The Middle Ground: Indians, Empires, and Republics in the Great Lakes Region, 1650-1815 (Studies in North American Indian History)

Book Description

This book seeks to step outside the simple stories of Indian/white relations--stories of conquest and assimilation and stories of cultural persistence. It is, instead, about a search for accommodation and common meaning. It tells how Europeans and Indians met, regarding each other as alien, as virtually nonhuman, and how between 1650 and 1815 they constructed a common, mutually comprehensible world in the region around the Great Lakes that the French called the "Pays d'en haut". Here the older worlds of the Algonquins and various Europeans overlapped, and their mixture created new systems of meaning and of exchange. Finally, the book tells of the breakdown of accommodation and common meanings and the recreation of the Indians as alien and exotic. The process of accommodation described in this book takes place in a middle ground, a place in between cultures and peoples, and in between empires and non-state villages. On the middle ground people try to persuade others who are different than themselves by appealing to what they perceive to be the values and practices of those others. From the creative misunderstandings that result, there arise shared meanings and new practices.

Customer Reviews:

Top five.......2006-03-20

This belongs on any list of the five best books of American Indian history, or of North American colonial history. Richard White is brilliant. Read this book.

A professional work.......2006-02-04

Richard White managed to write a historical book that combines political, social, and cultural history with a wonderful writing style, which captures the readers' attention from the very beginning.

White indicated in the introduction of his book that he "seeks to step outside the simple stories of Indian/white relations- stories of conquest and assimilation and stories of cultural pesistence." The book is about a search of accommodation and common meaning, according to the author.

Richard White maintains that in the Middle ground of the Great Lakes, many different cultures met and accommodated their differences to be able to live together. This Middle ground of overlapping cultures and lifestyles brought mutual understanding, changes in all societies and influence on one another, not assimialtion. The big colonial wars, however, concludes White, led to sudden ruptures of accommodation and common meanings between Europeans and Indians.

The Middle Ground and Victim Baiting.......2005-09-15

A CRITICAL REVIEW OF RICHARD WHITE'S
THE MIDDLE GROUND

By Jeff Hendricks

Richard White. The Middle Ground: Indians, Empires, and Republics in the Great Lakes Region, 1650-1815. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1991.

Richard White's The Middle Ground is a detailed and extensive study of the inter-relationships between various European colonists and the Native American tribes they encountered in the Great Lakes reigon of the current United States from 1650 to 1815. The study traces the development of what Richard White argues was a "middle ground" of cultural accomodation that was created as a result of these encounters. The whole of White's book is dedicated to proving his "middle ground" argument.

At the beginning of White's study, he creates a category that lumps together the Native Americans of the Great Lakes region, known as the pays d'en haut, into a grouping that he refers to as the Algonquins. The Algonquins were an assortment of tribes from various areas surrounding the pays d'en haut who had been forced together into the region due to warfare in the east. White's study begins with descriptions of the brutal and murderous situation taking place in the pays d'en haut as the various factions of the Algonquins engaged in inter-village warfare amongst themselves, as well as war against the Iroquoi federation, which had been attacking the region from the east. In addition to these inter-tribal wars, the Algonquins living in the region were also forced to deal with the French colonists, who had begun to enter the pays d'en haut in order to profit from the fur trade. The entrance of the French traders into the region set in motion the events that would eventually lead to the formation of White's "middle ground."

White argues that the middle ground begins to form slowly, as the French colonists insert themselves into the day to day happenings of the pays d'en haut and work to achieve a position in the area that will allow them to carry on trade with the Algonquins. White shows how, in order to achieve a profitable trade situation, the French quickly realize that they need to bring the inter-tribal warfare to a hault - or at the least reduce it enough to permit trade to occur. In their attempts at building a trading realtionship with the Algonquins, the French realized that the Algonquins' social system differed greatly from their own. The French were products of a hierarchal society, and from that society they had been conditioned to see obedience and respect as things that were gained through force. When the French tried to impose their own notions of social order on the Algonquins, who lived in a collective based non-hierarchal society, they soon realized that they would have to accommodate and negotiate with the Algonquins to form a profitable trade relationship with them. Simply brutalizing the Algonquins into submission was not going to work. For the Algonquins, brutality did not breed submission - it bred resistance.

