Earth, Nature and You

The activities in this book offer opportunities for open-ended play while the children are off exploring nature and the great outdoors. Here Kate Bass and Jane Vella, busy Early Year practitioners, share with you some of their favourite resources, with ideas from how to enhance your 'mud kitchen' to developing narrative and exciting opportunities to develop creativity while enriching children's language and communication.

Jedediah Purdy begins with a history of how Americans have shaped their landscapes. He explores the competing traditions that still infuse environmental law and culture a frontier vision of settlement and development, a wilderness-seeking Romanticism, a utilitarian attitude that tries to manage nature for human benefit, and a twentieth-century ecological view. These traditions are ways of seeing the world and humans place in it. They are also modes of lawmaking that inscribe ideal visions on the earth itself. Each has shaped landscapes that make its vision of nature real, from wilderness to farmland to suburbs opening some new ways of living on the earth while foreclosing others. The Anthropocene demands that we draw on all these legacies and go beyond them. With human and environmental fates now inseparable, environmental politics will become either more deeply democratic or more unequal and inhumane.

One of the first comprehensive treatments of land use in contemporary art, Critical Landscapes skillfully surveys the stakes and concerns of recent land-based practices, outlining the art historical contexts, methodological strategies, and geopolitical phenomena. This cross-disciplinary collection is destined to be an essential reference not only within the fields of art and art history, but also across those of cultural geography, architecture and urban planning, environmental history, and landscape studies.

Written by world-leading thinkers on the front-lines of global change research and policy, this multi-disciplinary collection maintains a dual focus: some essays investigate specific facets of the physical Earth system, while others explore the social, legal and political dimensions shaping the human environmental footprint.

While concern about the state of our land, air, and water continues to grow, there is widespread belief that environmental issues are primarily of interest to wealthy white communities. Engage, Connect, Protect explodes this myth, revealing the deep and abiding interest that African American, Latino, and Native American communities – many of whom live in degraded and polluted parts of the country – have in our collective environment. Part eye-opening critique of the cultural divide in environmentalism, part biography of a leading social entrepreneur, and part practical toolkit for engaging diverse youth.

Rachel Carson's Silent Spring antagonized some of the most powerful interests in the nation--including the farm block and the agricultural chemical industry--and helped launch the modern environmental movement. In The Gentle Subversive, Mark Hamilton Lytle offers a compact life of Carson, illuminating the road that led to this vastly influential book.Succinct and engaging, The Gentle Subversive is a story of success, celebrity, controversy, and vindication. It will inspire anyone interested in protecting the natural world or in women's struggle to find a voice in society.

It's a belief that unites the left and right, psychologists and philosophers, writers and historians. It drives the headlines that surround us and the laws that touch our lives. From Machiavelli to Hobbes, Freud to Dawkins, the roots of this belief have sunk deep into Western thought. Human beings, we're taught, are by nature selfish and governed by self-interest. Humankind makes a new argument: that it is realistic, as well as revolutionary, to assume that people are good. The instinct to cooperate rather than compete, trust rather than distrust, has an evolutionary basis going right back to the beginning of Homo sapiens. By thinking the worst of others, we bring out the worst in our politics and economics too. In this major book, internationally bestselling author Rutger Bregman takes some of the world's most famous studies and events and reframes them, providing a new perspective on the last 200,000 years of human history.

Northern Canada's distinctive landscapes, its complex social relations and the contested place of the North in contemporary political, military, scientific and economic affairs have fueled recent scholarly discussion. At the same time, both the media and the wider public have shown increasing interest in the region. This timely volume extends our understanding of the environmental history of northern Canada - clarifying both its practice and promise, and providing critical perspectives on current public debates. Ice Blink provides opportunities to consider critical issues in other disciplines and geographic contexts.

