Tag Archives: wilderness
Celebrating Wilderness
A Facebook friend posted this reflection on the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Wilderness Act, and naturally, the Wilderness Society is commemorating it as well. If you’re not especially familiar with the legislation, its background, or it consequences, … Continue reading
The Great Dismal Swamp
Between moving from two apartments and a storage unit into a single house, attending three weddings in three different states, revising and submitting one article manuscript and working on another, writing a conference paper, and creating/revising syllabi, I didn’t make … Continue reading
The Power of Wilderness
With the semester done, we’ve obviously wrapped up my American Wilderness class. We actually finished our book-based discussions a few weeks ago, on the penultimate Wednesday of instruction. Our final class session was comprised entirely of student presentations–10 minutes drawn … Continue reading
You’ve been flocked!
Who said nothing exciting ever happens in Fredericksburg?! I was heading downhill on Hanover the other day, and off to my right I caught a flash of pink, and another, and–a flock of plastic pink flamingos stuck in somebody’s lawn. … Continue reading
Yellow Datsuns
When I ran us through the reading schedule on the first day of my American Wilderness class, I initially stated that our last two books of the semester would be “lighter reading,” before I thought better of it, and settled … Continue reading
Rewilding nature and the classroom
Yeah yeah, I’ve been remiss in my postings, and haven’t lately posted much on what we’re reading for American Wilderness. But here we are: two more. We’ve talked quite a bit throughout the semester about the fact that nowhere is … Continue reading
Removing Indians to create National Parks
Although most of our readings for American Wilderness so far have focused on Euroamerican conceptions/constructions, we’ve inevitably discussed Native Americans some in the midst of our conversations (often prefaced with something like “I know Sellers wants us to say something … Continue reading
The book that inspired it all…
So this is the genesis of the American Wilderness class. I’d read Melanie Perreault’s essay in here after Jan Golinski recommended it to me over lunch at The Huntington, and ultimately cited both their work in my own scholarship. I … Continue reading
“Digital History means no more snow days”
That’s what UMW History’s department chair, Jeff McClurken, told one of his classes the other day, and I’m reminded of it after last night’s mad scramble to figure out what to do about the snow. I have a senior seminar … Continue reading
Up next in American Wilderness…
The quintessential study, now a classic. Interesting Preface to the Fourth Edition of a book first published in 1967, an intellectual history of American ideas about wilderness from their European roots to an epilogue considering the contemporary “ethical and biocentric … Continue reading
