fire

Only in recent times have serious historical studies been published about floods, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, storm tides, forest-fires, and other natural disasters and their effects on human life.

Scrubland grazing by the omnivorous goat could reduce the risk of widespread fires. But goat populations have been controlled by bans and restrictions for many centuries. The political, economic and cultural reasons why the animal had such an unsavoury reputation are explored.

The author argues in this paper that the basis of these cattlemen’s use of fire to manage the land was their understanding of the practices during the ‘pioneering’ period of European settlement and of Aboriginal people before that.

Burning cultivation of peatlands has been practised in peat-rich countries at one time or other throughout Western Europe. In these and other peat-rich countries, the inclusion of the emissions from burning cultivation could substantially alter historical carbon dioxide emission estimates.

Mention of the island nation of Madagascar conjures up images of exotic nature, rampant deforestation, and destructive erosion. Popular descriptions of the island frequently include phrases such as ‘ecological mayhem’ or ‘barren landscape.’

This paper contends that recent scholarly interest in systems of colonising knowledge, whether called ‘scientific forestry,’ or ‘development,’ has paid inadequate attention to the historical processes shaping such knowledge production in specific colonial locations.