Landscape, Memory and History: Anthropological Perspectives FROM THE PUBLISHER
Over the last 20 years, a debate has opened up in the social sciences about notions of 'space' and 'place'. This collection of papers draws on anthropological perspectives to examine how a sense of landscape is imbued with -- and in turn affected by -- deeply imbedded notions of history, in a variety of different settings. American, Australian and British scholars examine the significance of this use of landscape for studies of identity -- particularly as an alternative to a previous concentration solely on nationalism and national sense of identity. In doing so they re-establish a sphere for present-day social anthropology to link back to earlier 'community-based' approaches and to make explicit an emphasis on political change, citizenship et al. They examine, quite literally, how people really see themselves in their environment -- and how that perception changes and is affected by history.
SYNOPSIS
Anthropologists from North America and the Antipodes present case studies of particular individuals, emplaced within a physical environment, who interact with others within their social environment through their remembered and imaginary experiences. Among the topics are landscape and history in the local poetry of the Scottish borders, memories of ancestry in the forests of Madagascar, routes and rootedness as sources of identity in Highlands New Guinea, and seascape and conflict in Jamaica. Distributed by Stylus. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
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