People, Values, and Natural Resources
Monday, May 08, 2006
review and study sessions
A study session will be held Monday May 15 from 5:00-8:00 pm in Fernow 304.
A study session will be held Tuesday May 16 at 2:00 pm in Fernow 212.
Saturday, May 06, 2006
THERAPEUTIC TREE WALK - Tuesday May 9th
sponsored by the Cornell Forestry Club.
*This is great practice for NTRES210: FIELDBIO or a refresher if you've already taken this required course.
Any questions can be directed to Shavonne at ses65@cornell.edu.
Sunday, April 30, 2006
Nature in Los Angeles
To: H-ENVIRONMENT@H-NET.MSU.EDU
From: Ben Johnson
Date: 25 April 2006
Subject: Price piece on cities and Nature
Fellow H-Enviros:
Wanted to call everybody's attention to a compelling (and entertaining) piece by Jennifer Price, author of Flight Maps, in the new issue of the Believer, complete with handsome photographs by Stephen Smith. Price's questioning of what we mean by nature, and her trenchant critique of nature writing, will be of interest to all environmental historians, even those who don't share her knowledge or fascination with Los Angeles, whose history and culture serve as the point of departure for her wider arguments.
Coming off of the annual meeting, this is a particularly timely piece. Environmental historians, it seems to me, do an excellent job of interdisciplinary work with field scientists and public lands managers. But we largely neglect cultural history (as confirmed by a quick look at the program for the St. Paul meeting), and in so doing, I think sharply limit our ability to convince the rest of the profession of the centrality of environmental questions. This piece suggests how we might effectively bring cultural questions to the heart of our work.
Here's the link:
http://www.believermag.com/issues/200604/?read=article_price
jt
Friday, April 28, 2006
Carl Leopold talk on Tuesday May 2
NTRES grad student and TA for Environmental Conservation, Florian Eichiner, organized this talk for students in NTRES 201, but the talk will be open to anyone that might be interested in the topic and hearing Carl...
Tuesday, May 2nd, 2006
Department of Natural Resources, 304 Fernow Hall, 7:00pm
Speaker: Carl A. Leopold
The ethical relationship with the land that supports us: a discussion of Aldo Leopold's Land Ethic
A great chance to hear Aldo Leopold's son Carl talking about his father's Land Ethic, why that has become a prominent factor in agriculture and forestry, and nevertheless how rapidly unethical exploitation of our resources continues to expand.
Tuesday, April 11, 2006
Week 11 addition to the syllabus
** Worster, Donald. “Clements and the Climax Community,” chapter 11 in Nature’s Economy: A History of Ecological Ideas, 2nd. Edition (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1985), pp. 205-220 plus notes (electronic reserve).
In addition, we strongly suggest also taking a look at:
+ Tobey, Ronald C. , “Frederic Clements’s Theory of Plant Succession,” chapter 4 in Saving the Prairies: The Life Cycle of the Founding School of American Plant Ecology, 1895-1955 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1981), pp. 76-109 plus notes (electronic reserve).
Both of these readings are on electronic reserve. thanks everyone.
Jim
Friday, March 31, 2006
"The Ledge" now off-Broadway
I had mentioned in class that "The Ledge" has just been turned into a play that is currently in production in New York. Here are the details--if anyone is planning a trip to NYC next weekend, could be an interesting thing to check out:
THE LEDGE
A New Play Based on the Short Story by Lawrence Sargent Hall
Written by Jack Hanley
Directed by Christopher Eaves
Starring Mike Houston
Friday March 24
Saturday March 25
Friday April 7
Saturday April 8
8:00 PM (Doors Open at 7:30)
Dixon Place
258 Bowery, 2nd Floor (South of E Houston)
New York City
TICKETS: 212 219 0736
For more information visit http://www.eavesdrop.net or http://dixonplace.org
Tuesday, March 14, 2006
Bambi ad
pre-exam humor...
-Emily Benning
Friday, March 10, 2006
review sessions
just a reminder that there will be two review sessions for the mid-term. Jocelyn will run a session on Sunday afternoon March 12 in Fernow 304 at 4:00 pm. Then on Monday March 13 we will hold a review in Fernow 304 at 2:00 pm.
thanks everyone.
