Wilderness and nature

KGA172 Space, Place and NaturePresented by Associate Professor Elaine StratfordSemester 2

Photo by Rob Blakers from Endangered Viking

LOOKING BACK, LOOKING FORWARD

Part 1

Revising Lecture 3.21. What does Tattersall mean when he refers to

human adaptive capacity as exaptive?2. What evidence can you bring to bear to

support the argument – advanced by Tattersall, that “As climates changed at the end of the last Ice Age, the new technophile proclivity was expressed in a shift toward agriculture and sedentary lifestyles: a shift that precipitated a fundamentally new (and potentially self-destructive) relationship with nature.”

3. Describe the general pattern of the spread of humans around the world, referring to Diamond’s work to assist you.

4. What does the archaeological evidence suggest about the lifestyles of gathering and hunting communities? How did those lifestyles change with the advent of agriculture and pastoralism? Why might that be so?

5. What is meant by the term Pleistocene overkill? Neolithic Revolution? Hydraulic civilizations?

A Woman Thinking

Learning ObjectivesModule 3 Lecture 3• be able to

– define current concepts of wilderness and address the historic background to wilderness areas, and the contemporary use of the term

– explain why the concept of wilderness has been questioned

– explain why effective wilderness conservation and management are worthy goals

KGA172• Know and be able to (a) employ basic

geographical terminology and concepts, (b) find, evaluate, analyse and reference appropriate literature, (c) contribute to debates about development and sustainability

• Comprehend and be able to explain spatial patterns, generate basic maps, field sketches and graphs, and communicate in written and graphical forms

• Apply key academic skills and (a) engage in critical thinking, discussion and listening, and in self-reflection and reflection upon the viewpoints of others and (b) research, plan and conduct fieldwork to collect data

• Analyse and interpret basic spatial, numerical and qualitative information

• Synthesize and integrate knowledge of social and Earth systems

Textbook Reading Cronon, W. (1995) The trouble with wilderness; or getting back to the wrong nature. In Cronon, W. (ed.), Uncommon Ground: Rethinking the Human Place in Nature. New York, W.W. Norton, 69-90, 80-81.

Kirkpatrick, J.B. (2006) Science and nature conservation in the wilderness. In Brown, I. (ed.), Celebrating Wilderness. Envirobook, Canterbury NSW, pp. 78-89.

Critical reading1.What is the author’s purpose?2.What key questions or problems does the author raise?3.What information, data and evidence does the author present?4.What key concepts does the author use to organize this information, this evidence?5.What key conclusions is the author coming to? Are those conclusions justified? 6.What are the author’s primary assumptions?7.What viewpoints is the author writing from?8.What are the implications of the author’s reasoning?[from Foundation for Critical Thinking]

Old Woman Reading a Lectionary, Gerard Dou

DEFINING WILDERNESS – HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES

Part 2

Hebrew words for wilderness desolatearidwasteland

He found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness; he led him about, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye.Deuteronomy 32:10 (King James Bible)

A waste and howling wilderness,Where none inhabitedBut hellish fiends and brutish menThat devils worshipped.Michael Wigglesworth 1662

St John the Baptist Entering the WildernessGiovanni di Paolo, 1417–1482

Christ in the Wilderness Kramskoy, Ivan 1837-1887

And he was there in the wilderness forty days, tempted of Satan; and was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered unto him.

Mark 1:12-13

Satan’s Home?

Wilderness wordsConcise Oxford Dictionary

1) desert, uncultivated and uninhabited tract2) part of garden left uncultivated3) confused assemblage

On-line Free Dictionary1) an unsettled, uncultivated region left in its naturalcondition, especially:

a. a large wild tract of land covered with dense vegetation or forestsb. an extensive area, such as a desert or ocean, that is

barren or empty; a wastec. a piece of land set aside to grow wild

2) something characterized by bewildering vastness, peril, or unchecked profusion

The Garden of EdenThomas Cole 1828

Wilderness images? From wild and threatening to the sublime

Home in the WoodsThomas Cole 1847

A home in the wilderness?

'And in future what a splendid contemplation ... preserved in their pristine beauty and wildness, in a magnificent park,

where the world could see for ages to come, the native Indian in his classic attire, galloping his wild horse, with sinewy bow,

and shield and lance, amid the fleeting herds of elks and buffaloes ... A nation's Park, containing man and beast, in all

the wild and freshness of their nature's beauty!’

