January 8-10

ASB372 Environmental Hazards of the West a death-defying attempt to articulate a coherent Definition OF ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY Douglas Weiner Weiner discusses how systems of politics and surrounding economies influence ourview of the ecological practices surrounding the associated environments. Ecology is just like any other part of science with many interlocking parts requiring isolation of the part of the system in question in order to isolate the part one must create an artificial abstraction. Environmental History views the world as an set of cognitive frameworks attempting to grasp some unknowable truth. The environment is a social machination masking the reference by instantiating it. Every environmental struggle is a POWER STRUGGLE. Wilderness is a socially invented term used to assist in the psychological and physical dispossession of land from the native peoples from the Native Americans to the Bantu. Anytime a cultural wanted to redefine the landscape under their own framework the cultural initially in possession of the land was annihilated for example Hitler's vision, the Bolsheviks,etc.

The Zionist Party does the same thing in Israel. Dispossessing the native inhabitants of what was promised to be Palestine in order to build homes and make the desert bloom. What is Environmental History and who should interpret it? One must look at all the hidden environmental configurations and practices. Every component comprising the components of power. Political Ecologies Ch.1

Paul Robbins (2012) Political Ecology. Blackwell: Maulden, MA. Second Edition Political Economies affect the ecology of a region. More intrinsic to the allocation of resources and the corresponding methodology used to implement resource acquisition. Cash crop industry is contributing to the accelerated animal habitat loss and deforestation in Kenya. Money, Influence = power and influence greatly the way an environment will either be maintained and preserved or destroyed. Malthus in 1790 stated that overpopulation and social reform were the leading cause of resource depletion. Malthus believed population control and not the reallocation of resources was the necessary solution for any ecological crisis. Political Ecology -Malthus view was Apolitical Apolitical studies symptoms while political looks for causes. Diffusion: Diffusing technology from first world to third world Valuation of services and competitive win win competion. Modernization of resources geared towards technological sustainability Five Dominant Narratives The degradation and marginalization of resources thesis states that production systems reach overexploitation of natural resources due t state development and/or integration into regional or global markets. Modernization efforts have been unsuccessful in terms of equality in resource distribution.

My Thoughts on the readings The main points of the readings is to give us an understanding about the mechanisms behind ecological environments and how to best study ecological issues. The readings illustrate what environmental history and political ecological systems offer in terms of resource preservation and reasons for resource depletion. Policy viewing ecological degradation is based on power structures. The institutions in power have their own agendas when deciding what is important concerning resource preservation. The factors that control government and business are often contradictory to what the environment needs to ensured proper resource utilization and preservation. Home renters independent of ethnicity are also at risk to higher levels of ozone but for various reasons concerning lack of interest to home buyers aside from realtors who rent properties out to tenants,

January 15-17

Reisner Ch. 1 Country of Illusion Powell, Dead Pool M. Reisner, (1993) Cadillac Desert. New York: Penguin. Selections on Reisner speaks about the way in which the exploitation of resources has been long standing in the history of the Americas. in 1539 Don Francisco De Coronado was sent on a mission to Arizona and its neighboring territories not yet explored and conquered by the Spanish. Its colonial agenda was to find gold and other precious minerals for the crown and church tabernacle. De Coronado realized how inhospitable the West and its Desert climate can be and how the elements of the desert can ravage the spirit of even the most experienced traveller. Later in the mid-nineteenth century outdoorsmen such as Jedediah Smith made their way across the landscape of the the West. Travelling from Salt Lake City to St. Loius and beyond Smith and his cohorts traded pelts and took part in the first Anglo-ritual on the desert landscape. All the great pioneering outdoorsmen met in St Louis to trade stories and merchandise. The stories of Smith and De Coronado both show us exactly how important political and economic agendas are to the Ecological Historian. Without the Spanish search for gold or the demand for pelts there would be no immediate demand to esplore the Western frontier until some other economic and/ or political event occurred. John Wesley Powell was the scientific voice that helped define the topography, hydrography, climate and viability for human habitation of the West. Powell,. ..

