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-Dramatic global transition from nomadic hunter-gathering to sedentary agricultural lifestyle
-rise in agriculture accompanied by domestication of livestock--> greater spread of disease in old world |
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dramatic disappearance of the large mammals during the late Pleistocene era, known as megafauna.
-Reasons for extinctions- environmental or overhunting by paleoindeans
-Important because it left the bison as the only megafauna remaining-- indians when contacted by Euros did not have livestock, horses especially (major disadvantage) along with that, because there was no livestock the indians did not live in close contact with livestock and didn't contract diseases early on |
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One of many old-world species that the Europeans brought to the new world, part of "biological revolution.
-Gave europeans massive advantage over Indians at first contact.
-Once plains indians were able to obtain horses, transformed lifestyle--fit into niche of environment of the plains, but competed with bison for resources
-changed power dynamic of indian tribes, and within tribes as they were individually owned in a communal society
-source of transportation in the city--also waste (manure) |
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| Slater Mill was the first textile factory in North America, started by Samuel Slater and Moses Brown. Textile factories such as Slater Mill raised high dams to harness huge amounts of energy to run their machinery, and the dams posed a big barrier to fish and fishermen. The trend that followed the Slater Mill’s success brought increasing ecological change, resulting in the ownership and privatization of lakes and rivers (notion that water should be “put to best use.” This was a controversial, because felt it wasn’t an appropriate use of natural waters, while the mill owners argued that the mills brought greater public good than the sacrifices it made. |
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| Crosby uses this term to refer to the parts of the world outside Europe that the European settlers transformed into new environments intended to approximate Europe. This includes the plant and animal species brought from Europe to inhabit North America (TJ pointed out that some parts would more accurate be called Neo-Africa).Neo-Europes are important in understanding why the diseases brought to the North America were so devastating to the Indians. Creating a “neo-Europe” was the key to European success, because it meant they could thrive while the Indians perished. |
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| Eugenics was a movement stemming from Social Darwinism. The main idea is that humans hereditary can be manipulated to create a pure population of top-quality people. Goddard propagated the idea of sterilization of those seen as unfit. It gained popularity in response to the higher rates of reproduction among the immigrant and lower classes, and lower rates among the upper class. Eugenics used biological and environmental explanations to inform their views. It’s important to remember how uncontroversial the movement was (Eugenic notions still linger today), and it also was built on the rather practical goal of maintaining a population that was small enough for everyone to be well cared for, and to promote a productive society through a biological trickle-down of the people of the “best stock.” |
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| Hudson River school artist, born in England. Involved in the Romantic Movement to portray landscape. Portrayal of what would become Yellowstone helped in forming the National Parks movement, a reaction to the manifest destiny ideology and what would happen to Jackson’s ideas of America as defined by its open spaces—what will happen when the land is gone? |
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| Practiced among the plains Indians in the late 1800’s on the Great Plains. After the heavy depletion of buffalo on the plains (40 million in 1500 down to 85 wild bison in 1889). The loss of the buffalo meant a loss of their subsistence way of life, and thus, a loss of the rituals surrounding this way of life. In response, the Ghost Dance was started. It began with the Paiute tribe and spread to Lakota and others. Sitting bull was a supporter of the Ghost Dance. The idea that was by intensifying the ritual, time would run backward. |
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| A European way of looking at the body during the Scientific Revolution (1543-1800)--originates in the Greek idea that there are four elements (earth, air, fire and water—all of which are associated with the body (as a microcosm of nature). The Four Humours correspond to blood, phlegm, yellow bile and black vile. All the elements need to be in balance, thus bleeding was utilized to restore balance to the body. |
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Proposed by Johann Heinrich von Thunen (a contemporary of Karl Marx) in 1826 in “the isolated State.’ It states that there are five zones of production surrounding a city center: 1. Zone of intensive agriculture
2. Forest
3. Zone of extensive agriculture
4. More extensive agriculture
5. Wilderness.
Theory states that population density decreases as the distance away from the city center makes the cost of transportation rise. However, it doesn’t account for other urban centers or the best growing regions. It is the “geography of capitalism” mapping the market onto the landscape. |
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| disease fist found in Indian in 1817, NYC on June 26, 1832, killing 3800 people. Often referred to as the disease of the lower classes. John Snow in 1854 in London discovered how the disease was spreading through polluted water. Started the installation of Aqueducts to bring clean water into the cities, 1835 in NYC, and by 1860, the 16 largest cities had installed aqueducts. The aqueducts needed reservoirs to fuel the water going into the cities—resulted in redirection of water, and eminent domain to control water rights in the countryside flowing into the cities (Quabbin Resevoir in Western MA). |
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Term coined by Alfred Crosby. Referring to the New World – Virgin Soil – implying that it was untouched, unspoiled and waiting for it to be colonized, settled, populated. The epidemics included smallpox, malaria, venereal diseases, and other airborne illnesses. They decimated populations before they came in contact / saw any Europeans, thus “paving the way” for conquest, leaving villages, fields intact, waiting for the Europeans. David Jones defines Crosby’s virgin soils as “populations without defense, who are therefore immunologically almost defenseless.”