George Catlin, 1841 (1989): The Manners and Customs of the North American Indians. Penguin, Harmondsworth, p.vii.

Natives and NationThe perceived link between wilderness and indigeneity

Grand Canyon of the YellowstoneThomas Moran 1872

Second half of the nineteenth centuryFrom the sublime to the … dedication of National Parks?

Mt Olympus, Lake St ClairWC Piguenit, 1888

Solitude“In wildness is the preservation of the world”

“It is as solitary where I live as on the prairies. … I have, as it were my own sun and moon and stars, and a little

world all to myself”

Henry David Thoreau 18541997: Walden, 119, 121

“land retaining … outstanding opportunities for solitude”US Wilderness Act 1964

“Wilderness solitude … a mental freedom … where visitors experience nature essentially free of the reminders of society”US Fish & Wildlife Service 2001

“To provide opportunities for solitude” The Wilderness Society (Australia)

Bob Brown’s House, NE TasBrown 2004: Memo for a Saner WorldBradley 1998: Wisconsin Academy Review; Meine 1988 Aldo Leopold

Aldo Leopold

MODERN PERSPECTIVES ON WILDERNESS

Part 3

Taroko National ParkTaiwanE Stratford

Types of natural and protected areasI. (a) Strictly Nature Reserve (only), (b) Wilderness AreaII. National Park (NP)III. National Monument IV. Habitat / Species Management AreaV. Protected Landscape / SeascapeVI. Managed (multiple-use) Resource Protection Area (RPA)

Taroko, Taiwan, E Stratford

Types of natural and protected areas

Elephant Rock, at Mornington Peninsula National Park, southeastern Australia. See Matysek, Stratford and Kriwoken (2006)

Purpose and function ofwilderness and natural area reserves

Lava tube cave, Maui, Hawaii, E Stratford

Contemporary concepts of wilderness• Founded in both science (ecology) and ethics (social science/values)• Broad objectives of management:

– Appropriate protection and use (conservation) of natural resources and environments in ecologically sustainable ways

– To enhance environmental, social, cultural and economic well-being of all peoples alongside the sustainable protection and use of those natural resources

– Wilderness conservation and protection, not necessarily preservation

Christ figure in the wilderness, Vatican, E Stratford

The trouble with wilderness?

“This, then, is the central paradox: Wilderness embodies a dualistic vision in which the human is entirely outside the

natural ... We thereby leave ourselves little hope of discovering what an ethical,

sustainable, honourable human place in nature might actually look like.

Worse: to the extent that we live in an urban-industrial civilization but at the same

time pretend to ourselves that our real home is in the wilderness, just to that extent

we give ourselves permission to evade responsibility for the lives we actually lead.”

Bill Cronon (pictured far right)

PROBLEMS, HAZARDS AND THREATS TO MANAGEMENT

Part 4

The challenge

Hallasan National Park, Jeju Island, South KoreaE Stratford

Conceptual Approaches to Wilderness Conservation

Classical anthropocentric view of life its environmental problems

and events

Ecocentric view of life and environmental problems and

events

Human needs and wants are privileged and at the centre of importance

Sees humanity as ‘apart from’, and in charge of nature and its resources, which are to be accessed through science, technology and management

Human needs and wants are seen as part of a larger set of imperatives to be accounted for

Requires sustainable use and protection of the Earth’s natural and living resources

Near Pearshape LagoonKing IslandE Stratford

Benefits of an ecocentric view

Reproduction of a painting of a thylacine by John Lewin, circa 1817, Linnean Society of London

Is wilderness a state of the natural environment or a state of the human

psyche or perhaps both?

Dove Lake, Cradle Mountain National Park

Nature conservationThe benefits of remoteness

lack of artificial movement barriers

lack of movement channels for exotics

small proportion of area with edge effects

Corridors and edge effects

The problem of streams

The problem of coasts

The virtues of size and heterogeneity

Species at high trophic levels

Jon Marsden-Smedley

Resilience to climatic change

Management intervention for biodiversity conservation

Jon Marsden-Smedley

Science and wilderness

The problems of cost and regulation

The destruction of mystery

The virtue of landscape benchmarks

The virtue of ‘natural’ processes

Jon Marsden-Smedley

Photo by Rob Blakers from Endangered Viking

Wilderness art – where are the people? Should they be there?

Photo by Rob Blakers from Endangered Viking

Is this better?

Or this? Or is that the right question in the first place?

Breeden and Wright 1989, Kakadu, Simon & Schuster NSW, cover photo