136-067 Ecology and the Environmental Movement

Note

Availability

Credit Points

Coordinator

Prerequisites

Admission to Honours see Honours entry

Semester

Contact

Subject Description

This seminar examines the history of ecology during the last century--a period of unprecedented transformation in both the environment and the sciences created to interpret these changes. This seminar will focus on the development of both ecology and environmentalism within a broader social context of interdependence and tension. In the ecological sciences we will explore the instrumental ecological ideas of: geography, natural history, plant succession, ecosystem ecology, the Gaia hypothesis, and chaos ecology. Simultaneously, in the evolving field of environmental thought, we will examine: conservation, green politics, deep ecology, ecofeminism, environmental racism and justice, and bioethics. The methodology to investigate these issues will be historical case studies. Specific case studies will focus on ecological investigations of human systems including: nuclear fallout, introduced species and pests, deforestation, and overpopulation. The sources will range from ecological papers and field studies to popular films, books, and articles on environmental thought. This seminar should be of interest to students wishing to learn more about the historically complex relationship between the world we inhabit and the ways in which we understand our world.

Assessment

Written work which may comprise classpapers and essay totalling 5000 words.

Prescribed Texts

• D Worster, Nature's Economy: A History of Ecological Ideas. 1995.
• W Cronon (ed), Uncommon Ground: rethinking the Human Place in Nature. 1996.