The Powell Geographic Expedition left Wyoming Green River area to set out on their expedition. The group leader John Wesley Powell was accompanied by O.G. Howland, Billy Dunn, Bill Hawkins, and Powells brothers Walter and Seneca. Powell also picked up Andy Hall, Frank Goodman and Jack Summer along the way. The group of adventurers explored the extent of the Rapids.

The Big Canal The Political Ecology of the Central Arizona Project. Sheridan T. Sheridan (1995) Arizona: A History. Tucson: University of Arizona Press Before the CAP existed many farmers in the Salt River Valley area from 1896 to 1905 lost 24 percent of irrigable land from drought from 127,500 to 96,000 acres. It was so devestating the farmer turned to the federal reclamation service, founded in 1902, for help. The federal engineers soon adopted the Salt River Project. 60 miles northeast of Mesa in the easternmost farming region the engineers built the Roosevelt Dam. The Central Arizona Project - Canal that carries water 335 miles uphill from the Colorado River t to Phoenix, Tucson, the cotton fields in the middle of them and many reservations along the way. The Roosevelt Dam allowed the cotton boom to industrialize AZ. The hydraulic pumps put in place around the end of WW2 allowed AZ to blow up into the Metropolitan City it is today. Now the very innovations that allowed iAZ to prosper now stand as a coercive and monolithic hierarchal system

The CAP is forged from a chaotic power struggle between political, indigenous, and big business interests.

My Thoughts The readings make me realize the way in which water use in the West is monopolized and exploited to maintain a system of continual water overuse. Powell and the Mormon communities had a method in place that ensured water would be used with optimum efficacy. As long as the communities did not strain the available water resources. However when the early Mormon farming communities in the Salt River Valley began to see the effects of extreme drought the community relied on the government to fix the problem. Instead of acknowledging the truth and unpredictability of farming in a desert environment they relied on the federal reclamation project and brought innovation that is turning into a parody of its initial intention.

January 22-24 M. Reisner, (1993) Cadillac Desert. New York Part 2 Deadpool James Lawrence Powell

Powell, J. (2008) Dead Pool: Lake Powell, Global Warming and the Future of Water in the West. Berkeley University of California Press. Building of Empire Appointment in Samarra In the Ancient Fertile Crescent the land of Sumer began to use a new subsistence method that would later , in part, bloom into what became the hanging gardens of Babylon. The Ancient Egyptians also used this system of cultivating mass crops to sustain large numbers of people. This system is known to us as agriculture. The Sumerians can be traced to as early as the sixth millenium BC. They dug canals to the city state of UR that housed approximately 250000 people. The inhabitants of Ur were in large part sustained by this irrigation technology. Even though the Sumerians were intelligent enough to give us writing, the sixty minute hour, the wheel, the city-state, and our urbanized psyche; they were eventually unable to prevent the end of their own civilization. The subsistence methods of the Babylonian civilizations after the Sumerians still followed their model of irrigation more or less. Three enemies of irrigation communities are silt, salt, and internal political weaknesses. The Aswan Dam in Egypt is a modern innovation with huge ecological repurcussions. Egyptians have been irrigating since before the ancient Mesopotamians around 8,000 years ago. However the modern dam in Egypt is monopolizing the area of inundation and soil deposition usually evenly dispersed amongst the seasonal flooding area. This has caused mass aridification of once irrigable land. The Hohokam managed to dig viable canals from the colorado river to Phoenix and as far as Flagstaff.

M. Reisner, (1993) Cadillac Desert. New York Chapter 2 The Red QUEEN

the Sierra Nevada foothills gold and the association of all the signature ecological devastation caused San Francisco earned its place as a destination to visit in the middle of the nineteenth century.

January 31st and 29th The Trouble with Wilderness; or, Getting Back to the Wrong Nature

by William Cronon (William Cronon, ed., Uncommon Ground: Rethinking the Human Place in Nature, New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 1995, 69-90) In the trouble of wilderness. Cronon points out that Wilderness as we see it today is a machination or parody of the essence it should encapsulate. The very nature of our society(Urban) can be seen in its antithesis( so far rural that it needs a different term dubbed wilderness. He proves that the very idea of wilderness triggers thoughts of escaping society and being at one with undefiled nature. The truth is that humanities footprint(in large part mans but in an attempt to be politically correct. Cronon refers to Wordsworth and Thoreau who view the Wilderness as Sublime. Wilderness was initially an awe inspiring and overwhelming object to behold. The Europeans had never seen something so fear invoking yet amazingly alluring as wilderness. Its odd because Wordsworth and Thoreau were part of an era that viewed indians as savages but the white man quickly adopted the view of nature as divine and sacred when forced to deal with its isolating and often unforgiving attributes.

