Changes in the Land, Revised Edition: Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England

by William Cronon, John Demos (Foreword by), William Cronon (Afterword)

Overview

The book that launched environmental history, William Cronon's Changes in the Land, now revised and updated.

Winner of the Francis Parkman Prize

In this landmark work of environmental history, William Cronon offers an original and profound explanation of the effects European colonists' sense of property and their pursuit of capitalism had upon the ecosystems of New England. Reissued here with an updated afterword by the author and a new preface by the distinguished colonialist John Demos, Changes in the Land, provides a brilliant inter-disciplinary interpretation of how land and people influence one another. With its chilling closing line, "The people of plenty were a people of waste," Cronon's enduring and thought-provoking book is ethno-ecological history at its best.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780809016341
Publisher:	Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Publication date:	09/01/2003
Edition description:	Revised, 20th Anniversary Edition
Pages:	288
Sales rank:	187,409
Product dimensions:	8.08(w) x 11.06(h) x 0.77(d)
Lexile:	1390L (what's this?)

About the Author

William Cronon is the Frederick Jackson Turner Professor of History at the University of Wisconsin—Madison. His book Nature's Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West won the Bancroft Prize in 1992.

Table of Contents

	Foreword	xi
	Preface	xv
Part I.	Looking Backward
1	The View from Walden	3
Part II.	The Ecological Transformation of Colonial New England
2	Landscape and Patchwork	19
3	Seasons of Want and Plenty	34
4	Bounding the Land	54
5	Commodities of the Hunt	82
6	Taking the Forest	108
7	A World of Fields and Fences	127
Part III.	Harvests of Change
8	That Wilderness Should Turn a Mart	159
	Afterword: The Book That Almost Wasn't	171
	Notes	187
	Bibliographical Essay	223
	Index	253

Editorial Reviews

Changes in the Land exemplifies, and realizes, the promise of ecological history with stunning effect. Setting his sights squarely on the well-worn terrain of colonial New England, [Cronon] fashions a story that is fresh, ingenious, compelling and altogether important. His approach is at once vividly descriptive and profoundly analytic.” —John Demos, The New York Times Book Review

“A superb achievement: Cronon has changed the terms of historical discourse regarding colonial New England.” —Wilcomb E. Washburn, director of the Office of American Studies, Smithsonian Institution

“A cogent, sophisticated, and balanced study of Indian-white contact. Gracefully written, subtly argued, and well informed, it is a work whose implications extend far beyond colonial New England.” —Richard White, Michigan State University

“This is ethno-ecological history at its best . . . American colonial history will never be the same after this path-breaking, exciting book.” —Wilbur R. Jacobs, University of California, Santa Barbara

“A brilliant performance, from which all students of early American history will profit.” —Edmund S. Morgan, Yale University

From the Publisher