Download or read book Rivers and Society written by Malcolm Cooper and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-11-22 with total page 253 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rivers and their watersheds constitute some of the most dynamic and complex landscapes. Rivers have sustained human communities, and human societies have utilized and altered river flows in a number of ways for millennia. However, the level of human impact on rivers, and on watershed environments, has become acute during the last hundred years or so. This book brings together empirical research and theoretical perspectives on the changing conditions of a range of river basin environments in the contemporary world, including the history and culture of local societies living in these river basins. It provides theoretical insights on the patterns and nature of the interaction between rivers and their use by human communities. The chapters are written from a variety of positions, including environmental science, hydrology, human ecology, urban studies, water management, historical geography, cultural anthropology and tourism studies. The case studies span different geographical regions, providing valuable insight on the multifaceted interactions between rivers and our societies, and on the changing riverscapes in different parts of the world. Specific detailed examples are included from Australia, Brazil, France, India, Iran, Japan, the Netherlands, New Zealand, South Africa, UK and USA. Chapter 11 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.
Download or read book Reading Rivers in Roman Literature and Culture written by Prudence J. Jones and published by Lexington Books. This book was released on 2005 with total page 148 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Reading Rivers is the first book in a new series: Roman Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches. Author Prudence Jones examines rivers as a literary phenomenon, particularly in the poetry of Vergil. The point of such an investigation is twofold: an examination of VergilOs poetry elucidates particularly clearly a point about rivers: that their inclusion functions almost as a literary device, and an examination of rivers makes a point about Vergil: that rivers are essential to understanding the trajectory of his works, in particular the structure of the Aeneid. This study depends primarily on the close analysis of the poetry of Vergil and of other relevant authors. In Part I Jones examines the Greco-Roman understanding of the river in its primary symbolic roles: cosmological, ritual and ethnographical. Part II analyzes the river as a literary device, with particular attention to the works of Vergil, and argues that descriptions of rivers in Roman poetry are, in many cases, a form of authorial comment on the progress or structure of a narrative. Jones gives scholars in the classics, and literary critics who focus specifically on Roman antiquity a special prism through which to view the works of Vergil as well as other significant authors. This book is also for those working in the fields of cultural studies, cultural geography, and ancient philosophy.
Download or read book Rivers in History written by Christof Mauch and published by University of Pittsburgh Pre. This book was released on 2008-07-27 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Throughout history, rivers have run a wide course through human temporal and spiritual experience. They have demarcated mythological worlds, framed the cradle of Western civilization, and served as physical and psychological boundaries among nations. Rivers have become a crux of transportation, industry, and commerce. They have been loved as nurturing providers, nationalist symbols, and the source of romantic lore but also loathed as sites of conflict and natural disaster.Rivers in History presents one of the first comparative histories of rivers on the continents of Europe and North America in the modern age. The contributors examine the impact of rivers on humans and, conversely, the impact of humans on rivers. They view this dynamic relationship through political, cultural, industrial, social, and ecological perspectives in national and transnational settings. As integral sources of food and water, local and international transportation, recreation, and aesthetic beauty, rivers have dictated where cities have risen, and in times of flooding, drought, and war, where they've fallen. Modern Western civilizations have sought to control rivers by channeling them for irrigation, raising and lowering them in canal systems, and damming them for power generation. Contributors analyze the regional, national, and international politicization of rivers, the use and treatment of waterways in urban versus rural environments, and the increasing role of international commissions in ecological and commercial legislation for the protection of river resources. Case studies include the Seine in Paris, the Mississippi, the Volga, the Rhine, and the rivers of Pittsburgh. Rivers in History is a broad environmental history of waterways that makes a major contribution to the study, preservation, and continued sustainability of rivers as vital lifelines of Western culture.