Another obstacle that the French encountered in their trade with the Algonquins was the differentiation between their respective economic systems. To put it simply, Algonquin economics were based on need, whereas French economics were based on excess accumulation and profit. The Algonquins were not accustomed to exploitative economic relations and thus resisted any type of trade that they did not view as meeting the needs of both parties involved. The French, on the other hand, could not understand an economic system based on mutual aid and cooperation. In order to push past this cultural/economic barrier to relations, the French had to create a system of trade that the Algonquins could view as a mutual exchange of gifts rather than a purely economic exchange of material for private profit.

The story of the formation of the "middle ground" was based on these and other mutual agreements and accomodations that were developed between the French and the Algonquins. To facilitate trade, the French singled out individuals from various factions of Algonquins to mold into trade emissaries, whom they referred to as "Cheifs." The French instituted a system in which they bestowed gifts to these Algonquin Cheifs, who in turn would distribute the gifts amongst their own village population. In time, these Algonquin Cheifs developed a degree of authority within their villages due to their distribution of goods, as well as their ability to communicate with the French. The European goods that the Cheifs distributed to members of their village soon became objects of status in the Algonquin world. As the Algonquins developed a want of these European goods, they began to spend some of their excess time hunting fur animals for the French which they could then trade in exhange for items such as rum, guns, knives, cloth, and various metalic utensils. Soon this system became cemented, enabling trade to take place in a somewhat peaceful manner.

Once the French had created Cheifs within the villages who could weild some degree of authority amongst their own people, they began to use their economic control of these Cheifs to press them to pacify the warriors of their respective villages. In this way, the French were able to help bring about the cessation of hostilities amongst many of the villages of the pays d'en haut. Soon, according to White, the various Algonquin peoples came to view their relation to the French as one of a child to its father. The French became the only people who could bring about an end to the bloody fighting amongst the various tribes that was occuring in the area. With this positon of negotiated power, the French were able to pacify the pays d'en haut long enough to build a profitable fur trade.

By 1701, the French had managed to help negotiate a peace between the Algonquins and the Iroquoi federation and thus had succeded in creating an atmosphere that would be favorable to their own economic exploitition of the region. A period of relatively peaceful French / Algonquin interaction existed on the "middle ground" for the next few decades as the French and Algonquins engaged in trading relations. However by the 1720s, the English had begun to inch in on French economic turf and by 1728 warfare had broken out between the English and the French/Algonquin alliance. Although White continues with his "middle ground" hypothesis throughout the remainder of his book, the war of 1728 was, in reality, the beginning of the decline of the "middle ground." Shortly after the French/Algonquin alliance succeded in driving back the British, the Algonquins broke apart into pro and anti French groupings. By the 1740s, many of the Algonquins had turned against their French-made village cheifs, who preached peace and conciliation, and joined a republic comprised of various Indian nations whose purpose was to disengage from the "middle ground" and regain their traditional pre-European lifestyles. As it became increasingly apparent to the Indian villagers that the the French and English were engaged in their own imperial struggle and were only really interested in using the villages as pawns towards their own ends, the middle ground laid down on its death bed.

From this point on, many tribes, including the Iroquoi, developed an understanding of the true imperial nature of both the French and the English and refused to fight on either side. Those tribes/villages who did decide to continue to fight on the side of the French in the Seven Years War (1754-1761) were doing so only as a part of their own strategy to rid the pays d'en haut of all European invaders - once the English had been driven out, the tribes had planned to turn on the French and drive them out as well. Although there were still short lived re-births of "middle ground" relations between the Algonquins and the French, these were not the norm. Concerning the English, there was almost never any middle ground of cultural accomodation between themselves and the Algonquins. After the defeat of French in the Seven Years War, the British occupied French positions in the pays d'en haut (in violation of a promise not to) and as White himself states, "[the British] vision of the pays d'en haut was a simple one: the British were conquerors; the Indians were subjects. It was a view that abolished the middle ground." The problem for the British was the fact that the Algonquins had never actually been conquered - they still retained village cohesion and the ability to resist British incursions with force. As the Algonquins began to resist the British with force, the British cynically tried to bring back a policy of cultural accomodation with the Algonquins in order to normalize trade relations. This transparent attempt to become "fathers" to the Algonquins was quickly scrapped in the face of Algonquin resistance to what they came to realize were British attempts to occupy their lands. By the 1760s, open warfare had once again broken out amongst the Algonquins and against the British. This pattern of short lived peace followed by rebellion and war became the norm in the pays d'en haut for the remainder of White's study, as the various factions of Europeans encroached upon Algonquin lands. By the early 19th century, at the conclusion of the book, the French traders and English traders had, for the most part, been replaced by American frontier squatters who, along with the implicit and explicit support of Washington, embarked on a campaign of removal and extermination.

