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Environmental Studies 2403/ 2182: Environment and in North American History

Matthew Klingle Department of History & Environmental Studies Program Bowdoin College Spring Semester 2019

Lecture/discussion times and location: Monday and Wednesday, 11:40 am -1:05 pm, 207N Roux Center Class email: [email protected] Office hours: Monday, 1:00-3:00 pm; Wednesday, 2:00-4:00 pm, and by appointment Office location: 120 Roux Center Office telephone: 798-7141 (campus x7141) E-mail: [email protected] Course web site: http://blackboard.bowdoin.edu/ (access for enrolled students only)

Course Description This course examines the changing relationships between human beings and the natural world through time from the fifteenth century to the present. Topics include Native American uses and views of the natural world, the ecological effects of Europeans in the Americas, resource exploitation from the colonial period through the present day, the emergence of the preservationist and conservationist movements, the origins of environmental injustice and inequalities, and political responses to environmental problems. Although this is a history course, we will also draw from , philosophy, the visual and performing arts, and religion.

We will approach from several perspectives. First, how have human activities historically depended on and responded to a dynamic natural world? Second, how have attitudes toward the natural world, particularly those in the United States, changed over time, and how have those attitudes shaped our nation’s cultural, social, and political foundations? Third, how have human ideas, activities, and technologies affected the North American landscape, and what have been the consequences of those changes? Over the semester, we will add still more questions to this list.

The central purpose of this course is to improve your ability to think historically and conceptually while broadening your knowledge of North American history as viewed from an environmental angle. Historical thinking does not come naturally. It is hard, difficult work that includes learning to recognize the complexity, ambiguity, and uncertainty in human affairs; developing a critical eye toward sources of information about the past (and present); and understanding that events occur sequentially and that order matters. Placing events and details in context is a key to thinking historically. Imposing order on the messy, numerous, and diverse information from the past is neither easy nor quickly learned. Thinking historically, then, requires learning details, accounting for discrepancies in sources, placing events in context and applying this knowledge to support your interpretation in a scholarly, persuasive manner.

Readings and Other Course Materials There is no textbook for the course. Interested students may want to look at Eric Foner, ed. The New American History rev. ed. and Eric Foner and Lisa McGirr, eds., American History Now, both of which have several interpretative essays to guide you through the historical terrain we will navigate this term, as well as copies of the following books also on reserve at Hawthorne-Longfellow Library:

J. R. McNeill, Something New Under the Sun: An Environmental History of the 20th-century World Carolyn Merchant, The Columbia Guide to American Environmental History Emily W. B. Russell, People and the Land through Time: Linking and History Theodore Steinberg, Down to Earth: ’s Role in American History The Oxford Handbook of Environmental History, ed. Andrew C. Isenberg

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Required books are available through the Bowdoin Bookstore at https://bowdoin.ecampus.com/ or through other booksellers. All titles are also on 2-hour reserve at H-L Library, along with other relevant titles.

Students should note that the reading load for this course is substantial, averaging 150-200 pages per week, yet reasonable for an intermediate college-level history course. I may amend the assignments during the term, so note any changes on your syllabus. The required readings are:

William Cronon, Changes in the Land: Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England Andrew Hurley, Environmental Inequalities: Class, Race, and Industrial in Gary, Indiana, 1945-1980 Gregg Mitman, Breathing Space: How Allergies Shape our Lives and Landscapes Catherine McNeur, Taming Manhattan: Environmental Battles in the Antebellum City Karl Jacoby, Crimes Against Nature: Squatters, Poachers, Thieves, and the Hidden History of American Conservation Electronic reserve materials (via Blackboard or the Bowdoin Library Gateway)

Additional documents will be on electronic reserve via Blackboard or the Bowdoin College Library Gateway. There may be, from time to time, handouts or additions to supplement the weekly assignments. For example, I will sometimes distribute primary sources during class to supplement our discussions. In addition, you should pay attention to current periodicals, web sites, and literature for contemporary urban disputes that may inform class discussions.

The following book is optional but highly recommended:

Mary Lynn Rampolla, A Pocket Guide to Writing in History 7th ed.