Download or read book The People between the Rivers written by Catherine Churchman and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2016-09-14 with total page 267 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This fundamental study provides the first comprehensive history in any language of the lands between the Red and Pearl Rivers in southern China and the people who resided there over a span of a thousand years. Bringing to life the mysterious early people known as Li and Lao who inhabited the area, Catherine Churchman explores their custom of casting large bronze kettledrums. As the symbols of political authority and legitimacy for the Li and Lao rulers, the abundance of drums found in the archaeological record is an indication not only of the great number of such rulers, but also of their great wealth and power, which increased significantly from the third century CE even as the Chinese Empires tightened their control over surrounding districts. Drawing on a combination of Classical Chinese sources and scholarship in archaeology, anthropology, and historical linguistics, the author explains the political and economic factors behind the rise to power and subsequent disappearance of the indigenous leadership and its drum culture. She fills significant gaps in our understanding of the early interactions between China and northern Southeast Asia, challenging many widely held assumptions about the history of Chinese settlement and ethnic relations in the region, including those concerning the relationship between the Chinese Empires and the lands that would form the heart of a future Vietnamese state. A crucial work for understanding historical developments in the highland regions south of the Yangtze valley, it examines the first steps in the Sinic penetration of this highland world, one that has continued to the present. Bringing unprecedented attention to the historical identity of a previously overlooked region and a people, this book creates a new category in East Asian history.
Download or read book A Story of Six Rivers written by Peter Coates and published by Reaktion Books. This book was released on 2013-06-01 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Many of the world’s major cities sprang up on the banks of rivers. Used for water, food, irrigation, transportation, and power, rivers sustain life and connect the world together, but most of us think of them simply as waterways that must be crossed on the way to another place. Using four European and two North American rivers as examples, A Story of Six Rivers considers the place of rivers in our world and emphasizes the inextricable links between history, culture, and ecology. Peter Coates explores six rivers, chosen as examples of the types of rivers found on the planet: the Danube, the second-longest river in Europe; the Spree, which flows through Berlin; the Po, which cuts eastward across northern Italy; the Mersey in northwest England; the Yukon, which runs through Canada and Alaska; and the Los Angeles in California. Creating a series of river biographies, Coates gives voice to each of these bodies of water, exploring how rivers nurture us, provide cultural and economic opportunities, and pose threats to our everyday lives. He challenges recent narratives that paint rivers as the victims of abuse, pollution, and damage at the hands of humans, focusing on change rather than devastation. Describing how humans and rivers form a symbiotic—and sometimes mutually destructive—relationship, Coates argues that rivers illustrate the limits of human authority and that their capacity to inspire us is as strong as our ability to pollute them. An intimate portrait of the way these bodies of water inform our lives, A Story of Six Rivers will make us reconsider the streams and tributaries we traverse each day.
Download or read book Rivers Memory And Nation building written by Dorothy Zeisler-Vralsted and published by Berghahn Books. This book was released on 2014-11-01 with total page 203 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rivers figure prominently in a nation’s historical memory, and the Volga and Mississippi have special importance in Russian and American cultures. Beginning in the pre-modern world, both rivers served as critical trade routes connecting cultures in an extensive exchange network, while also sustaining populations through their surrounding wetlands and bottomlands. In modern times, “Mother Volga” and the “Father of Waters” became integral parts of national identity, contributing to a sense of Russian and American exceptionalism. Furthermore, both rivers were drafted into service as the means to modernize the nation-state through hydropower and navigation. Despite being forced into submission for modern-day hydrological regimes, the Volga and Mississippi Rivers persist in the collective memory and continue to offer solace, recreation, and sustenance. Through their histories we derive a more nuanced view of human interaction with the environment, which adds another lens to our understanding of the past.
Download or read book Rivers of Paradise written by Sheila Blair and published by . This book was released on 2009 with total page 392 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For millennia the collection, distribution, and symbolism of water have played pivotal roles in the lands where Islam has flourished. This book is the first to address this important subject. A diverse spectrum of scholars covers a wide range of topics: from the revelation of Islam in the 7th century to today’s conservation and development issues, from watering oases in the Moroccan desert to the flooded plains of Bengal. Copiously illustrated with beautiful color photographs and newly drawn plans and maps, this book will provoke readers to appreciate and acknowledge the essential, if often invisible and transitory, roles that water played in the arts of the Islamic lands and beyond.