Thus, a major flaw with White's analysis is the fact that the "middle ground" of cultural accomodation, which White describes throughout the book as being of central importance to the relations between the tribes of the pays d'en haut and the European invaders, was in fact already dead before White had even progressed halfway through his study. Although White's descriptions of the various ways that the French and English developed methods to facilitate cultural understanding with the Algonquins were interesting and insightfull, it really should not have been the central theme around which the book was written. The over-the-top focus on the "middle ground" argument found throughout White's book also leads one to question what political effect White had intended his study to have on the previous and current historiography on the subject.

White's book has been described by many historians and reviewers as a refreshing and intelligent attempt to tell the story of Native Americans in a way that it has never been told before. Colin G. Calloway, upon reviewing, The Middle Ground, stated that he believed it to be a success because it altered from the established norm: "most studies of Indian-White relations [are] too simplistic in their story of conquest and assimilation or of cultural persistence in the face of tremendous odds." This speaks to what seems to be an attempt by White to frame his study as the real story - a story that attempts to avoid taking sides, either by resorting to romanticization of the Algonquins or slander of the Europeans. However, the overall attempt at fairness and objectivity with which White seems to cloak his study in seems transparent at many points.

A major symptom of this problem lies with White's research materials and his interpretation of them. White's study relies very heavily on documentation produced by the colonizers themselves. This reliance may be a result of objective circumstance, as the Algonquins did not leave written documentation of their own activities, however when one is forced to rely on one-sided documentation to make a historical argument, it should be common sense to understand that documents cannot always be accepted as factual interpretations of past events. White runs into deep trouble when he incorporates, sometimes word for word, the writings of those Europeans whose economic and religious intrests rested with the demonization and slander of native populations.

In the case of European/Native American interactions, historians such as David Stannard in his book American Holocaust, have shown that many of the European accounts of interaction with Native Americans were deliberate exaggerations, if not outright fabrications. Stannard has shown that it was common for European Army officers or Priests to exaggerate accounts concerning violence, spirituality, and sexuality in order to justify to themselves and their superiors that their conquests and conversions were of necessity. Continually throughout his book, White relays descriptions from military officers and priests that portrayed the Algonquins as savage, brutal, cannibalistic, drunken savages. Attacks committed by Algonquins against Europeans are continually described in bloody detail while European attacks against Alqonquins are most often only stated as dry numerical fact.

There are other problamatic factors with White's choice of event descriptions in his study. Granted, no historian can include everything in one historical study, White makes a few profound ommissions of historical occurances that would have had great impact on the overall cause and effect cycle of his study. As was stated earlier, White begins his study in the midst of a brutal war beging waged against the Algonquin refugees by the Iroquoi federation. White takes great time reprinting the descriptions of this warfare written by French colonists such as Allouez and Priests such as Nicolas Perrott. Page after page, White allows descriptions of extreme, bloody and canibalistic brutality being waged by the Iroquoi Federation against the Algonquins to enter his narritive without so much as a single remark about the possibility of exaggeration on the part of the colonizers. The worst offense of these opening pages is the fact that White fails to even mention at all the fact that the Iroquoi were only in the pays d'en haut because they had been pushed west into Algonquin lands by the British.

