Book Reviews

BOOK REVIEWS An Environmental An Environmental History of Canada. History of Canada I would heartily recommend it be adopted, and I suspect it will be in high Laurel Sefton MacDowell demand. Vancouver: ubc Press, 2012. 352 pp. After a short, but essential, $49.95 paper. introduction regarding definitions and directions in environmental history, Sterling Evans MacDowell divides the textbook into University of Oklahoma four parts. The first, “Aboriginal Peoples and Settlers,” has a couple of chapters entitled, respectively, o the growing list of books “Encountering a New Land” and Ton Canadian environmental “Settling the Land and Transforming history, University of Toronto historian the ‘Wilderness.’” Part 2 treats various Laurel MacDowell’s new textbook, facets of “Industrialism, Reform, and An Environmental History of Canada, Infrastructure,” which includes topics should take a prominent place. on urban history, conservation, mining, The evolution of this field of study and consumerism. The third part, indicates both a rapidly maturing “Harnessing Nature, Harming Nature,” branch of history and the need for a examines the important topics of energy, solid textbook for undergraduate upper water, and food/agriculture. The final division courses. Along with the first part is entitled “The Environmental book in the field,Consuming Canada: Era.” It has chapters on the Canadian Readings in Environmental History environmental movement, parks and (1995), edited by Chad Gaffield and Pam wildlife, coastal fisheries, and the North Gaffield; David Freeland Duke’s edited and climate change. Each chapter ends volume, Canadian Environmental with an excellent list of important History: Essential Readings (2006), works devoted to the topics covered which is essentially a nicely arranged (and nicely divided into subtopics) – course packet; and Graeme Wynn’s an extremely useful tool for students. Canada and Arctic North America: An A conclusion rounds out the textbook, Environmental History (2007); we can but it is rather short, at only four now add MacDowell’s fine textbook, pages, and perhaps could have been bc studies, no. 78, Summer 3 121 122 bc studies expanded to thematically unite some MacDowell explains right off that of the various dimensions of Canadian Canada “has a different climate [from environmental history dealt with that found in the United States], throughout the book. distinctive geographical features, A word about style and layout: Both such as the Canadian Shield, its own MacDowell and ubc Press should be history, a parliamentary system of congratulated for designing a model government and politics, and unique textbook. It is loaded with excellent elements such as Crown lands”(4). illustrations and photos, has in every These points are well taken, especially chapter a variety of engaging sidebar in her chapters on coastal fisheries stories (although some readers might and the environmental history of the find some of these a bit too short and far North. Instructors in the United superficial), and makes use of numerous States could benefit from adding maps, graphs, and diagrams. The map this textbook to their own courses on Canada’s ecological regions (42), on North American environmental however, should have appeared earlier history. Indeed, it would be a welcome in the book in order to provide some trend if Americans were to start seeing geographical context, and it should things more continentally. And, if have been reproduced in a larger and they find themselves a bit behind on more colourful format. But all of these their knowledge of Canadian history, features make for an enjoyable reading adopting this text will fill in the gaps experience, breaking up the narrative and will be of much use to professor and and providing a great many points of student alike. departure for classroom discussions. And, unlike Consuming Canada or Canadian Environmental History, Canadians and the Natural MacDowell’s book, thankfully, delves deep into twentieth- and twenty-first- Environment to the century topics, especially in terms of Twenty-First Century natural resources and environmental Neil S. Forkey politics and activism. These current issues are important for students Toronto: University of Toronto to understand; and the historical Press, 2012. 158 pp. $24.95 paper. grounding provided in the book, along with corresponding lectures, will Jonathan Clapperton help them to do so. As MacDowell University of Alberta explains the goal of the book: “This environmental history of Canada brings he field of Canadian to light the grave consequences of the Tenvironmental history has development ethos as it played out in blossomed over the past two decades. Canadian history, not to condemn, but Consequently, instructors of Canadian so we can develop strategies to create a environmental history courses are livable, sustainable environment in the becoming increasingly spoiled, having future” (6). so many good options from which to Some scholars south of the forty- choose for course readers. In all of ninth parallel may wonder how this this new scholarship, however, a short text differs from its counterparts in synthesis of Canadian environmental American environmental history. history was absent. Neil Forkey’s Book Reviews 123 recent work, Canadians and the Natural Aboriginals and non-Aboriginals have Environment to the Twenty-First cooperated on issues of the environment Century, fills this gap. (e.g., the Hudson’s Bay Company Forkey has arranged his book and the Cree with regard to beaver chronologically, with each of the conservation) as well as to defending five chapters addressing what he sees the important caveat that “modern as a dominant theme in Canadian environmentalism is replete with environmental history. His thesis: stories of dispossession and exclusion Canadians have always expressed of Aboriginal peoples” (114). This competing desires to both exploit and latter argument is made by offering protect natural resources. Chapter 1, such examples as the appropriation of spanning the 1600s to the early 1900s, Aboriginal identities via the notion of provides an overview of how Canada came the “Ecological Indian” as well as by to be conceived as, and its economy reliant highlighting the rifts that have emerged upon, a storehouse of fish, furs, timber, between environmentalists and First agriculture, minerals, and hydroelectric Nations during protest events. power. He also examines Canada’s Forkey’s book, part of the Themes importance as a place for scientific in Canadian History series, delivers exploration and natural study. Chapters on the series’ promise to provide titles 2 and 3 focus on the rise of conservation that are accessible to non-specialist and preservation, respectively. Forkey readers and to offer broad overviews of focuses on the emergence of a state- the main themes of particular subjects. centred environmental regime, which The book’s brevity necessitates some includes the creation of parks and other unfortunate omissions. There is no protected areas, and the concomitant discussion of environmental history marginalization of “rural” and methodology or theory, and there is no Aboriginal people from these places historiographical debate (though Forkey in the nineteenth and early twentieth states that this is beyond the scope of centuries. In Chapter 3, his discussion his work). That being said, one will of the key differences between English- find the most influential environmental Canadian and French-Canadian historians in Canada, and many of those nature romanticism deserves to be abroad, cited in Forkey’s bibliography. highlighted; it adds a dimension to The absence of maps or images – two Canadian environmental history that integral components of any introductory is lacking in other readers and is the text – is much more problematic. most intriguing section of the book. Nonetheless, in a classroom setting Chapter 4 chronicles the history of the these shortcomings could easily be modern environmental movement in addressed by pairing Forkey’s work with Canada. Arguably, it over-emphasizes either of two relatively recent edited the significance of literary writers such collections: David Freeland Duke’s as Farley Mowat and Hugh MacLennan Canadian Environmental History: in spurring the movement, and pays Essential Readings (2006) and Alan too little attention to environmentalist MacEachern and William J. Turkel’s organizations (perhaps reflecting the Method and Meaning in Canadian relative dearth of historical scholarship Environmental History (2009). Forkey in this area) or government responses deserves credit for producing an to environmental activism. Chapter 5 is engaging and jargon-free text that will dedicated to a short discussion of how appeal to students and that instructors 124 bc studies can use as a foundation for introductory organization, different policy contexts environmental history courses. at the provincial level, and the human resources and skills they foster. Further, resource towns are not simply nodes to Why Canadian Forestry and facilitate broader goals of development Mining Towns Are Organized and geopolitics but, rather, the homes Differently: The Role of Staples in of workers and their families as they develop routines, identities, and shared Shaping Community, Class, and communities. Louise Dignard’s book Consciousness focuses on these latter differences in Louise Dignard Canada’s resource towns, or sits, to use her preferred acronym. Lampeter, Wales: The Edwin In general terms, Harold Innis’s

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