U.S. Environmental History   

Broadly speaking, Environmental History is the study of humankind's past interactions with the natural world. This course explores major themes in U.S. Environmental History by posing three broad questions: How have humans interacted with the landscape at different times in history? What were the consequences of those interactions? How and why have ideas about the environment and environmental ethics changed over time? The field is not limited to nature but overlaps with culture, economics, politics, labor, race, gender, the arts, and quite literally any other historical field one can name. Each week we will discuss tenets of the field in a broad U.S. context, while also exploring issues specific to the Pacific Northwest.