People and Nature (eBook)

An Introduction to Human Ecological Relations

Emilio F. Moran (Autor)

eBook Download: PDF

2016 | 2. Auflage
John Wiley & Sons (Verlag)
978-1-118-87731-9 (ISBN)

Infos

Now updated and expanded, People and Nature is a lively, accessible introduction to environmental anthropology that focuses on the interactions between people, culture, and nature around the world.

• Written by a respected scholar in environmental anthropology with a multi-disciplinary focus that also draws from geography, ecology, and environmental studies
• Addresses new issues of importance, including climate change, population change, the rise of the slow food and farm-to-table movements, and consumer-driven shifts in sustainability
• Explains key theoretical issues in the field, as well as the most important research, at a level appropriate for readers coming to the topic for the first time
• Discusses the challenges in ensuring a livable future for generations to come and explores solutions for correcting the damage already done to the environment
• Offers a powerful, hopeful future vision for improved relations between humans and nature that embraces the idea of community needs rather than consumption wants, and the importance of building trust as a foundation for a sustainable future

Emilio F. Moran is John A. Hannah Distinguished Professor at the Center for Global Change and Earth Observations, the Center for System Integration and Sustainability, and the Department of Geography at Michigan State University, USA.  Until 2012, he was Distinguished Professor and the James H. Rudy Professor of Anthropology at Indiana University, USA. He is the author of ten books, fifteen edited volumes, and more than 190 journal articles and book chapters, which address human interaction with the environment under conditions of change. Most recently, he is the author of Environmental Social Science: Human-Environment Interactions and Sustainability(Wiley Blackwell, 2010). He is a Fellow of the Linnean Society of London, the American Anthropological Association, the Society for Applied Anthropology, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2010.

Inhalt

Title Page 5
Copyright Page 6
Contents 9
Preface to the Second Edition 12
Acknowledgments 15
Chapter 1 Human Agency and the State of the Earth 17
Introduction 17
Can One Conceive of Ecosystems Without Human Agents? 27
Human Agency: Individuals Making a Difference 30
Overwhelming Evidence for Concern with the Condition of the Earth System 33
Looking Back and Looking Forward 42
Additional Resources 43
References 44
Chapter 2 A Reminder: How Things Were… 49
The Study of Human Ecological Relations 49
The Contemporary Study of Environmental Issues: The Rise of Cross?Disciplinary Team?Based Approaches 55
The Evolution of Human–Environment Interactions 63
Hunter-Gatherers: Setting Our Preferences 68
How Did We Decide to Become Farmers? 72
Herding and Farming: An Uneasy Relationship 75
More Food for the Masses 77
Additional Resources 80
References 80
Chapter 3 The Great Forgetting 91
Earth Transformations in Prehistory 91
The Archeology of Environmental Change 99
The Urban–Industrial Revolution and the Unleashing of Prometheus 102
The Contemporary Situation: Human-Dominated Ecosystems 105
Additional Resources 107
References 108
Chapter 4 The Web of Life: Are We In It? 112
The Web of Life and Trophic Relations: Thinking Ecologically 112
Ecosystem Productivity and Net Primary Production 119
Land Use and Long?Term Disturbance 121
Additional Resources 133
References 133
Chapter 5 What Makes People Do That? 138
Learning, Adaptation, and Information 138
Mitigation and the Cautionary Principle 151
Transforming the Face of the Earth: Making Better Decisions 152
Additional Resources 155
References 156
Chapter 6 Population and Environment 161
Theories about Population 162
The Demographic Transition 163
Aging and International Flows of Labor 166
Addressing the Needs of 10 Billion People 169
Changing the Population and Environment Nexus 175
Additional Resources 178
References 179
Chapter 7 Rebuilding Communities and Institutions 182
Community in Human Evolution 182
What is Sacred in Human Evolution? 185
Tragedies of the Commons 188
Institutions and Self?Organization 192
Bioregionalism, Deep Ecology, and Embedding People in Nature 196
Additional Resources 198
References 199
Chapter 8 Can We Learn When We Have Enough? 204
Material Boys and Material Girls 204
Patterns of Consumption in Developed Countries 205
Patterns of Consumption in Developing Countries 212
A Feeding Frenzy and a Crisis in Public Health 216
Burning Fossil Fuels instead of Calories 218
Do We Have Enough Material Goods Now? 221
Additional Resources 223
References 224
Chapter 9 Quality of Life: When Less Is More 226
Resource Abundance versus Resource Scarcity 226
When Less is More 236
The Scale of the Problem and the Scale of the Solution 245
Restoring Our Balance: Valuing Community and Trust 249
Are We Happier When We Have More? 254
References 257
Index 260
EULA 275

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 28.7.2016
• Reihe/Serie: Primers in Anthropology
• Reihe/Serie: Primers in Anthropology
• Reihe/Serie: Primers in Anthropology
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Archäologie
• Themenwelt: Geschichte ► Allgemeine Geschichte ► Vor- und Frühgeschichte
• Themenwelt: Naturwissenschaften ► Biologie ► Ökologie / Naturschutz
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Ethnologie
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Politik / Verwaltung
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Soziologie
• Schlagworte: Anthropogeographie • Anthropologie • Anthropology • biodiversity • climate change • conservation • consumption • Demography • ecosystem science and policy • Environmental Studies • Food Systems • Geographie • Geography • human ecology • Human geography • natural resource management • Population • sustainable development • Umweltforschung
• ISBN-10: 1-118-87731-4 / 1118877314
• ISBN-13: 978-1-118-87731-9 / 9781118877319