For those of you planning to major in history, the Rampolla book is an invaluable for history research and writing. I also endorse Professor Patrick Rael’s Reading, Writing, and Researching for History: A Guide for College Students as an excellent primer for all types of writing: http://www.bowdoin.edu/writing-guides/

Course Requirements Major graded assignments include one short paper, a midterm, a longer research paper, weekly Blackboard postings and a final examination. I'm happy to look at paper drafts, but ask that you submit all drafts at least three days before any due date. Finally, you must complete all assigned work in order to pass the course.

1. Short paper (15% course grade), due Wednesday, February 13, in class: You will write a 4-5 page thesis- driven essay based on Cronon, Changes in the Land and a set of primary documents. Details forthcoming. 2. In-class midterm, Wednesday, March 6 (15% course grade): This will be an in-class examination: one essay and several short identifications based upon material covered in the first half of the term. I will distribute study questions in advance to help you prepare. 3. Research paper (25% course grade): This assignment is an opportunity to synthesize the material in this course through your own original research. You will pick a familiar landscape or place, from home or from your travels, and analyze that place as an environmental historian, using a combination of primary and secondary sources to write an 8-10 page thesis-driven essay. For this paper, we will work closely with Barbara Levergood, Government Documents Librarian and History Department Liaison, to direct your research. Details forthcoming. • Preliminary topic due Monday, February 11 in class and via Blackboard • Library research seminar, Electronic Classroom (ECR), H-L Library on Wednesday, February 13 • Revised paper proposal with annotated bibliography, due Monday, February 25 in class • Final draft due Friday, April 26 at 5 p.m. at my office (120 Roux)

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4. Final exam, Friday, May 17 (25% course grade): This exam will cover material from the entire semester, but focus largely on material since the midterm. Again, I will provide study questions. 5. Blackboard postings (10% course grade): In order to facilitate discussion, I ask that you post reactions to the weekly readings on the Blackboard Discussion Board at least once per week for 14 responses total. (The exception to the once a week rule is Week One, where everyone must respond to the Cronon “Kennecott Journey” essay.) You may post more than once per week if you wish, but no less. Your responses need not be long—a short but thoughtful paragraph will suffice. Please see the Blackboard site for details. All postings need to be made no later than 10 a.m. on the day of the assigned readings. 6. Attendance and class participation (10% course grade): I expect you to attend all classes and arrive prepared to participate. This means coming to discuss the readings and lectures with thoughtful questions that go beyond simple opinions or snap reactions. Additionally, there may be several in-class writing assignments, ranging from your response to the assigned readings to personal reflections on the course material that will also count toward your participation grade. (These writing assignments will be graded credit/no credit, but they are all mandatory.) Participation, however, is more than speaking up in class. It is also coming to see me during office hours, writing emails, and posting additional comments by e-mail or Blackboard.

Attendance and Student Responsibilities It is your responsibility to come to class having done the reading in advance. I will announce changes to the syllabus in class as well as on the website. However, if you are not in class, it is your responsibility to find out what you missed. Attendance is a major part of your participation grade. If you do not come to class, you cannot do well in the course.

Ultimately, this is your course and I am here to help you make the most of it. One thing that you can do to succeed is to take , both during discussion and in your papers. By its very nature, the study of history cuts against received wisdom, undermines cherished assumptions, and erodes stereotypes. Studying history allows us to learn how past circumstances can touch people in the present while giving them a voice to critique political, social, and cultural conditions that shape their lives today. In this class, we will debate the meanings of texts, the judgments of authors, the contexts in which they wrote, and the voices excluded or perspectives ignored. As a result, our discussions about the past may become intense. I look forward to such times; real learning often occurs then. However, you should treat one another with dignity and civility no matter what the situation. I will endeavor to do the same. To repeat, all ideas are open to challenge, even my own, because history is about interpretation and analysis.

Finally, I hope that you will make the time to meet with me outside of class. Getting to know your professors is one of the most rewarding opportunities of attending a school like Bowdoin.

A Note on Email Like many instructors, I frequently use email to communicate with students individually or collectively. If you write to me, I usually reply within a reasonable amount of time, often no later than 24 hours. But please do not expect an immediate response as I neither check email at all times nor am I available at all hours.

Grading and Late Assignments I will convert numerical grades to letter grades according to the following system.

94-100=A 87-89=B+ 77-79=C+ 60-69=D 90-93=A- 83-86=B 73-76=C 60 and below=F 80-82=B- 70-72=C-

I will read and comment on all assignments, but late papers will be marked down 1/3 of a grade per day (e.g., B+ to B). I rarely grant extensions, so please do not ask unless you are ill or face dire personal trials.

