ENST 242: Environmental History of the Developing World (Spring semester)

Environmental History of the Developing World is a reading seminar that applies concepts from environmental history and political ecology to examine the historical roots of environmental and social change in the "developing" regions of the world, focusing mainly on the 19th and 20th centuries.   The course focuses on the rise of modern capitalism, colonial expansion, and industrialization as manifestations of the "modern world system," covering Latin America, Africa, and Southeast Asia.   Core themes include economic dependency, world systems theory, capitalism, resource access and control, colonialism, biodiversity loss, wartime development, environmental protection and enclosure as well as globalization, sustainability, and the rise of Third World environmentalism.   Readings include: Plundering Paradise (Broad and Cavanaugh, 1993), With Broadax and Firebrand (Dean, 1995), King Leopold's Ghost (Hochschild, 1999), Imposing Wilderness (Neumann, 1998), and Seeing Like a State (Scott, 1998).   Requirements for the course are: five (5) one-page reading critiques, two (2) essay exams, a semester-long research paper, and in-class participation.

This course will not be offered in Spring 2007.

Spring 2005 syllabus pdf format

Fulfills these CLA (common learning agenda) requirements: W2 (writing course), NFBW (natural and fabricated worlds), SOSC (social science).

Fulfills these ENST requirements: social science/humanities (list 4)

Prerequisites: none