"First Nations, Métis and Inuit artists, activists, educators and writers, youth and elders come together to envision Indigenous futures in Canada and around the world. Discussing everything from language renewal to sci-fi, this collection is a powerful and important expression of imagination rooted in social critique, cultural experience, traditional knowledge, activism and the multifaceted experiences of Indigenous people on Turtle Island. In Me Tomorrow... Darrel J. McLeod, Cree author from Treaty-8 territory in Northern Alberta, blends the four elements of the Indigenous cosmovision with the four directions of the medicine wheel to create a prayer for the power, strength and resilience of Indigenous peoples. Autumn Peltier, Anishinaabe water-rights activist, tells the origin story of her present and future career in advocacy--and how the nine months she spent in her mother's womb formed her first water teaching. When the water breaks, like snow melting in the spring, new life comes. Lee Maracle, acclaimed Stó:lō Nation author and educator, reflects on cultural revival--imagining a future a century from now in which Indigenous people are more united than ever before. For readers who want to imagine the future, and to cultivate a better one, Me Tomorrow is a journey through the visions generously offered by a diverse group of Indigenous thinkers."-- Provided by publisher.

In this edition of their bestseller, the sequel to the best-selling Good News for a Change, authors David Suzuki and Holly Dressel provide the latest inspiring stories about individuals, groups, and businesses that are making real change in the world. More Good News features the most up-to-date information about critical subjects, such as energy and the economy, not covered in the previous edition. These stories offer compelling proof from the front lines that sustainable solutions already exist.

Drawing on a wide range of examples from literature, comics, film, television and digital media, Nerd Ecology is the first substantial ecocritical study of nerd culture’s engagement with environmental issues. Exploring such works as Star Trek, Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, The Matrix, Joss Whedon’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Firefly, the fiction of Thomas Pynchon, The Hunger Games, and superhero comics such as Green Lantern and X-Men, Anthony Lioi maps out the development of nerd culture and its intersections with the most fundamental ecocritical themes. In this way Lioi finds in the narratives of unpopular culture - narratives in which marginalised individuals and communities unite to save the planet - the building blocks of a new environmental politics in tune with the concerns of contemporary ecocritical theory and practice.

This Open Access book provides a critical reflection into how indigenous cultures are attempting to adapt to climate change. Through detailed first-hand accounts, the book describes the unique challenges facing indigenous peoples in the context of climate change adaptation, governance, communication strategies, and institutional pressures. The book shows how current climate change terminologies and communication strategies often perpetuate the marginalisation of indigenous peoples and suggests that new approaches that prioritise Indigenous voices, agency and survival are required.

"There is virtually nowhere on Earth today that remains untouched by plastic and ecosystems are evolving to adapt to this new context. While plastics have revolutionized our modern world, new and often unforeseen effects of plastic and its production are continually being discovered. Plastics are entangled in multiple ecological and social crises, from the plasticization of the oceans to the embeddedness of plastics in political hierarchies. The complexities surrounding the global plastic crisis require an interdisciplinary approach and the materialities of plastic demand new temporalities of thought and action." -- Provided by the Publisher

"United Nations water expert Robert William Sandford takes the reader on a thought-provoking tour of a world where water, weather, cities, landscapes, economies, even entire cultures, are dramatically impacted by a changing climate. Human beings and industrial-based society are changing the composition of our planet's atmosphere and causing it to warm at an unnatural and oftentimes astonishingly rapid rate. Much of that warmth is being absorbed by water, which as a result is moving through the global hydrological cycle faster and in unprecedented ways." -- Provided by the Publisher

Hailed as 'one of the most eminent environmental historians of the West' by Alan Brinkley in The New York Times Book Review, Donald Worster has been a leader in reshaping the study of American history. Winner of the prestigious Bancroft Prize for his book 'Dust Bowl', Worster has helped bring humanity's interaction with nature to the forefront of historical thinking. Now, in 'The Wealth of Nature', he offers a series of thoughtful, eloquent essays which lay out his views on environmental history, tying the study of the past to today's agenda for change.

"From award-winning author Merilyn Simonds, a remarkable biography of an extraordinary woman -- a Swedish aristocrat who survived the Russian Revolution to become an internationally renowned naturalist, one of the first to track the mid-century decline of songbirds. Referred to as a Canadian Rachel Carson, Louise de Kiriline Lawrence lived and worked in an isolated log cabin near North Bay. After her husband was murdered by Bolsheviks, she refused her Swedish privilege and joined the Canadian Red Cross, visiting her northern Ontario patients by dogsled. When Elzire Dionne gave birth to five babies, Louise became nurse to the Dionne Quintuplets. Repulsed by the media circus, she retreated to her wilderness cabin, where she devoted herself to studying the birds that nested in her forest. Author of six books and scores of magazine stories, de Kiriline Lawrence and her "loghouse nest" became a Mecca for international ornithologists. Lawrence was an old woman when Merilyn Simonds moved into the woods not far away. Their paths crossed, sparking Simonds's lifelong interest. A dedicated birder, Simonds brings her own songbird experiences from Canadian nesting grounds and Mexican wintering grounds to this deeply researched, engaging portrait of a uniquely fascinating woman."-- Provided by publisher.