White's opening pages paint a picture of the Iroquoi as brutal imperialistic invaders out to steal land and kill off animals for profit - White calls the Iroquoi Federation "an engine of destruction." All of this in the first few pages really begs the obvious question: what then were the Europeans? White shows his carelessness, or possibly his sympathy for European conquest, when he continually describes effects without refrence to their origin. Why were the Iroquoi fighting with the Algonquins? Why had Indian on Indian violence become endemic within the pays d'en haut region? Why were Native American village structures falling apart? Why was there rampant alcohol abuse? Why did some of the Native Americans succumb to killing animals for profit? White is only providing the symptoms while ignoring the root of the problem.

The debate over victimization and agency is one that is needed and correct for historians to involve themselves in and this debate is especially important when writing histories that deal with the European invasion of the Americas. However, White's The Middle Ground has vastly over-emphasized the agency at the expense of the tragic victimization of the Native American peoples of the pays d'en haut. White and his supporters are correct in appluading the fact that White's work has moved away from a Turnerian paradigm in which the Native Americans were marginal and inconsequential barriers to progress which were quickly overrun by Manifest Destiny. To its credit, White's book is an execellent resource for researchers, and his extensive documentation of dates, places and names makes his book important as an encyclopedic refrence. However, the analysis and arguments contained within The Middle Ground cannot lead to a realistic interpretation of how the events of the pays d'en haut actually played out.

Native American historians such as David Stannard, Ward Churchill, and others of the victimization with agency school, come much closer to a realistic portrayal of what the cirumstances were when it came to the interactions between the European invaders and Native American Tribes. Their success stems from the fact that they make a concerted effort to get at the Native American perspective on the colonization of the Americas wheras White makes absolutley none.

Although in many ways White's book moves away from the classic Turnerian framework, it remains fully within it in at the same time. White fails to move away from basing his analysis on primary sources written by the colonists themselves and in doing so he has produced yet another one-sided account, in line with the Turnerian framework. White's book may not be Eurocentric, as it does involve the Algonquins as central players in the narrative, but it still remains entrenched in European bias and, because of this, it fails in its attempts to make a legitimate argument or to provide a realistic view of the actual events that occurred in the pays d'en haut from 1650-1812.

Jeff Hendricks
www.tiamatpublications.com

Breaking new ground.......2005-02-03

Richard White should be awfully proud of himself. Using a close examination of a particular time in a particular place, he manages to open one's eyes to an entirely new way of thinking about the long term dynamics of human interaction that we call "history". Works like these are the fruit of all the painstaking hard work that American historians have been contributing over the last one or two generations. The studies of gender, environment, disease and race might seem like annoying "political correctness" to the close-minded, but when divorced from ideological polemics (pro or con) they have proven to be goldmines of fresh perspective. This book is an elegant example of what can be achieved when the primary evidence is reassessed in the light of this new spirit of inquiry.

Amply supported by a wide selection of primary sources, White plunges into a detailed dissection of the course of history in what the French called the "Pays d'en haut"--the roughly triangular territory bounded by the Mississippi, the Ohio and the Great Lakes--from the establishment of French hegemony to the defeat of Tecumseh at the hands of the United States. Characters, landscape and events are vividly drawn, but underlying it all is White's astonishing theoretical angle: that the various participants--traders, chiefs, colonial officials, missionaries, prophets, warriors and women--were forced to continually construct the rules of a common game that their respective cultures and traditions were inadequate to navigate by themselves. Of course, neither Europeans or natives discarded their cultural baggage wholesale--rather, they raided each other's ideologies and practices for tools they could use for their own purposes, refashioning them into novel combinations and thus a new "culture". Under White's sharp lens, activities and categories which might seem unambiguous--"murder", "trade", "prostitute", "father", "metal tool"--are shown to actually be embedded in a kaleidoscopically shifting galaxy of symbols, mutually forged, mutually apprehended (and misapprehended) by the resourceful women and men of the "middle ground". White carefully traces the strategies of exploitation and survival mediated by French, Algonquin, British and Iroquois participation in this new world--scenes of sickening brutality, unexpected mercy and clever dealing merge with those of day-to-day business and coexistence in a vast mural that rings as true as any history I've yet encountered. I am eager to see how this brand of method and insight will be employed in other histories.

