Environmental History

Catalog description

This graduate course introduces students to classic and cutting-edge works in environmental history. If environmental history first emerged from the study of the American West and parks, its practitioners now work across the globe to study the relationship between race and geography; how gender and class shape the production of environmental knowledge; and how colonialism and enslavement transformed landscapes and the exploitation of the earth and its diverse inhabitants. We will explore these among other themes through articles and books centered on the history of rivers, parks, plantations, farms, ecological movements, and cities in Africa, the Americas, Oceania, and Asia. This course provides the necessary groundwork for students pursuing an examination in the field of environmental history. It will also appeal to graduate students working on a variety of topics who are interested in methods for studying the historic engagements of people—living in villages, cities, states, and empires—with the natural world.