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Citation of Sources In your written work, when referring to sources (primary or secondary) on which you have drawn, you should provide a complete citation including author, title, publisher, place and date of publication and page numbers. I ask that you use follow the so-called “Chicago-style” for all footnotes or endnotes. Be sure to include a bibliography as well. We will discuss how to assemble proper notes and bibliographies later this term. Good printed reference works for citation include The Chicago Manual of Style and Kate Turabian’s A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations. There is also information on the Bowdoin Library Gateway. The Library also offers courses and individual instruction in bibliographic software, like EndNote and Zotero, both of which will be invaluable in any class that requires research, regardless of your major. You can also the Bowdoin Library’s Style and Citation Guides page for help on specific citation style questions: https://library.bowdoin.edu/research/citation-guides

Plagiarism and Adherence to the Academic Honor and Social Codes All students are responsible for reading and heeding the statement on plagiarism, as well as reviewing and following the Academic Honor Code and Social Code, as written in the Bowdoin Student Handbook, 2018-19. Suspected cases of plagiarism will result in a meeting with me, and, if necessary, the Judicial Board. If you are unsure about plagiarism, you should re-read the Handbook, visit the College’s “Academic Honesty and Plagiarism” website at https://www.bowdoin.edu/dean-of-students/judicial-board/academic-honesty-and- plagiarism/index.html, talk to a librarian, or ask me.

Intercollegiate Athletics and Special Accommodations Athletics are an important part of Bowdoin. If your participation in intercollegiate athletics compels you to miss class, however, it is your responsibility to inform me of your schedule in advance, what work you will miss, and how and when you intend to make up that work.

Some of you may have special accommodations for your learning needs, and I will make every effort to meet them. Nonetheless, even if I have received notification from the Dean of Student Affairs about your situation, it is your responsibility to arrange for your needs well in advance of any exam or assignment.

PRELIMINARY SCHEDULE ** Refer to the course Blackboard page for any changes to this schedule! **

Week 1 Introduction: Putting nature back into Monday, January 21 NO CLASS—Dr. Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day

Wednesday, January 23 Introductions and overview of environmental history William Cronon, “Kennecott Journey: The Paths out of Town.” in Under an Open Sky: Rethinking America’s Western Past. William Cronon, George Miles, and Jay Gitlin, eds. (New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 1992), 28-51

Week 2 Colliding and in the New World Monday, January 28 Cronon, Changes in the Land, 3-81

Wednesday, January 30 Rosemary Horrox, trans. and ed., “The Plague Seen from Rochester,” The Black Death (New York: Manchester University Press, 1994), 71-73 George Vancouver, A Voyage to the North Pacific Ocean and Round the World (London: G. G. and J. Robinson, 1798), 252-57

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Colin G. Calloway, ed., Our Hearts Fell to the Ground: Plains Indian Views of How the West Was Lost (New York: Bedford Books, 1996), 50-53

Week 3 Shaping the territory: Animals, Natives, African slaves, and European colonists Monday, February 4 Cronon, Changes in the Land, 82-170

Wednesday, February 6 Dan Flores, “Bison Ecology and Bison Diplomacy: The Southern Plains from 1800 to 1850,” Journal of American History 78 (September 1991): 465-85 Colin G. Calloway, ed., Dawnland Encounters: Indians and Europeans in Northern New England (Hanover, NH: University Press of New England, 1991), 31-36, 115-18, 128-31, 184-87

Week 4 Building nature and nation in the early republic Monday, February 11 • Preliminary term paper topic—bring to class and post to Blackboard McNeur, Taming Manhattan, 1-133 Solomon Northrup, Twelve Years as a Slave (New York: Dover Publications, 1853, 1970), 162- 75, 208-13 Frederick Olmsted, The Slave States, Harvey Wish, ed. (New York, Capricorn Books, 1959), 178-83 Mart A. Stewart, “Rice, Water, and Power: Landscapes of Domination and Resistance in the Low Country, 1790-1880,” Environmental History Review 15 (Fall 1991): 47-64

Wednesday, February 13 • Research seminar—Electronic Classroom, H-L Library Basement, 11:40 am sharp! • Paper #1 due in class • Preliminary term paper topic due in class and via Blackboard