Download or read book The Historic River written by Sylvia Mary Haslam and published by . This book was released on 1991 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is an absorbing and stimulating text for all interested in rivers and river ecology. Combining scholarship with first-hand experience Dr Haslam has brought together a wealth of information and insight into this one volume. The influence of riverine environments on all aspects of life is traced from the earliest time to the present with the help of many examples from the United Kingdom, elsewhere in Europe, and in other locations. The text is supported by numerous illustrations and helpful guides which will encourage the reader to look for evidence and signs of the many links between rivers and man which exist in the local area and when visiting further afield. This book is not only concerned with rivers and the surrounding land as providers of water and resources. Haslam also draws the reader's attention to important conservation matters and the need for a greater understanding of river ecology if these important environments are to be properly managed for the future. She sites cases of falling water tables, pollution and other types of environmental damage occurring through past misuse and abuse. Yet this is also balanced by some very positive and encouraging comments on how the many demands made by man on rivers for water, resources, transport, leisure and recreation may be reconciled. This is a timely and very welcome addition to the limited literature on this important topic. It is a book, which readers will not only enjoy but which will also be an important source of reference.
Download or read book Cultural Etiquette A Guide for the Well Intentioned written by Amoja Three Rivers and published by Lulu.com. This book was released on 2018-08-14 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Amoja Three Rivers' "Cultural Etiquette: A Guide for the Well-Intentioned," originally published in 1990 and "slightly revised" in 1991, was intended as an antidote to the poison of microaggressions committed by people of all racial and ethnic groups in writing and thinking about as well as speaking and interacting with Black/Indigenous/People of Color and Jewish people. This edition is authorized by the next-of-kin of the late Amoja Three Rivers and is published by the author's designated custodian of her writings. It preserves all of Three Rivers' words with only tiny changes in punctuation, spelling corrections and formatting.
Download or read book River Culture written by UNESCO and published by UNESCO Publishing. This book was released on 2023-01-05 with total page 893 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Rivers and the Power of Ancient Rome written by Brian Campbell and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2012-08-15 with total page 606 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Figuring in myth, religion, law, the military, commerce, and transportation, rivers were at the heart of Rome's increasing exploitation of the environment of the Mediterranean world. In Rivers and the Power of Ancient Rome, Brian Campbell explores the role and influence of rivers and their surrounding landscape on the society and culture of the Roman Empire. Examining artistic representations of rivers, related architecture, and the work of ancient geographers and topographers, as well as writers who describe rivers, Campbell reveals how Romans defined the geographical areas they conquered and how geography and natural surroundings related to their society and activities. In addition, he illuminates the prominence and value of rivers in the control and expansion of the Roman Empire--through the legal regulation of riverine activities, the exploitation of rivers in military tactics, and the use of rivers as routes of communication and movement. Campbell shows how a technological understanding of--and even mastery over--the forces of the river helped Rome rise to its central place in the ancient world.
Download or read book Four Great Rivers to Cross written by Patrick Mendoza and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 1998-04-15 with total page 148 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Presenting a distinct historical perspective, these intriguing stories chronicle the history and culture of a people we call the Cheyenne (the Tse Tse Stus)-from creation accounts and the introduction of horses to the present. The stories are told as seen through the eyes of Old Nam Shim (which means grandfather) and a little girl named Shadow. Written to present the true story of the Tse Tse Stus, these accounts are accompanied by discussion questions, extension activities, a vocabulary list, and a glossary of Cheyenne terms. They are ideal as a reading supplement for anyone studying Western history, Cheyenne Indian wars, or the anthropology of the Cheyenne people, this book is a valuable resource for multicultural units.
