Includes bibliographical references (p. [207]-[248]) and index.
Contents:
Villages of vines and trees -- An estimate of the anthropogenesis -- Comparison of high and fallow forests -- People of the fallow forest -- Vanishing plant names -- Conquest and migration -- From their point of view -- Retention of traditional knowledge -- Confection, inflection -- Discernment of environmental variation -- Rethinking the landscape -- Appendix 1. Guajá generic plant names -- Appendix 2. Trees of the anthropogenic forest.
Summary:
"Cultural Forests of the Amazon is a comprehensive and diverse account of how indigenous people transformed landscapes and managed resources in the most extensive region of tropical forests in the world. Until recently, most scholars and scientists, as well as the general public, thought indigenous people had a minimal impact on Amazon forests, once considered to be total wildernesses. William Balée's research, conducted over a span of three decades, shows a more complicated truth. In Cultural Forests of the Amazon, he argues that indigenous people, past and present, have time and time again profoundly transformed nature into culture. Moreover, they have done so using their traditional knowledge and technology developed over thousands of years. Balée demonstrates the inestimable value of indigenous knowledge in providing guideposts for a potentially less destructive future for environments and biota in the Amazon. He shows that we can no longer think about species and landscape diversity in any tropical forest without taking into account the intricacies of human history and the impact of all forms of knowledge and technology. Balée describes the development of his historical ecology approach in Amazonia, along with important material on little-known forest dwellers and their habitats, current thinking in Amazonian historical ecology, and a narrative of his own dialogue with the Amazon and its people."--book jacket.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.