Short Response Essay 2

2. Try to be specific as you could.

Question #1 (250-300 words): Chapters 2, 3, and 4 of Nature’s Ghosts address a variety of unexpected alliances, contradictions, unintended consequences, and ironic developments with respect to the story of 19th-century wildlife extinction. Discuss at least one of these unexpected correlations/contradictions/unintended consequences/ironies that stands out to you, and what you consider to be the most interesting or valuable lesson that it poses for us as students of the history of ecology and environmentalism.

Question #2 (250-300 words): Briefly discuss at least one aspect of Professor Michael Egan’s Feb. 7th presentation that interests you, and how it relates to one of the specific articles or chapters assigned so far, and/or to one or more of the major questions of the course listed on the first page of the syllabus.

Here is the title and abstract of Professor Egan’s talk:

“Covenant with the Future: First Thoughts on Catastrophe as an Organizing Principle”

One of the hazards of writing contemporary history is the temptation to treat each new event as the latest catastrophe. In the wake of global climate change and the Anthropocene, however, the latest catastrophe may also be the last catastrophe. This presentation seeks to raise two avenues of inquiry. In the first, it interrogates world history from the perspective of catastrophe. If we treat disaster not as a punctuated interruption to a predominantly progressive historical narrative but, rather, as the historical norm: how does that alter our understanding of the world around us? The second reflection picks up on that premise and asks what parts of a precarious world are worth saving. It introduces “modern arks”: the protection and/or preservation of things, places, and ideas that are deemed important to some abstract (and different) future. Drawing on examples as conceptually and geographically diverse as the Svalbard Global Seed Vault and the Galápagos Islands, the talk invites reflection on arks great and small and how contemporary and historical constructions of power drive much of this future-thinking.

Egan’s talk 1