Influential beyond its scope.......1999-08-20

Anyone who has attended an academic history conference in the last five or so years already realizes the impact that this densely-written, but provocatively argued book by an historian of the American west has had on the study of American history. For both good and ill, White's central thesis -- that Indians and Europeans in the Great Lakes region created together and sustained an elaborate system of cultural and political contact that endured for centuries based not on mutual understandings, but mutual MISunderstandings, often deliberate ones -- has come to set the tone for the most recent studies of cultural encounter and creolization in the New World. Indeed, White's "middle ground" bids fair to assume the blanket hegemony exercised over the American historical imagination a decade or more back by the idea of "republicanism." And, not without cause: White's book is in many respects a stupendous achievement -- exhaustively researched, laser-subtle analyses, and ambitious in scope. What weakens the book is White's tendency to often assert the existence of a so-called cultural "middle ground" between Indians and others in advance of the evidence he presents. The "middle ground" is too often presented as a given, one that can act as the explanation, rather than as the hypothetical that it actually is, the actual subject that should be under investigation. This said, the influence of this book will be felt for years to come.

Average customer rating:

Fun, informative, but biased against certain denominations.

Good History Text

The Enlightenment was a Crock

Streams of Civilization Vol. 2: Cultures in Conflict Since the Reformation
Garry J. Moes , Garry Moes , and Eric Bristley
Manufacturer: Christian Liberty Pr
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Customer Reviews:

Fun, informative, but biased against certain denominations........2006-02-07

Okay, okay. Yeah, great resource-- full of good information; Beats your status-quo antichristian antiamerican stark-ravin-liberal history text any day. But is that really enough?!!! Christian Liberty Press demonstrates a better perspective on history than publically funded propaganda. But what ever happened to "unbiased"? Why can't we just tell it like it is without throwing a little "non-denominational" coloring in the mix?

Yes, I thought the narrative was informative and engaging -- 5 stars on that count. But I just couldn't ignore several major issues. The publishers state in the foreword (or the introduction-- I don't recall which) of Volume 1 that they feel it the personal responsibility of every Christian to propagate a Biblical perspective on history. Of course, theirs is the only "Biblical" perspective. Maybe it would have been slightly less offensive if I agreed with every jot and tittle of their theology. But I am not alone in my disagreement. (Nor am I a Baptist.)

For one, the course notably discounts Baptist origins in its broad coverage of *important* religious groups and denominations. Why? Because Baptists historically originated from pacifist anabaptist groups, which did not fight bloody religious wars. This failure to contribute to the rise of Christian Utopia made them historically negligible.

This, of course, is just one effect of the broader "dominion" doctrine-- a fancy name for Christian imperialism. Yes, it would seem that it is our responsibility as Christians to take over the world. We can't leave ruling the world to the infidels. In fact, Jesus won't return until we have established God's Kingdom on earth and instituted Christian culture in every corner. By the way: What is Christian culture?...

Well, this kind of exclusionary bias is present throughout the book, casting its shadow on the facts at every turn of history. Why must we call the American Revolution the "War for Independance"? Even the American Civil War is openly slighted; The puzzlingly brief coverage, accompanied by subfusc ambiguities, leaves the reader wondering "Are they suggesting that the South was right???"

So if you appreciate the taste of malicious sectarian bias-- political or theological-- this book is for you. But I personally wouldn't recommend letting your kids read it without some good discussion of these issues. Baptist or not.

2Tim 3:13 "But evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse..." Mat 24:12 "And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold." Jhn 18:36 "Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world..."

Good History Text.......2006-01-22

One of the few world history texts that combines a biblical worldview, creation science, and church history; it gives a solid overview of civilization. It has fair inclusion of both creationist and evolutionist theory of beginnings. The authors treat the Bible as one reliable historical document to be included among all the rest. This is an EXCELLENT introduction to western civilization, interesting, clear and full of opportunities for discussion. Major world cultures, religions, and their development are explained with the aid of maps, timelines, and graphics. This material provides information for classroom conversation which will in turn help the students to process, apply, and remember what they are reading. Take it further and enhance the students' learning with biographies, films, picture books, and historical fiction novels.