Week 5 The business of nature: 19th century industrialization and the environment Monday, February 18 McNeur, Taming Manhattan, 135-236

Wednesday, February 20 Henry David Thoreau, “Ktaadn,” from The Maine Woods vol. 3, The Writings of Henry David Thoreau (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1906), 61-79 George Perkins Marsh, Man and Nature: Or, Physical as Modified by Human Action, ed. David Lowenthal (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of , 1965), 7- 13, 48-52 John S. Springer, Forest Life and Forest Trees (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1851), 155-76

Week 6 People of plenty: Nature and the expanding nation Monday, February 25 • Revised research paper proposal—bring to class and post to Blackboard Jacoby, Crimes Against Nature, xv-146 Theodore Roosevelt, The Wilderness Hunter (New York: G.P. Putnam’s and Sons, 1893), 1-32 John Muir, “My First Summer in the Sierra,” in The Writings of John Muir (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1911), 123-28

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Wednesday, February 27 • Visit #1 to Bowdoin Museum of Art—meet in the lobby, 10 am sharp! Last names A-H: Benjamin Heber Johnson, “Conservation, Subsistence, and Class at the Birth of Superior National Forest,” Environmental History 4 (January 1999): 80-99 Gifford Pinchot, The Fight for Conservation (New York: Doubleday, Page & Co., 1910), 40-52 Last names J-W: Steven Hahn, “Hunting, Fishing, and Foraging: Common Rights and Class Relations in the Postbellum South,” Radical History Review 26 (October 1982): 36-64 William T. Hornaday, Our Vanishing Wild Life: Its Extermination and Preservation (New York: New York Zoological Society, 1913), 53-62, 105-13

Thursday, February 28—REQUIRED TALK • Talk by Joseph E. Taylor III, “The Progressive Roots of ALEC: Familial Wealth and Anti-Democracy in the Conservation Era,” 7-8:30 p.m., The Lantern at Roux

Week 7 Saving nature: Progressivism and the origins of conservation Monday, March 4 Video (in-class): “The Wilderness Idea” Jacoby, Crimes Against Nature, 148-208

Wednesday, March 6 • In-class midterm—bring pencils or pens; blue books provided

NO CLASS—Spring Vacation, March 9-24

Week 8 Mail-order nature: outdoor recreation and consumer culture Monday, March 25 • Visit #2 to Bowdoin Museum of Art—meet in the lobby, 10 am sharp! David Louter, “Glaciers and Gasoline: The Making of a Windshield Wilderness, 1900-1915,” in Seen and Being Seen: Tourism in the American West ed. David M. Wrobel and Patrick T. Long (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2001): 248-70 John Soluri, “Accounting for Taste: Export Bananas, Mass Markets, and Panama Disease,” Environmental History vol. 7, no. 3 (July 2002): 386-410

Wednesday, March 27 Last names A-H: Marion F. Crawford, Bar Harbor (New York: Charles Scribner’s and Sons, 1896), 1-21 Louise Dickinson Rich, We Took to the Woods (Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott, 1942), 53-56 Last names J-W: Norman Hayner, “Auto Camps in the Evergreen Playground,” Social Forces 9 (December 1930): 256-66 “The Cooperative Group,” c. 1938 and “Price List (Recreational Equipment, Inc. Co-Op),” April 25, 1945, Lloyd Anderson Papers, University of Washington Libraries

Week 9 Landscapes of exposure: health, urbanization, and industrialization Monday, April 1 Mitman, Breathing Space, ix-xii, 1-88

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Wednesday, April 3 Last names A-H: Carl Zimring, “Dirty Work: How Hygiene and Xenophobia Marginalized the American Waste Trades, 1870–1930,” Environmental History 9 (January 2004): 80-101 Margaret Byington, Homestead: The of a Mill Town, Samuel P. Hays, intro. (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1910, 1974), map, 3-32 Last names J-W: Connie Y. Chiang, “‘Monterey-by-the-Smell’: Odors and Social Conflict on the California Coastline,” Pacific Historical Review 73 (May 2004): 183-214 Jack London, “White and Yellow,” Tales of the Fish Patrol (New York: The Regents Press, 1905), 11-38

Week 10 Something of a wasteland: the limits of nature in twentieth-century America Monday, April 8 Mitman, Breathing Space, 89-166