Cronon overlooks a big issue. He disregards man as a natural creature. The changes we make to wilderness and society are our invention from our own nature thus everything under the sun and beyond is all considered nature. I think its difficult for some to say that this world is the result of mans destructive and ignorant nature. WE ARE NATURE no matter how we abuse the planet, each other or the cosmos. Wilderness is still nature its just a microcosmic example of how humanity has perverted everything with our current social, cultural, and other core values. Our complacency to the horrible atrocities of ignorance in our colonial, cappitolist and industrial innovations has led us to this point. I think we can point out how much we have destroyed nature without realizing we can never be separate from it seems obtuse. On a communal level we need to unite as a species and reject any materialistic gain that costs the human race its next generation. Certain institutions promise an opportunity for a comfortable life at the future cost of the planet and everything on it. We know the planet will survive as it has lived billions of years and seen 99 percent of all living matter come and go. We are part of the living 1 percent and it seems we may just be another phase of life on this giving and nurturing being we call Earth. We need to step back from our ego that wants things we dont need and is upset with people we have never met, constantly seeking to judge others to validate our own supposedly superior integrity. All humans living in the societies that perpetuate the mechanisms causing the problem are equally culpable. We put people in prison for petty things. Because of our capitolist system institutions of legitimate business invest in the prison system successfully and people have the audacity to say only bad people go to jail, but the prison system and the people trapped in the system both come from our society so we breed the bad people that we then judge as different from ourselves. Anytime we judgetwe have to deal with the aftermath. People judged each other based on race so now we have a huge rift with minorities turning to violence out of frustration. When a white peson hears about it they feel vindicated as though their judgment of the inferiorrace was right. When we use a cell phone that promotes the death of Palestinians or the local bus systems like VEOLIA in AZ we are promoting a company in Israel responsible for horrible human rights violations. For example the VEOLIA buses are segregated and cross into

Palestinian land to instigate violence knowing the Palestinians have no way of competing with the power of a bona fide military. We promote segregation in a Democratic state like Israel to ride on the Orbits for free. We buy sugar cane from Brazil where corp. force the locals into indentured servitude borderlining on slavery. When all our values are so commercialized and false is it any wonder that even our own nature(wilderness) is fabricated? I just wish Cronon could have listed options for how to combat this issue. If there was any way to globally change the communal psyche of humanity scholars of his caliber should ideas. Instead the worlds smartest minds just seem to point the finger at organizations such as and instititions that have been pointing theirs at us long ago.

February 5th and 7th Rethinking Environmental Racism: White Privilege and Urban Development in Southern California Author(s): Laura Pulido Source: Annals of the Association of American Geographers, Vol. 90, No. 1 (Mar., 2000), pp. 12 In this article we read about many of the ecological forms of racism. Racism is often viewed as intentional individualized malicious acts. Ecological racism is viewed in the same way except for Bullard. Writer asks how did whites distance themselves from both non whites and pollution? Views racism as multifaceted in nature. She argues that there are people, institutions an structural influences and gives the scope of racism as white privilege. Her example is damned if you do and damned if you dont. Racist if you avould the company of colored people and racist if you want a color blind society???? WHAT?? Whites will not bother to be

inconvenienced to see social change. What about the civil rights movement? What about her or does she think shes the only white person to realize the disparity? Whites resist because the feel they have something to lose. Whites want to retain their benefit. Whites believe people of color make them uncomfortable and bring down property value. Unethical practices that are economically sound contribute to the problem.