The Enlightenment was a Crock.......2005-11-01

Or so this particular masterwork would have one believe. A rather dry slog, and yet it metes out more than its fair share of c/overt propaganda, including my particular favorite, which has the Enlightenment in scare quotes. Sorry, Misters Franklin, Hume, Jefferson, Locke, Newton, Kant, Rouseeau, Spinoza, but boy oh boy were you deluded.

History told slant, with a decidedly Christian bias. The Bible is accepted as a factual historical source, and while divergent theories are allowed to exist, this beauty sides always with the Good Book, without acknowledging the scholarship suggesting that literality may not be the best (or even a possible) interpretation of its hallowed text.

As an alumna of this choice bit of propaganda, I can say that in my case, it backfired.

Book Description

The one-stop resource for all aspects of water treatment engineering-from theory to practice
Completely revised and updated to address current practices and technologies, Water Treatment: Principles and Design, Second Edition provides unique coverage of both the principles and theory of water treatment, as well as the practical considerations of plant design and distribution.
Written by the world's leading water engineering firm, Water Treatment: Principles and Design, Second Edition presents the breadth of water treatment engineering-from the theory and principles of water chemistry and microbiology to in-depth discussions of revolutionary treatment processes to concise tips for plant and network design. Material has been extensively updated and revised in response to regulatory requirements and growing public awareness, particularly in the areas of disinfection, membrane filtration, disposal of treatment plant residuals, and basic microbiology with an emphasis on human pathogens and diseases.
Water Treatment: Principles and Design, Second Edition provides an essential textbook for students and a reliable resource for environmental and water resources engineers.

Customer Reviews:

Review for Water Treatment: Principles and Design.......2007-09-08

This is a great book... It covers all the basics and explains every concept well.

Excellent.......2007-03-06

This book covers all the theory and application in an outstanding way without getting too simple or complex. The book is coherent, very well organized, and filled with excellent tables and graphs. Great examples as well. I have nothing negative to say about this text.

Water Treatment: Principles and Design.......2007-02-20

Great condition, though not much less expensive than the bookstore.

Water Treatment: Principles and Design.......2007-01-04

Interesting and helpful, but for $100, the book is very flimsy and has many typos.

a good book for Environmental Engineer.......2000-07-11

I'm a Environmental Engineer Of wastewater treatment, and have worked only for one year. I am so eager to get the knowlege for this effect.

Hydrological Dimensioning and Operation of Reservoirs: Practical Design Concepts and Principles (Water Science and Technology Library, Volume 39)

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Hydrological Dimensioning and Operation of Reservoirs: Practical Design Concepts and Principles (Water Science and Technology Library, Volume 39)
Imre V. Nagy
Manufacturer: Kluwer Academic Publishers
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Book Description

This book elaborates some very important concepts, tools, and methodologies that can be used to help resolve multiple reservoir capacity allocation problems in a consistent, efficient, and cost-effective way. The material presented in the book will guide the hydrological analyst or design engineer in the determination of the optimal storage capacities and operational strategies of the individual elements in a system of reservoirs present at a set of potential dam sites. The specific goal in the type of optimization problem elaborated here will be to help minimize the reservoir capacities and/or shortfalls (which are a surrogate for minimizing costs) and still meet capacity requirements and needs. The ultimate objective in such an application will be to prevent over-design or under-design of reservoir storage capacities under optimum conditions of reservoir operation. Thus, the optimal solution will produce the smallest reservoir storage required to meet all project demands with an acceptable degree of reliability.

Audience: The subject matter of this book will be of interest to practising hydrologists, water resources systems analysts, and civil engineers, as well as to students taking a variety of courses in water resources planning and development.

