Made From This Earth: American Women and Nature / Edition 1

by Vera Norwood

Overview

The broad sweep of environmental and ecological history has until now been written and understood in predominantly male terms. In Made From This Earth, Vera Norwood explores the relationship of women to the natural environment through the work of writers, illustrators, landscape and garden designers, ornithologists, botanists, biologists, and conservationists.

Norwood begins by showing that the study and promotion of botany was an activity deemed appropriate for women in the early 1800s. After highlighting the work of nineteenth-century scientific illustrators and garden designers, she focuses on nature's advocates such as Rachel Carson and Dian Fossey who differed strongly with men on both women's "nature" and the value of the natural world. These women challenged the dominant, male-controlled ideologies, often framing their critique with reference to values arising from the female experience. Norwood concludes with an analysis of the utopian solutions posed by ecofeminists, the most recent group of women to contest men over the meaning and value of nature.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780807843963
Publisher:	The University of North Carolina Press
Publication date:	03/05/1993
Series:	Gender and American Culture
Edition description:	1
Pages:	392
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.25(h) x 0.88(d)
Lexile:	1460L (what's this?)

About the Author

Vera Norwood, professor of American studies at the University of New Mexico, is coeditor of The Desert Is No Lady: Southwestern Landscapes in Women's Writing and Art.

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

A wide-ranging and ambitious book that, in many ways, makes up for the not-so-benign neglect that natural historians—almost entirely male—have visited on women naturalists. . . . Dense with fact and discursive in approach, Made From This Earth succeeds best by giving an understanding of how both the study of nature and the attitudes toward it are governed by gender.—Natural History

A very important contribution to the information available about 'women's place' in the history of our country.—Bloomsbury Review

Norwood has made a significant contribution to the women's ecology movement, while at the same time providing all those interested in the environment, both men and women, with a richly deserved 'second look' at our environmental history.—Belles Lettres

An inventive and wide-ranging work.—Journal of American History

A valuable and thoroughly interesting exploration of the relationship of women to the natural environment through the work of nineteenth- and twentieth-century writers, illustrators, landscape and garden designers, ornithologists, botanists, biologists, and conservationists.—Nineteenth-Century Literature

This book rescues from ignorance and neglect a surprisingly diverse, interesting group of women who have helped shape American thinking about the natural world and encouraged its protection. They came from all walks of life, represented different classes and races, and present us today with a rich array of ideas and feelings about what our relations to animals and plants ought to be. Norwood makes a strong, convincing case that women have long been interested in the natural world, and she raises many important questions about the role of gender in shaping our perception and treatment of the earth.—Donald E. Worster, University of Kansas

Demonstrates conclusively that women never were marginal to the American garden and that they have always been central to an ongoing dialogue about relations between humans and the natural world. [Norwood's] work puts ecofeminist critiques into historical perspective and gives them new authority.—Annette Kolodny, author of The Lay of the Land and The Land Before Her

Editorial Reviews

A valuable and thoroughly interesting exploration of the relationship of women to the natural environment.

"Nineteenth-Century Literature"

A very important contribution to the information available about 'women's place' in the history of our country.

"Bloomsbury Review"

A wide-ranging and ambitious book. . . . Dense with fact and discursive in approach.

"Natural History"

An inventive and wide-ranging work.

"Journal of American History"

Norwood has made a significant contribution to the women's ecology movement.

"Belles Lettres"

From the Publisher

In this thoroughly researched and readable book, Norwood, an associate professor of American studies, interprets the contributions of American women to nature study and environmental protection as exemplars of a gender-based ethical relationship to the natural world. Surveying the 19th century, her early chapters pay tribute to the neglected nature essays of Susan Fenimore Cooper and the unrecognized accomplishments of women in their fields of scientific illustration and landscape design. The pivotal chapter on Rachel Carson presents her ecological understanding as the culmination of the domestic theme of nature. Later chapters explore the wildlife careers of women ethologists and the portrayal of nature by women novelists. Norwood concludes with an examination of the current eco-feminist movement. Recommended for women's studies and environmental collections.-- Joan Elbers, Montgomery Coll., Rockville, MD.

Library Journal

Seeking to reclaim the contribution American women have made to the study of nature from the early 19th century to the present, Norwood explores the relationship of women to the natural environment through the work of writers, illustrators, landscape and garden designers, ornithologists, botanists, biologists, and conservationlists. Paper edition (unseen), $17.95. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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