Wednesday, April 10 Video: Selections from Pare Lorentz, The Plow that Broke the Plains (1936) and The River (1938) Great Plains Committee, The Future of the Great Plains (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1936), 1-11, “Pictorial History,” 121-27 Last names A-H: Robert Marshall, The People’s Forests (New York: Harrison Smith and Robert Haas, 1933), 77- 85 Last names M-W: Aldo Leopold, “Thinking Like a Mountain” from A Sand County Almanac, with Other Essays on Conservation from Round River (New York: Oxford University Press, 1966; reprint, New York: Ballantine Books, 1982), 137-41

Week 11 Power lines: race, class, gender and environmentalist schisms Monday, April 15 Hurley, Environmental Inequalities • Everyone, 1-45 • Group A (middle-class whites): 46-76 • Group B (working-class ethnic whites): 77-110 • Group C (African Americans): 111-35 Adam Rome, “‘Give Earth a Chance’: The and the Sixties,” Journal of American History 90 (September 2003): 525-54

Wednesday, April 17 Hurley, Environmental Inequalities, 136-82 James Morton Turner, “‘The Specter of :’ Wilderness, , and the Evolution of the New Right,” Journal of American History (June 2009): 123-49 Flannery Burke and Jennifer Seltz. “Mothers’ Nature: Feminisms, Environmentalism, and Childbirth in the 1970s,” Journal of Women's History 30 (Summer 2018): 63-87

Week 12 Green dreams, synthetic nightmares: The Cold War, technology, and environmentalism Monday, April 22 Video: “Place Matters” from Unnatural Causes: Is Inequality Making Us Sick? (2008).

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Mitman, Breathing Space, 167-205 Nancy Langston, “The Retreat from Precaution: Regulating Diethylstilbestrol (DES), Endocrine Disruptors, and ,” Environmental History 13 (January 2008): 41-65

Wednesday, April 24 James Morton Turner, “From Woodcraft to ‘Leave No Trace’: Wilderness, Consumerism, and Environmentalism in Twentieth-Century America,” Environmental History 7 (July 2002): 462-84 Joseph E. Taylor III, “Climber, Granite, Sky,” Environmental History 11 (January 2006), 130- 35. 1972 Chouinard Equipment catalog at http://climbaz.com/chouinard72/chouinard.html

Friday, April 26 • Research paper due by 5 pm, my office (120 Roux), with copies of topic and paper proposals, plus any drafts with comments

Week 13 Apollo’s dimmed fire: energy and climate crises in historical perspective Monday, April 29 Naomi Oreskes, “The Scientific Consensus on : How do We Know that We’re Not Wrong?,” in Climate Change: What It Means for Us, Our Children, and Our Grandchildren, Joseph F. C. DiMento and Pamela M. Doughman, eds. (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2007), 65-99 David S. Painter, “Oil and the American Century,” Journal of American History 99 (June 2012): 24-39 Paul Sabin, “‘The Ultimate Environmental Dilemma’: Making a Place for Historians in the Climate Change and Energy Debates,” Environmental History 15 (January 2010): 76-93

Wednesday, May 1 Karen R. Merrill, excerpted documents from The Oil Crisis of 1973-1974: A Brief History with Documents (Boston: Bedford/St. Martins, 2007): 66-85, 108-12 Charles D. Keeling, “The Concentration and Isotopic Abundances of Carbon Dioxide in the Atmosphere,” Tellus 12 (May 1960): 200-03 J.S. Sawyer, “Man-made Carbon Dioxide and the ‘Greenhouse’ Effect,” Nature 239 (September 1, 1972): 23-26 Joshua P. Howe, “This is Nature; This is Un-Nature: Reading the Keeling Curve,” Environmental History 20 (April 2015): 286-93

Week 14 The end of nature?: The changing faces of environmentalism Monday, May 6 Mitman, Breathing Space, 206-53 Craig E. Colten, “The Rusting of the Chemical Corridor” and Barbara Allen, “Cradle of a Revolution?: The Industrial Transformation of Louisiana’s Lower Mississippi River,” Technology and Culture 47 (January 2006): 95-101, 112-19

Wednesday, May 8 No reading—discussion, course wrap up, and evaluations

Reading Period Thursday, May 9-Sunday, May 12 Exam Period Monday, May 13-Saturday, May 18

Final exam Friday, May 17, 8:30-11:30 am

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