Marcus Garvey and his organization, the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA), represent the largest mass movement in African-American history. Proclaiming a black nationalist “Back to Africa” message, Garvey and the UNIA established 700 branches in thirty-eight states by the early 1920s. Considering the strong political and economic black nationalism of Garvey’s movement, it may seem … Continued
Nineteenth century America contained a bewildering array of Protestant sects and denominations, with different doctrines, practices, and organizational forms. But by the 1830s almost all of these bodies had a deep evangelical emphasis in common. Protestantism has always contained an important evangelical strain, but it was in the nineteenth century that a particular style of … Continued
In the course of the twentieth century, the face of Roman Catholicism in America changed again, almost as dramatically as it had in the nineteenth century. In the nineteenth century, the change was predominantly demographic, as Catholic immigration added to church ranks thirteen million from far-flung corners of the world. In the twentieth century, the … Continued
Evangelicalism needs to be understood not only as a religious movement, but also as a social movement. As such, it was an integral part of a broader organizational revolution that transformed nineteenth-century American society. For the most part, eighteenth-century Americans lived their lives within hierarchically ordered institutions. They were oriented primarily to place, and they … Continued
Who studies roads as mini-environments? Very few scholars do, in fact almost none. Highway engineers know a great deal about engineering roads but admit to knowing little about their ecological and cultural effects. But look again. Every road is a sort of ecosystem that ecologists are only just now starting to study. Paved roads transformed … Continued
Civil War scholars and environmental historians have not so much debated as ignored each other. Environmental works on the South are few and fewer still directly address the war. A consciously ecological view of the Civil War is actually required for two compelling reasons. First, the environmental movement itself. Since World War II and especially … Continued
Prior to the arrival of Europeans and their powerful, transforming products, desires, and structures, American Indians possessed extensive knowledge about the environments in which they lived and made sense of living beings in myriad culturally appropriate ways. The buffalo was first and foremost of utmost significance to people of the plains and prairies. In a … Continued
By the second century of their existence in the New World, the sober, frugal, hard-working Puritans had transformed the American wilderness into fruitful farms and shining cities on hills. The “howling” wilderness encountered by the first generation of Puritans in America was demonized. It was the vast domain of Satan, his minions the “Salvages,” and … Continued
For tens of millions of years the dominant pattern of biological evolution on this planet has been one of geographical divergence dictated by the simple fact of the separateness of the continents. However, in the last few thousand years there has been a countervailing force. Homo sapiens have gone everywhere, taking with us, intentionally, our … Continued
With fire, humans claim a unique ecological niche: this is what we do that no other creature does. We apply and withhold it according to social institutions, cultural norms, perceptions of how we see ourselves in nature. Different people have created distinctive fire regimes, as they have distinctive literatures and architectures. In this way fire … Continued