Final Exam Flashcards
living machines
Horses were used as “machines” to power industrial equipment, haul materials, and as transit within and outside of cities. They were used because they could do that the work that would have needed 6 to 7 men, and instead they are able to use just one horse for this. During the mid 1800’s and later they were used exclusive, but after WWII they were replaced by the automobile. They are significant because they represented nature within the city, that humans controlled even though it still held its “wildness”. Horses treatment also brought about the start of the SPCA, and introduction to animal rights within the city.
nature
Nature is a concept that is almost fully created within our psyche. Nature is subjective concept that is created under certain societal conditions, and is contextualized based on how we are trying to define it. Often nature is referred to as everything other than the human artifice, taking humans out of the natural world. The first example of our creation of the concept of nature is the frontier, a concept of something wild that humans needed to conquer. Nature is significant in that it has agency over humans, as humans have agency over it, creating an reciprocal relationship of both shaping each other.
industrial suburb
Began in the late-nineteenth century with decentralizing the city. The downtown core became undesirable due to perceived and actual health risks (streets, sewage, health, congestion). The perceived health benefits of living in the suburbs inspired the middle class to transition out of the downtown core. Industrial companies were pushed to the edge of the cities, or given free land or tax-breaks as incentives to move away from the center. Workers and immigrants followed industry, as they relied upon the work for money.
human artifice
Although the built environment is composed of naturally forming atoms and elements, humans are responsible for ordering and assembling these items intro specific forms that would not exist naturally. Human artifice created the built environment which is composed of both artificial and “natural” components. The significance of human artifice is that our built materials are responsible for the separation of humans from nature, and illustrate human agency over nature.
Johan Heinrich von Thunen:
He was a German agriculturalist who lived and worked in early to mid 19th century. He was known for thinking about the flow of materials from rural areas to cities. Best known for the theory of The Isolated State which he came up with in 1826. He created a model where cities were at the center and surrounded by rings of production for different items. The most valuable land closest to the cities in the smallest rings would be orchards and dairy production, then would be grains and cereals in the next ring, and the outermost rings would be rangeland. This development was significant because it created a new, highly structured model for city design.
Natural History
Natural history is the history and study of animal and plant life. Its foundation is in observation but it is a very broad area of study. Its significance in relation to environmental history is that it focuses only on the natural world where as environmental history looks at the relationship between humans and nature. An example of an element of natural history is the study of the evolution of a particular species in an environment.
antimodernism
Antimodernism was a push to find more purpose and meaning in life by moving away from the rigid structures of society. It was a mid 1800 social reaction to the modern everyday life. The worst effects of the city were counteracted by antimodernist features, such as parks. The parks allowed for a closer relationship with nature and by creating a more esthetically pleasing environment. There was the belief that this type of esthetically pleasing environment would make good people and good people make good cities.
American Society for the Preventions of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA)
The ASPCA was a society that was created in 1866 by Henry Bergh in the response to a large number of incidents related to horses. During this time in history, horses were living machines and treated like property by the people using them for work. These animals were being worked to death because they were viewed as an object for the purpose of getting the job done, and they were easily replaceable it they were worked to death. Rules to regulate their use were developed due to the efforts made by moral reformers to prevent animal cruelty. The ASPCA shows how horses were once used and treated as machines but in the late 19th century, many people realized that they were living beings and needed to be treated with respect as do all other animals.
Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency (CRA)
Following the adoption of the car and flight to the suburbs was the transfer of capital that threatened to decline the inner city. California’s response to urban deindustrialization and decline was the 1949 Federal Housing Act.
This lead towards the Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency (CRA) being founded in 1949, whose duty it was to replan the urban cores with low-income housing intended for the benefit of the greater populous.
However, the power invested into this system lead to cronyism and the CRA opposing low-income housing projects under the influence the rich LA landowners, investors, and developers.
The CRA’s greatest failure was ignoring the needs of low income residents by expropriating the socially segregable Bunker Hill in 1960 under the guise of “Revitalization of downtown.” Ultimately the CRA represents the ability for corrupt human systems to fail in their purposes and causing perpetual socioeconomic inequality in the urban environment.