This theory, while groundbreaking, generated an enormous backlash, because of its implications of the New World as inferior. Indeed, the land was already densely populated, trade routes were established, fields and agriculture. |
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| Designed by Frederick Law Olmsted, completed in 1858. The creation of Central Park was part of a Jeffersonian heritage in Americans – love of nature and the wish to incorporate it in the amoral, industrial abyss of the city. Inhabitants of the city were afraid of losing their past. Central Park is an excellent case study for the parks movement. Designed on curves, many sections reflecting many different aspects of pastoral settings: hills (the Ramble), the Sheep Meadow, ponds, trees, the Parade Grounds. Ironic because the park itself is trying to be “nature within the city” yet that very aspiration makes the park itself completely unnatural – cities are bustling, industrial, full of anxiety, disorder and lawlessness. Central Parks and parks in general examples of social stratification – strict rules on who could use the park, in what numbers, for what purpose, etc. |
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| a Native American nation. Used as a case study disproving Crosby’s Virgin Soil theory by Hämäläinen – not all nations fit into Crosby’s theory of inferiority. The Comanche nation prospered during the period of conquest, evidenced by their massive population explosion, their manipulation of European exports (guns, horses, alcohol, metal tools, etc) to increase their own power and empire. Expanded from central plains to the Southwest, even into Mexico – seeking grass to feed their horses. Developed a sense of how disease spread – realized their enemies, both Indian and European, were dying, from Crosby’s ‘virgin soil epidemics’ – made their trade partners come to them to prevent getting sick themselves. Comanche nation downfall by 1875. |
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| a movement that formed in response to the scientific rationalization of the Enlightenment, developed an understanding in emotion, intuition, direct understanding of situations, realizing that there are deeper truths in everything. There was a distinctly religious dimension to the movement, rediscovering spiritual values in nature itself, making nature a supplement and substitute for the Bible. Traditionally associated with music, literature, art. Literature included Emerson and Thoreau. Art included Thomas Cole and Thomas Moran, who painted nature settings full of symbolism typical of the time: westward looking people (if there were any), downfall of nature due to industrialization, animals running away. The rise of Romanticism in politics led to an increase in nationalism, which is evident in the American Romantic paintings – westward expansion, Manifest Destiny = inherently American. |
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| use began in 18th century, especially with the rise of mills. Early dams were seasonal, temporary. Pre-steam power, water power was the most important source, and in New England there were many streams and rivers capable of generating the power via water wheels – the water’s weight powered the wheels. Dams helped control the flow of water, demonstrating the power of man over nature. Most of the settlers were still agriculturalists, and these dams, however temporary, brought destruction to their fields: droughts or floods, thus took action into their own hands by destroying the dams. Dams disrupted animals’ reproductive and migration patterns. Today there are 79,000 dams in the US. |
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| Greek- total land, all land: Pangea was a massive block of land existing around 235 million years ago.When Pangea broke apart, the individual continents we are familiar with today were formed. Pangea’s significance lies in the fact that because it was one land mass, most of the plant and animal species of the world were able to disperse to the ends of the land mass. After Pangea broke apart, most of the same species that were present on all of the separate continents developed and evolved in isolation from each other for millions of years, leading to the incredible biodiversity that exists (or used to exist). Prior to the rise in human travel, Pangea was the last time that the interaction between all areas of the world was possible. |
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| The ideal republican subject, according to Thomas Jefferson. A yeoman farmer owned his land, often as a family farm, and grew crops primarily to subsist. The yeoman is associated with hard work, independence, individual liberty and high value and would have met the requisite “landholding male” title in order to vote. The opposite of the yeoman farmer were those inherently corrupt occupations like the accountant or clerk--both city jobs. Significance: The yeoman farmer represented an earlier ideal of American-ness as espoused by Jefferson. The anxieties of modernism and city then were so powerful because they seemed antithetical to the previously predominant definition of what it meant to be “American”. |
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| Important author- Judith Carney “African Rice in Columbian Exchange”. Rice was cultivated in antebellum south by African slaves who came from a rice-cultivating area of West Africa. Important because it is one of many examples of how African slaves, who are usually discussed historically without any agency, changed the American landscape using the agrarian knowledge they had gained in Africa. Also important in considering the nature of the Columbian exchange and how food goods (besides slaves) were taken from Africa and used around the world. |
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| Invasive species introduced in the Great Lakes in the 1920s. Devastates fish populations by feeding on large fish like trout, walleye and the sturgeon. Because the sea lamprey evolved apart from its prey, it had a huge advantage that lead to the devastation of the native fish species. Important because it shows one of the more drastic effects of introducing a non-native species to a new environment. |
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| Aside from corn, probably the most important crop native to the new world to be exported to the old world. The potato is an example of the two way nature of the Columbian exchange, especially considering how it, like other goods (tomato, chocolate) became integral to European cooking and culture. |
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| 19th century garment made from whale bone. Physical representation of the unequal and often repressive social status of women at the time. The flexibility of the whale’s bone made it a good component of the corset. Important that it drove up demand for whales and subsequently drove the overhunting of the whales. |
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| Developed a process in 1846 to refine coal into kerosine. This provided a cheaper, more accessible alternative to whale oil. Because of this development, and the subsequent ability to create kerosine from petroleum, Gesner’s company was able to install light fixtures on the streets of north american cities. Significance: 1) contributed to the rising standard of living and innovation 19th century US by providing a cheap source of light 2) in the process of getting petroleum for kerosine saw the development of the oil drill --> consequences of oil, etc. |
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| Nature like a trickster--acts one way to bring about a different result--counter to European static view of nature. Ex. ofchanging, unexpected nature of the environment |
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