Environmental Ion Exchange: PRINCIPLES & DESIGN

Average customer rating:

Good Examples & Graphics

Environmental Ion Exchange: PRINCIPLES & DESIGN
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ProductGroup: Book
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Book Description

Environmental Ion Exchange: Principles and Design contains the most important ion exchange-related design and application issues. Using tables, graphs, and conversion tables, this book teaches you the basics, giving you the knowledge to use ion exchange to reuse, recover, and recycle. This hands-on guide explains how to apply ion exchange to reuse wastewaters, recover valuable chemicals, and recycle industrial waters. For anyone who is designing unconventional ion exchange systems, or who needs a fundamental knowledge of ion exchange, this is the perfect working reference. Experts in environmental engineering, the authors hold nine patents related to ion exchange. In this book they share their expertise, taking you through the entire design process. Each chapter stands on its own, allowing rapid access to each topic of interest. Examples are abundant throughout, and most chapters provide reference sections for further reference and research. With Environmental Ion Exchange: Principles and Design, you will learn innovative, cost-effective solutions to water and wastewater problems.

Customer Reviews:

Good Examples & Graphics.......2006-03-09

I should caution that I have only read a few sections in this book but I am already impressed by the detail. This appears to be exactly what I am looking for: a calculation book. The block diagrams of processes are very useful. I look forward to using this book to explore a patent idea I am looking at.

WATER TREATMENT: PRINCIPLES AND DESIGN, SECOND EDITION

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WATER TREATMENT: PRINCIPLES AND DESIGN, SECOND EDITION
MWH
Manufacturer: NY
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Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000N5FZNY

Book Description

Nature-Friendly Communities presents an authoritative and readable overview of the successful approaches to protecting biodiversity and natural areas in America's growing communities. Addressing the crucial issues of sprawl, open space, and political realities, Chris Duerksen and Cara Snyder explain the most effective steps that communities can take to protect nature.

The book: documents the broad range of benefits, including economic impacts, resulting from comprehensive biodiversity protection efforts; identifies and disseminates information on replicable best community practices; establishes benchmarks for evaluating community biodiversity protection programs.

Nine comprehensive case studies of communities explain how nature protection programs have been implemented. From Austin and Baltimore to Tucson and Minneapolis, the authors explore how different cities and counties have taken bold steps to successfully protect natural areas. Examining program structure and administration, land acquisition strategies and sources of funding, habitat restoration programs, social impacts, education efforts, and overall results, these case studies lay out perfect examples that other communities can easily follow. Among the case study sites are Sanibel Island, Florida; Austin, Texas; Baltimore County, Maryland; Charlotte Harbor, Florida; and Teton County, Wyoming.

Nature-Friendly Communities offers a useful overview of the increasing number of communities that have established successful nature protection programs and the significant benefits those programs provide. It is an important new work for public officials, community activists, and anyone concerned with understanding or implementing local or regional biodiversity protection efforts.

Customer Reviews:

Important Book.......2007-09-29

Nature-friendly Communities is an important and timely book. Useful to both professional planners and community leaders, these case studies show what is possible, and encourage us all to move in these directions. Very readable, great information.

Warning: This Book Contains Some Propaganda.......2005-09-29

After my experiences with the Nature-UNfriendliness of Baltimore
County, with regards to being harassed by the county for having
wildflowers and native plants in a Nature-friendly landscape, I
was absolutely shocked to see Baltimore County listed as one of
the top-ten supposedly "Nature-Friendly" communities. Would a
truly Nature-friendly community issue someone a criminal citation
for having "weeds and tall grass," which are wildflowers and
native grasses, growing on one's property? Would a truly
Nature-friendly community have laws stating that all plants which
are allergenic
(as are most plants), all plants that are poisonous (as are many cultivated plants, as well as many native
plants!), any plants subjectively determined to be "weeds"
over a foot tall and any types of grasses over a foot tall,
are illegal? Unfortunately, Baltimore County only appears to be
Nature-friendly as long as one's neighbors have no complaints
about Nature-friendly landscapes and don't telephone code
enforcement to complain about "weeds and tall grass." Of course,
tall decorative grass growing outside of a county office building
is apparently not viewed as a violation of those same laws that
the county's citizens are subjected to.

Although I've telephoned the publisher of this book about the
inclusion of Baltimore County being a mistake, they've yet to
return my telephone call.

wonderful index.......2005-07-26

This is a timely and important book; especially in times that promote big business at the expense of the environment.

The wonderful index is a great aid to the reader.