Download or read book Malinowski Rivers Benedict and Others written by George W. Stocking and published by Univ of Wisconsin Press. This book was released on 1987-03-05 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: History of Anthropology is a series of annual volumes, inaugurated in 1983, each of which treats a theme of major importance in both the history and current practice of anthropological inquiry. Drawing its title from a poem of W. H. Auden's, the present volume, Malinowski, Rivers, Benedict, and Others (the fourth in the series) focuses on the emergence of anthropological interest in "culture and personality" during the 1920s and 1930s. It also explores the historical, cultural, literary, and biological background of major figures associated with the movement, including Bronislaw Manlinowski, Edward Sapir, Abram Kardiner, Ruth Benedict, Margaret Mead, and Gregory Bateson. Born in the aftermath of World War I, flowering in the years before and after World War II, severely attacked in the 1950s and 1960s, "culture and personality" was subsequently reborn as "psychological anthropology." Whether this foreshadows the emergence of a major anthropological subdiscipline (equivalent to cultural, social, biological, or linguistic anthropology) from the current welter of "adjectival" anthropologies remain to be seen. In the meantime, the essays collected in the volume may encourage a rethinking of the historical roots of many issues of current concern. Included in this volume are the contributions of Jeremy MacClancy, William C. Manson, William Jackson, Richard Handler, Regna Darnell, Virginia Yans-McLaughlin, James A. Boon, and the editor.
Download or read book Rivers of America written by Russell Bourne and published by Fulcrum Publishing. This book was released on 1998 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The wondrous roll of American rivers' names! Because of the rivers' significance, because of their power to shape human endeavor and to stimulate creativity, U.S. history can quite properly be told through them. On the Ohio River in 1817, a literate traveler named Morris Birkbech saw that connection; he sensed the end of one historical age and the beginning of another when he noted the heavy pulsing of the waterborne traffic. He exclaimed, "Old America seems to be breaking up and moving westward!" In the twentieth century, rivers have continued to be at the center of American concerns, as agriculturalists and dam builders contend with shippers and environmentalists. Within the pages of this exciting and insightful book, well-known historian Russell Bourne takes readers on a journey through time and place, to the rivers that gave life to our nation and to the communities that flourished along their banks. - Jacket.
Download or read book Ways of the Rivers written by Martha G. Anderson and published by University of Washington Press. This book was released on 2002 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The essays assembled in this lavishly illustrated volume are unique in considering issues of cultural convergence and divergence within a single region in Africa. They examine and celebrate the "water-related" ethos and the "warrior" ethos that are present throughout the Delta and explore the influence of its unique environment on beliefs and material culture.
Download or read book Rivers A Very Short Introduction written by Nick Middleton and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2012-04-26 with total page 153 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rivers have played an extraordinarily important role in creating the world in which we live. They create landscapes and provide water to people, plants and animals, nourishing both town and country. The flow of rivers has enthused poets and painters, explorers and pilgrims. Rivers have acted as cradles for civilization and agents of disaster; a river may be a barrier or a highway, it can bear trade and sediment, culture and conflict. A river may inspire or it may terrify. This Very Short Introduction is a celebration of rivers in all their diversity. Nick Middleton covers a wide and eclectic range of river-based themes, from physical geography to mythology, to industrial history and literary criticism. Worshipped and revered, respected and feared, rivers reflect both the natural and social history of our planet. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.
Download or read book Great Rivers of the World written by Volker Mehnert and published by National Geographic Books. This book was released on 2021-03-23 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Spend hours navigating the world's great rivers in this vibrant, fact-filled book for kids that blends geography, history, and culture. Where in the Rhein does the Nibelung Treasure lie? What river helps mark the prime meridian? Why do people make pilgrimages to the Indian city of Benares? Why is the Mekong called the "Nine Dragon" river in Vietnam? How does the Mississippi divide and unite the United States? These and hundreds of other facts are explored in this wonderfully illustrated atlas of the world's great rivers. Each spread in this book, which includes a goregeous gatefold page, offers a colorful map packed with drawings, figures, and facts. Cities that border the rivers are highlighted, as are distinct flora and fauna, significant natural and human-made features, and fascinating historical details. A "biography" of each river describes where it flows, and its importance to the communities it passes through. Special attention is given to the ecological health of the rivers--those that are thriving and those in danger of losing their valuable habitats. Along the way, young readers will come to understand the enormous impact that rivers have on our lives, while learning valuable information in a way that will spark their curiosity and imagination.