To blame just the symptoms of the present environmental disparity for pollution is to miss the root of the problem where the problem began. Intentionality is often used to gauge the degree of racism

Bolins article Criteria Air Pollution and Marginalized Populations: Environmental Inequity in Metropolitan Phoenix, Arizona

South Phoenix has more noise and other pollution. Noise pollution from the Sky Harbor Airport and vast industrial conquest in Arizona from comapnys such as Motorola whic h practiced a whites only hiring poloicy in early 1948. This on the fringe development in AZ has continued to disrupt the environment of the minority especially those living in South Phoenix. Phoenix has recently lead the way in new home communities. AZ is dependent on the home expansion and the sprwaling effects of such continuous expansion plays a significant role in polluting the air we breath. AZ depends on the housing and industrial growth in order to maintain its economic viability Groundwater and land pottion has become such a big problem in AZ. Bolin and other researchers predict higher levels of these pollutants to be present in the minirity hispaninc/ non white areas than in more affluent white suburban areas.

(In this analysis, we focus on three criteria pollutants that are associated with industrial activities and vehicular trafc, including the airport: nitrous oxides, ozone, and carbon monoxide. Nitrous oxides (NOX) are a group of reactive gases that includes nitrous dioxide (NO2 ). NOX is an important precursor to ground-level ozone and is implicated in respiratory and cardiovascular health (EPA, 2000b) ) Directly from the reading but integral to the research conducted.. Many different models were used in order to extrapolate data pertinent in recognizing just how much pollution Ozone Carbon Monoxide Nitrous Oxides CMAQ Models? People in poorer neighborhoods had higher levels of CO The areas with higher levels of Latinos and American Indians have higher levels of CO. Areas with higher amounts of renters have more CO. Hispanics get the worst of it in terms of NOx CO and Ozone deficiency. Poor minority areas are burdened by pollution in various forms including noise and the others mentioned.

February 9th - February 14th Reading material covered for February 9th - February 14th "Old West" and "New West" values. Readings: Resort Geographies: Building a Better Mountain? (131-154) in W. Travis 2007) New Geographies of the American West. Washington, D.C.: Island Press (E-book available via the library web site) A.J. Hansen et al. (2002) Ecological Causes and Consequences of Demographic Change in the New West. Bioscience 52(2), 151-162. (Available through ASU library website) J.E. Taylor (2004) The Many Lives of the New West. Western Historical

A.J. Hansen et al. (2002) Ecological Causes and Consequences of Demographic Change in the New West. Bioscience 52(2), 151-162. (Available through ASU library website) The term New West attempts to redefine the way we look at the West in terms of population growth, urbanization, industry modification / expansion into technology based economies not as dependent on

farming and.agriculture. Socio-economically and ecologically more vested in different resources for sustainability. A trend for the preservation of what has been termed natural amenities. Beautiful view, fresh mountain air, borderline misanthropic tendencies, isolation, lakes for fishing, etc. Natural amenities can only be enjoyed fully if they have a light socioeconomic / ecological foot. A trend to prevent the deepening global footprint of our current extraction based economic tendencies. A discussion question from class to look for in this reading is to examine if it is really The new west... or just the same old sh!@ presented in a new way? The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem Is the public and surrounding private lands of the contiguous area including the high plains surrounding the area of Yellowstone Park. The low lands are more soil nutrient rich due to flood inundation as water from the high plains above and from channel runoffs and other factors makes its way to the lowlands. The vast majority of wildlife preserves and other natural amenities are located in the highlands.Yellowstone is one such example. Yellowstone is full of rhyolites in the soil topography and along with other factors this indicates the soil is the geologic result of volcanic activity. This volcanic activity can deplete the nutrients of the soil in the highlands sharing close in proximity to eruption sites. The lowlands are now the primary areas of human expansion. The expansion pushes the animals up to higher levels of elevation and resource scarcity. The result of the huge influx of people has caused changes to the ecological and socioeconomic composition of the area. The New West is growing rapidly in comparison to others

March 19 -21 M. Davis 1998) The Case for Letting Malibu Burn (93-148) in The Ecology of Fear. New York: Vintage Books. (posted on Blackboard) W. Travis (2007) Beyond the Suburban Frontier: The Wests Exurbs (111130) in New Geographies of the American West. Washington, D.C.: Island Press

M. Reisner (2003) A Dangerous Place: Californias Unsettling Fate. New York: Pantheon. (selections on Blackboard) In this reading we learned about how city and state planning in California did not take into account the damage and devastation of natural disasters such as hurricanes. In