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Chapter 1 - Scenes of Human Diminishment in Early American Natural History

from Part I - Environmental Histories

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 March 2022

By
Christoph Irmscher
Edited by
Sarah Ensor  and
Susan Scott Parrish
Sarah Ensor
Affiliation:
University of Wisconsin, Madison
Susan Scott Parrish
Affiliation:
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
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Summary

From William Bartram to John James Audubon to Susan Fenimore Cooper, early American writers on natural history challenged anthropomorphic thinking and human exceptionalism. Imagining human diminishment amid scenes of natural wonder, they offered a way forward in thinking about “the world we did not make” (William Cronon) that remains largely untraveled today.

Keywords

natural historycritique of anthropomorphic thinkingresource extractionJohn James AudubonWilliam BartramSusan Fenimore Cooperlocal knowledgeweb of lifewildernessAnthropocene
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Companion to American Literature and the Environment , pp. 15 - 28
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2022

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