Text

E-book Migrant Ecologies : Environmental Histories of the Pacific World

---

Penilaian

---

The creation of—or even the existence of—a “Pacific World” is a question that has preoccupied scholars to a much greater degree than existential doubts have bothered historians of other oceanic basins. Economic historian Eric Jones and colleagues have written that “there can be no meaningful history ofthe whole Rim or Basin [ofthe Pacific] since there has never been such an integrated unit,” while environmental historian David Igler worries that “numerous issues urge caution against embracing a concept like the Pacific World.”2 Matt Matsuda carefully delineates the Pacific as a space of “multiple translocalisms” and stresses the radically diff erent expe-rience of people around the ocean.3 Finally, criticizing both Igler and Mat-suda for too hearty an embrace ofthe Pacific, David Hanlon has pointed to the “methodological shortcomings ofboth a Pacific history and a Pacific Worlds approach.”4 Part ofthe angst around the Pacific World concept comes from the size ofthe ocean itself, which, if considered a coherent whole,constitutes the largest geographical feature on Earth. As many scholars have rightly pointed out, geographical concepts have no inherent meaning, but are rather created and sustained or rejected through the practices of human culture.5 The concept of oceanic basins is itself relatively recent, replacing ancient Western notions of one gigantic encircling sea and more recent conceptions of much smaller navigational basins united by prevailing winds and routes oftrade.6 There is much, then, to recommend skepticism about the coherence of histories laid out over such large and contingent spaces.From the perspective of environmental history, however, there are some strong, but still mostly unexplored, arguments for considering as a coherent historical unit the Pacific Ocean as it is depicted on maps humans make. Many ofthese arguments are coming from marine science. On the broadest scale, maps oftsunami energy propagation in the Pacific give powerful testimony to the way local events can radiate their effects to every corner ofthe ocean, effects that either do not trickle into any other oceans or rapidly lose their power once they leave the cartographic Pacific. Because ofthe coherence ofthe Pacific, humans in Japan, for example, have to care about the effects of earthquakes in Alaska, Chile, or New Zealand, but not those in Western Indonesia (see figure 1.2). In important ways, the geographi cal Pacific periodically gathers all the humans living on its shores into com-munities experiencing similar, sometimes transformative, events.

---

Ketersediaan

Informasi Detail

Judul Seri

-

No. Panggil

990 BEA m

Penerbit

Hawaii : University of Hawaii Press., 2023

Deskripsi Fisik

321 hlm

Bahasa

English

ISBN/ISSN

9780824892258

Klasifikasi

990

Tipe Isi

text

Tipe Media

computer

Tipe Pembawa

online resource

Edisi

-

Subjek

History of Pacific Ocean Islands

Info Detail Spesifik

-

Pernyataan Tanggungjawab

-

Versi lain/terkait

Lampiran Berkas

Komentar

---

Anda harus masuk sebelum memberikan komentar