentioning

confidence: 99%

Taking a Hike and Hucking the Stout: The Troublesome Legacy of the Sublime in Outdoor Recreation

Drennig

2013

Cult. Unbound

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“…48 In turn, this movement inspired social historians to look at environmental degradation in relation to class, gender, and ethnicity. 49 Some scholars focused on the impact of global economic trends on spatial allocations. The worldwide drive towards industrialization was so overriding that the entrepreneurial class frequently won in the struggles over the use of urban space, the local authorities failing or unwilling to implement existing environmental laws.…”

Section: S O C I a L H I S T O Ry A N D E N V I R O N M E N Ta L S T mentioning

confidence: 99%

Globalization, Environmental Change, and Social History: An Introduction

Boomgaard¹,

Hart²

2010

Int Rev of Soc His

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“…Understanding the Ord River as one such water place, and recognising its embedded history of colonisation as a form of environmental injustice (Merchant ), I first define Indigenous water values for the Ord before exploring the possibility of co‐recognition of environmental and Indigenous water values. Introducing these notions, I quote from an interview I did with a traditional owner in Kununurra, the largest town in the Ord catchment, shown in Figure , with a population fluctuating from approximately 5000 to 7000 people seasonally.…”

Section: Introducing and Contextualising Indigenous Water Values In Tmentioning

confidence: 99%

Still colonising the Ord River, northern Australia: a postcolonial geography of the spaces between Indigenous people's and settlers' interests

McLean

2013

Geographical Journal

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The growing use of environmental flows in rivers and wetlands around the world, aimed at maintaining ecological health by allocating water to the environment, arguably also provides space for recognition of Indigenous water values. Theoretically, if environmental water values, which nominally determine what water is made available for restoring river health through environmental flows, do coincide with Indigenous water values, then this mutual benefit is conceivable. However, in contexts such as the Ord in northern Australia, where environmental water values are defined as post‐dam construction, then further marginalisation of Indigenous interests likely ensues. This paper looks at the history of two key industries in the Ord, pastoralism and irrigation, to examine the origins of its current geography of environmental water values. A geography of water emerges that unpacks postcolonial relations as manifest in society–water relations. I examine how particular colonial values that reinforce the status quo of industry in the Ord also dominate water management, effectively sidelining Indigenous water values.

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Shades of Darkness: Race and Environmental History

Cited by 78 publications

References 10 publications

Taking a Hike and Hucking the Stout: The Troublesome Legacy of the Sublime in Outdoor Recreation

Taking a Hike and Hucking the Stout: The Troublesome Legacy of the Sublime in Outdoor Recreation

Globalization, Environmental Change, and Social History: An Introduction

Still colonising the Ord River, northern Australia: a postcolonial geography of the spaces between Indigenous people's and settlers' interests

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