Content area
Full text
John Opie: Nature's Nation: An Environmental History of the United States. Fort Worth, TX: Harcourt Brace College Publishers, 1998.
At the recent ASEH (American Society of Environmental History) Conference in Tucson, Arizona, a round-table panel was held on John Opie's Nature's Nation: An Environmental History of the United States. As was expected, each of the panelists addressed this textbook from their area of expertise. Adam Rome graciously pointed out the deficiencies in its exploration of our industrial and consumer society and consumerism in general. Nancy Langston protested that there was a crucial gender element missing. And Mart Stewart pointed out its misrepresentations of the South as a distinct region. Each of these panelists had fine points, and John Opie one, two, or even three upped them, drawing from Peter Coates' review in Environmental History1 pointing out his textbook's shortcomings in terms of a global economic framework, lack of detail in discussion of forestry issues, nuclear issues, rural America, the environmental history of warfare, and the long-term history of Native Americans (who all but disappear after European settlement). Of course, this is not a complete list of the "deficiencies" of this textbook.
In light of the multi-disciplinary focus of environmental history these kinds of shortcomings are to be expected, and are unavoidable. How can one summarize 500-plus years of history, from the perspective of numerous disciplines, and please everyone? The critiques listed above raise a crucial question: What do we want, or expect, from a textbook? In the Preface to this text, titled "Note to the Instructor (and Students)," Opie states that, "no textbook is neutral. It should have a voice that offers a carefully thought-out point of view. An effective textbook should also make adventuresome statements,...