Friday, March 03, 2006
Hudson River School painters in the news
it's been a quiet week on the blog, but showing Asher Durand's painting, Progress, this morning made me think of another of his famous paintings--Kindred Spirits (1849), shown here.
This painting made the news last year when the New York Public Library decided to sell it off, and the buyer turned out to be Alice Walton, heir to the Wal-Mart fortune.
The rumored but uncomfirmed purchase price is estimated to be somewhere in the ballpark of $35 million, the largest amount ever paid for a work of art by an American artist!
This sparked a lot of commentary from critics who argued that the Library should have held on to the painting; or, if they had to sell Kindred Spirits, that at the least it shouldn't have gone to Wal-Mart.
Here are a couple of links to articles discussing the sale and whether it was appropriate. Another "UTPT"--Ultimate Term Paper Topic!
2005 Article "Kindred Spirits: Art and Money" from the Gotham Gazette, an NYC arts commentary publication.
Rebecca Skolnit Feb. 19, 2006 OpEd piece: "Not-so 'Kindred Spirits'" in the LATimes. You need to register with (for free) with LATimes to read the article. It's worth it.
Monday, February 27, 2006
Careful, it's rough out there, Bambi
Wednesday, February 15, 2006
The tension between Liberalism "Big L" and environmentalism
Book DescriptionJim again: Hopefully this will also help students in the "So What?" department, given the importance of understanding Liberalism for understanding contemporary environmental policy.
This book explores the tensions between American political culture, which is predicated on self-interest, and environmental regulation, which restricts individual property rights.
Environmental Deceptions brings together normative analysis and empirical data to explain the structural limitations liberal society places on environmental improvement. Whereas liberal society is predicated on individual self-interest, environmental legislation is predicated on communal regulation of individual property rights. Cahn's aim is to expose the tensions between American political culture and environmental regulation in an effort to make environmental policy discourse more effective. By analyzing such areas as air policy, water policy, waste policy, and energy policy, he exposes the subtle tensions that often lead to failure and explains why traditional models of environmental legislation are insufficient to resolve existing environmental dilemmas.
Friday, February 10, 2006
Beauty and the Beast: more than a fairy tale?
The literature on the subsequent film versions of the tale is vast: there are internet sites that discuss the Cocteau film as well as the Disney version.The story of Beauty and the Beast has been around for centuries in both written and oral form, and more recently in film and video. Many experts trace similarities back to the stories of Cupid and Psyche, Oedipus and Apuleius’ The Golden Ass of the second century A.D.
The tale of Beauty and the Beast was first collected in Gianfranceso Straparola’s Le piacevolo notti (The Nights of Straparola) 1550-53. The earliest French version is an ancient Basque tale where the father was a king and the beast a serpent. Charles Perrault popularized the fairy tale with his collection Contes de ma mere l’oye (Tales of Mother Goose) in 1697. The 17th century Pentamerone is also said to include similar tales.
The first truly similar tale to the one we know today was published in 1740 by Madame Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Gallon de Villeneuve as part of a collection of stories La jeune amériquaine, et les contes marins (told by an old woman during a long sea voyage). Mme. de Villeneuve wrote fairy tale romances drawn from earlier literature and folk tales for the entertainment of her salon friends.
Almost half of the Villeneuve story revolves around warring fairies and the lengthy history of the parentage of both Beauty and the Prince. Beauty is one of 12 children, her stepfather is a merchant, her real father being the King of the Happy Isles. The Queen of the Happy Isles is both Beauty’s mother and the Dream Fairy Sister. Villeneuve also made various digs at the many enforced marriages that women had to submit to, and her Beauty ponders that many women are made to marry men far more beastly than her Beast. The story was 362 pages long.