"This book is a practical guide for businesses looking to take action on climate change through a more complete and fuller understanding of the bigger paction of sustainability across the world. It focuses on the urgent need for reducing carbon emissions and the financial impacts of extreme weather events. The book explains climate risk in accessible language and offers actionable guidance for incorporating climate intelligence into decision-making. It also addresses recent changes in policy, including mandatory climate-related financial disclosures for businesses. This book fills a gap in existing resources by focusing on physical risk and adaptation rather than just the transition to a low-carbon economy. The book emphasizes the importance of open and transparent climate intelligence that is accessible to all -- truly successful climate change needs fully open climate intelligence. It highlights the interconnectedness of systems and how businesses may need to consider assets they don't even own. With its focus on practical guidance and accessible language, this book is a valuable resource for businesses looking to understand and address the financial impacts of climate change. Artificial intelligence and other new technologies help companies such as the author's to create high levels of climate intelligence, which in turn, enables organizations to work together to take action on climate change in a much more proactive way breeding effective results"-- Provided by publisher.

"This Handbook examines the diverse ways in which climate change impacts Indigenous peoples and local communities and considers their response to these changes. While there is well-established evidence that the climate of the Earth is changing, the scarcity of instrumental data oftentimes challenges scientists' ability to detect such impacts in remote and marginalized areas of the world or in areas with scarce data. Bridging this gap, this Handbook draws on field research among Indigenous Peoples and local communities distributed across different climatic zones and relying on different livelihood activities, to analyse their reports of and responses to climate change impacts. It includes contributions from a range of authors from different nationalities, disciplinary backgrounds, and positionalities, thus reflecting the diversity of approaches in the field. The Handbook is organised in two Parts: Part I examines the diverse ways in which climate change -alone or in interaction with other drivers of environmental change- affects Indigenous Peoples and local communities; Part II examines how Indigenous Peoples and local communities are locally adapting their responses to these impacts. Overall, this book highlights Indigenous and local knowledge systems as an untapped resource which will be vital in deepening our understanding of the effects of climate change. The Routledge Handbook of Climate Change Impacts and Adaptation Strategies on Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities will be an essential reference text for students and scholars of climate change, anthropology, environmental studies, ethnobiology and Indigenous studies"-- Provided by publisher.

Explore the ways in which the climate crisis is affecting our personal decisions about family planning, parenting, and political action. In The Conceivable Future, authors Meghan Elizabeth Kallman and Josephine Ferorelli explore the ways in which the climate crisis is affecting our personal decisions about family planning, parenting, and political action. This book offers fresh, timely answers to questions such as: How do I decide to have a baby when there's the threat of environmental collapse? How do I parent a child in the middle of the climate crisis? What can I actually do to help stop global warming? Drawing from their decade of work with the organization Conceivable Future, Kallman, a sociologist and Rhode Island State Senator, and Ferorelli, an activist and former Climate Bureau editor, offers both informed perspective and practical steps for taking meaningful action in combating the climate crisis, while also making smart, balanced decisions when it comes to starting and maintaining a family. First, The Conceivable Future explores what the real threats are to reproductive, gestational, and infant health (spoiler: it's inequality, heat, and fossil fueled pollution), and debunks the myths of personal carbon footprint, and the harmful legacy of population control. The authors examine the successes and impediments of women-led movements around the world and share what they've learned through ten years of organizing to bring attention to the reproductive crisis that is climate change. Finally, the book looks at what can be done about the climate crisis today. By taking these steps, we can both understand the crisis on its own terms, and stay rooted in the human scale, where our lives retain their full meaning. The Conceivable Future is a must-read for all who want to make a difference in the world--and secure a sustainable future for all our families.