Ecological Revolutions: Nature, Gender, and Science in New EnglandWith the arrival of European explorers and settlers during the seventeenth century, Native American ways of life and the environment itself underwent radical alterations as human relationships to the land and ways of thinking about nature all changed. This colonial ecological revolution held sway until the nineteenth century, when New England's industrial production brought on a capitalist revolution that again remade the ecology, economy, and conceptions of nature in the region. In Ecological Revolutions, Carolyn Merchant analyzes these two major transformations in the New England environment between 1600 and 1860. In a preface to the second edition, Merchant introduces new ideas about narrating environmental change based on gender and the dialectics of transformation, while the revised epilogue situates New England in the context of twenty-first-century globalization and climate change. Merchant argues that past ways of relating to the land could become an inspiration for renewing resources and achieving sustainability in the future. |
From inside the book
Results 1-5 of 45
Page x
... Population of New England , 1610 39 3.1 Approximate Food Intake per Capita of Southeastern New England Indians , 1605-1675 75 4.1 Source and Chemical Content of Fertilizers 120 8.1 The Global Ecological Revolution 275 Maps 2.1 Major ...
... Population of New England , 1610 39 3.1 Approximate Food Intake per Capita of Southeastern New England Indians , 1605-1675 75 4.1 Source and Chemical Content of Fertilizers 120 8.1 The Global Ecological Revolution 275 Maps 2.1 Major ...
Page xvii
... populations , they found ways to reorganize themselves and to engage sympathetic whites to achieve a measure of justice and retribution . The gendered narrative continued with the establishment of sub- sistence - oriented farming in ...
... populations , they found ways to reorganize themselves and to engage sympathetic whites to achieve a measure of justice and retribution . The gendered narrative continued with the establishment of sub- sistence - oriented farming in ...
Page 5
... Population does not press on the land and its resources directly , but on the mode of production . Two steps removed from immediate impact on the habitat are the modes through which a society knows and explains the natural world ...
... Population does not press on the land and its resources directly , but on the mode of production . Two steps removed from immediate impact on the habitat are the modes through which a society knows and explains the natural world ...
Page 12
... populations may increase or decrease through immigration and emigration , births and deaths , with implications for other spe- cies . The results alter habitat diversity and composition.14 New England is a significant historical ...
... populations may increase or decrease through immigration and emigration , births and deaths , with implications for other spe- cies . The results alter habitat diversity and composition.14 New England is a significant historical ...
Page 14
... population sizes and family relationships are maintained , and property and inheritance practices are reinforced . In subsistence - oriented economies , produc- tion and reproduction are united in the maintenance of the local community ...
... population sizes and family relationships are maintained , and property and inheritance practices are reinforced . In subsistence - oriented economies , produc- tion and reproduction are united in the maintenance of the local community ...
Contents
1 | |
27 | |
The Capitalist Ecological Revolution | 147 |
APPENDIXES | 281 |
Notes | 297 |
Bibliography | 337 |
Index | 377 |
Other editions - View all
Ecological Revolutions: Nature, Gender, and Science in New England Carolyn Merchant Limited preview - 1989 |
Ecological Revolutions: Nature, Gender, and Science in New England Carolyn Merchant Limited preview - 2010 |
Common terms and phrases
Abenaki acres Agricultural Agroecology Almanac American animals Astronomical Diary beans beaver biological reproduction Boston bushels capitalist ecological revolution cattle changes colonial ecological revolution colonists commodities Connecticut consciousness corn cosmos cows crops culture Diary earth ecofeminism ecological revolution Economy edited eighteenth century elites energy England Farmer English Environmental History ethic European farm female fertility fields fish forest Fur Trade garden Gluskabe grain Hampshire harvest human hunting Ibid improvement Island John John Winthrop labor land livestock Maine male manure Massachusetts meadows mechanistic Merchant mills mother native Americans nature nature's nonhuman Old Farmer's Almanac Oxford County pasture Penobscot percent Petersham plants plowing polycultures Population production and reproduction Puritan quotation Rhode Island River salt shaman sheep social soil southern New England subsistence symbols Thoreau tillage tion towns transformation trees tribes ture University Press vegetable Vermont wild wilderness William women wood woodland yields York