French aristocrat Madame Jeanne-Marie Le Prince de Beaumont (1711 - 1780) emigrated to England in 1745 where she established herself as a tutor and writer of books on education and morals. She took Mme. de Villeneuve’s tale and shortened it, publishing it in 1756 as part of a collection entitled Magasin des enfants. Although taking all the key elements from the Mme. de Villeneuve story, Mme. de Beaumont omits some dream sequences and the fact that in the original the transformation to handsome prince takes place after the wedding night. Intended as a lesson for her students, some of the subversive edges were polished off the story. It is pretty well the version we consider traditional today. Mme. Le Prince de Beaumont’s story was translated into English as The Young Misses Magazine, Containing Dialogues between a Governess and Several Young Ladies of Quality, Her Scholars (1757).
Wednesday, February 08, 2006
Gawain's World! Gawain's World!
Sir Gawain and the Green KnightJim again: a full text translation of the poem can be found online.
Written in the late fourteenth century, Sir Gawain is made up of two stories, one (the testing at Bercilak's castle) set inside the other (the beheading of the Green Knight at the beginning and the return blow at the end). That is not to say it is a cut-and-paste job; it is thought by many to be the finest literary work of the Middle Ages. It is also the rarest of tales: a love story that isn't, really, as well as one of the funniest tales of the Middle Ages, rivalling anything written by the anonymous poet's more famous contemporary, Geoffrey Chaucer. (The author also wrote a fine religious poem in the form of a dream vision, which we call Pearl.)In the first episode at King Arthur's castle, you must bear in mind that no one knows what is going on. Like Grendel, the Green Knight is a sort of creature never seen before by men. Sir Gawain is, throughout the poem, marked by absolute courtliness, that is to say, the is always courageous, honorable (he keeps his word), devout, loyal, and gracious toward all men and (especially) women (pay special attention to the pentangle). He thinks it is his courage that is being tested (wouldn't you?). He does not realize that the incidents in his bedroom at Bercilak's castle, which parallel the hunting scenes (can you guess why?) are actually another kind of test. Thus, when he arrives to face his test at the end, he discovers that he has already been tested--that his test is, in fact, over. Wouldn't you be angry at being tricked this way?
The Green Knight is probably not to be seen as evil. He is a shape-shifter, and Bercilak seems to say that the Bercilak-persona is the "real" one. However, don't give too much credence to his "explanation" of his motivations at the end of the poem (the Morgan le Faye stuff), which is pretty preposterous and doesn't really explain anything.
Ask yourself when you finish the poem: What is really being tested? (This is not a simple question.) How does Sir Gawain do? What are we supposed to think of the Green Knight? Bercilak's wife? King Arthur? his court? Sir Gawain himself?
And if anyone can find a picture or a screen capture out there of Mike Myers doing "Gawain's World," well . . . you might not be guaranteed an "A," but you'll be earning some serious brownie points. :-)
Friday, February 03, 2006
Gladiators
Here is an excerpt from one web site describing Caelius's problems in getting panthers. If I'm not mistaken, this is the same Caelius who despaired of getting any leopards from Cicero (overall he was probably having a really bad day getting animals):
Jim again: oh that wacky Cicero! he's always cutting me up.Roman officials (aediles) in charge of giving spectacles relied on their contacts in the provinces to help them get animals. In the following letter, M. Caelius Rufus, a protégé of Cicero, who had been elected to the office of aedile, complains to his mentor that he has not sent him more more panthers from Cilicia (modern southwest Turkey), where Cicero was provincial governor (Patiscus was a Roman businessman working in Cilicia) (ad Fam. 8.9.3):
In almost all my letters I wrote to you about panthers. It will embarrass you that Patiscus has sent ten panthers to Curio and that you have not sent me many more than that. Curio gave me those ten panthers plus another ten African ones…if you will only remember and procure panthers from Cibyra and likewise send a letter to Pamphylia (they say that more panthers are captured there), you will accomplish your purpose…for as soon as they are captured, you have people available whom I sent to feed and ship them.
Cicero responds somewhat humorously (ad Fam. 2.11.2):
The matter of the panthers is being dealt with at my command by those who are accustomed to hunt them. The problem is that there is a remarkable shortage of the animals, and those panthers that remain complain vigorously that the only traps set in my province are for them. Therefore the rumor is that they have decided to leave my province for Caria. Nevertheless your request is being taken care of and Patiscus is giving it first priority. As many panthers as are available will be yours…
Great topic for further reading.