Where Land and Water Meet: A Western Landscape Transformed (Weyerhaeuser Environmental Books)

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Where Land and Water Meet: A Western Landscape Transformed (Weyerhaeuser Environmental Books)
Nancy Langston
Manufacturer: University of Washington Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Sustainable Development | Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Natural Resources | Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

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Environmental Science | Earth Sciences | Science | Subjects | Books

Water Supply & Land Use | Nature & Ecology | Science | Subjects | Books

Natural History | Nature & Ecology | Science | Subjects | Books

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Water Supply | Environment | Outdoors & Nature | Subjects | Books

General | Conservation | Outdoors & Nature | Subjects | Books

Water | Conservation | Outdoors & Nature | Subjects | Books

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Reference | Outdoors & Nature | Subjects | Books

ASIN: 0295983078

Book Description

Water and land interrelate in surprising and ambiguous ways, and riparian zones, where land and water meet, have effects far outside their boundaries. Using the Malheur Basin in southeastern Oregon as a case study, this intriguing and nuanced book explores the ways people have envisioned boundaries between water and land, the ways they have altered these places, and the often unintended results.

The Malheur Basin, once home to the largest cattle empires in the world, experienced unintended widespread environmental degradation in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. After the establishment in 1908 of Malheur National Wildlife Refuge as a protected breeding ground for migratory birds, and its expansion in the 1930s and 1940s, the area experienced equally extreme, intentional modifications aimed at restoring riparian habitat. Refuge managers ditched wetlands, channelized rivers, applied Agent Orange and rotenone to waterways, killed beaver, and cut down willows. Where Land and Water Meet examines the reasoning behind and effects of these interventions, gleaning lessons from their successes and failures.

Book Description

Global environmental problems are much more severe and complex than many of the public believe. This book explores the paradox of humanity's dependence on biodiversity and landscape systems for survival while simultaneously placing an enormous stress on the existence of these natural systems. Leading contributors to the fields of biodiversity conservation, ecology, economics, entomology, forestry, history, landscape management, philosophy and sociology draw from their unique disciplinary perspectives to consider the origins, bases and possible solutions to this pressing problem. The volume shows that the need for a solution is one of the most urgent facing humanity, yet the challenge of solving it is one that will require a major shift in the composite of human values.

The Economics of Landscape and Wildlife Conservation

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The Economics of Landscape and Wildlife Conservation

Manufacturer: CABI
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Popular Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Sustainable Development | Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

Natural Resources | Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0851992226

Book Description

Europe has introduced a number of policies designed to conserve its landscape and wildlife. The papers collected here carefully examine these policies, many of which have been in effect for more than a decade. The overall perspective is an economic one, with several chapters reviewing
analytical methods, economic valuation of the benefits of agricultural landscapes and the costs and benefits of wildlife conservation. These are set in the context of the Common Agricultural Policy and environmental policies in the European Union. The book represents important reading for
agricultural and environmental economists, as well as those concerned with ecology and conservation. The papers revised here were originally delivered at a workshop at the University of Hohenheim in 1996, part of a series of EU Concerted Action workshops looking at policy measures to control
environmental impacts from agriculture.

Modeling joint production of wildlife and timber [An article from: Journal of Environmental Economics and Management]

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Modeling joint production of wildlife and timber [An article from: Journal of Environmental Economics and Management]
D.J. Nalle , C.A. Montgomery , J.L. Arthur , and Polasky
Manufacturer: Elsevier
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital
ASIN: B000RQYNNC

Book Description

This digital document is a journal article from Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, published by Elsevier in 2004. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Media Library immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Description:
Production of marketed commodities and protection of natural systems often conflict. A focus on only one goal can result in large losses in other goals and may result in inefficient and unsustainable outcomes. In this paper, we develop a method that combines economic and ecological models in a dynamic and spatial analysis to evaluate land use decisions and find cost-effective alternatives for which it is not possible to do better on one objective without harming another objective. The method is demonstrated using timber production and species conservation on a forested landscape over a 100-year planning horizon. Current land use strategies are simulated and compared with cost-effective alternatives. The approach is compared to a static reserve approach, similar to previous studies, and found to produce substantially more efficient management strategies for the case study landscape.

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