Donald Worster’s Three levels to environmental history
- The natural world as it exists whether or not there is a interaction at all
- Productive technology humans create as they interact with the environment - (tinkering and alternating)
- Intangible- mental type of encounter, a dialogue with nature in our heads morality, ideas, perspective (culture)
Stephen Boyden’s conceptual framework of bio history
o Biosphere is shaped by humans (technological manipulation) and culture (self-perception/relationship)
Culture- how humanity imagines the world and our role in it
gARBAGE SEPERATION
● late 19th century
● people began to realize garbage was not only unsightly, but also a potential health hazard
○ The waste/garbage problem
■ The urban metabolism was too great for the capacity of natural systems
○ Garbage/waste building up led to human health issues and disease
● The solution to the garbage problem was to establish another human system in the city
○ These were engineered solutions
○ Congruent to the industrial ideas of the time anything useful in the garbage was not wasted
○ If the garbage was separated the garbage problem could be dealt with more effectively
■ Garbage dealt with in the way most appropriate for that garbage
● Ex. Some wastes could be used for fertilizer on agricultural land
■ There are fewer options to deal with waste if everything is mixed
○ Separation allowed for reuse or recycling for sale
■ push cart operators would go around neighbourhoods collecting garbage that could be refurbished or reused
■ Scow trimmers would sift through garbage that had been loaded onto barges to be dumped off shore somewhere for anything of value
● As garbage collection became a municipal responsibility efficiency and economy became the most important drivers
○ By 1910 80% of US cities had municipally sponsored garbage collection
○ It wasn’t about what you could get out of the garbage, but how effectively and cheaply it could be disposed of
Frontier
● The edge between settled and unsettled land
● The frontier had held the promise of the future for the American people
○ You could carve out a piece, improve it, and create value
○ As an individual you could dominate the wilderness to improve your fortunes
● Settlers began to push the frontier back from the already established areas in America
○ The land had been used and ‘prepared’ by First Nations and fur traders
○ Pioneers that occupied this space then prepared the land for advanced farming
○ Farms prepared the land for cities
○ The endpoint was the establishment of the city
● The idea of the frontier and the consecutive levels of establishment informed the ambitions of those who moved West to Chicago
○ With Chicago the establishment of the city would be the starting point
○ Due to the city’s desirable location at the confluence of two major watersheds boosters desired the establishment of the city in this place
○ The natural geography attracted people to live there
■ The attitudes about the frontier and the ability to improve and create value in the environment fed the idea that humans could transform this space to suit the needs of humans
Technology
Technology is a human artifice that is created by visionaries and engineers with the intention of improving society and controlling nature. Technology can have the effect of creating second nature. In the Mississippi River the levies created were a form of technology. The levies caused overflowing in different places then the original river path would have intended.
Technology can also enable quicker transportation, increasing the size of cities. This spreading of the cities is consistent with the central place theory. As the cities grew the most unwanted areas were able to move further away while suburbs moved in, decreasing the population density.
Sanitary Engineers
Sanitary engineers are the people responsible for the prober disposal of wastes. Cities produce wastes as a part of the urban metabolism and dump them into surrounding sinks. The sinks can fill up or be damaged by incoming unwanted materials. The dumping in these sinks is very harmful to the surrounding hinterlands that make them up. Sanitary engineers separate and sort wastes to dispose of them in the most appropriate least environmentally damaging way. For example, the burning of wood products is advisable. However, plastics can produce harmful gasses and should not be burned.
Single Family Home
The suburbs became popular after the second world war when the street car made the daily commute to work easier for the middle class. With the expansion of the suburbs the idea of a single-family home was popularized. People wanted a house with a yard for themselves and their family. This popularization of the single-family household was advertised as an escape from the busy rat race of city life.
Stables
During the early 1900’s horses were still very popular in the city. Stables acted as a storage place to keep, feed and care for horses when they were not being used. Stables were traditionally made from wood and filled with hey. This made them a massive fire hazard. Additionally, stables were seen as a breeding ground for various diseases. Generally, people looked down upon the stable owners as being lower class. Despite the public dislike of stables, the presence of the stables allowed for horses to remain in the city. Horses were an essential part of the urban metabolism and improved the ability of people materials and wastes to be transported throughout the urban environment.
Declensionist Narrative
ID – theory of things declining in the city, and only getting worse. This theory was held by the new, post WWII environmental historians. Rachael Carson’s 1962 book Silent Spring provided evidence widely read in the public sphere that supported this outlook. The evidence was overwhelming with pollution by acid rain, polluted waterways, land fill sites, etc reaching frightening proportions at peak industrialized capacity during and after the War.
Significance – This reflects the initial narrative of environment history, but its significance now is to present a counterpoint leading to a more mixed/balanced approach of environmental historians today who see both the positive as well as the negative in human agency on urban environment. For example, the human systems provided affordable reliable meat protein, safe drinking water, increasingly efficient waste disposal systems with lesser negative impact over time. Perhaps this more balanced approach results from acknowledging that humans in the city are also part of the urban ecosystem, part of nature. Human culture and nature intersect. The view of this course balances the impact of increasingly large populations and the efficiencies that support them on North American cities and their hinterlands stressing that humans as well as nature have agency.
