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We live in an age of unprecedented environmental change: global, interconnected and universal. Yet though our lives are inextricably connected to global processes, and increasingly mobile, we still live in particular places. Our perceptions of change, and what kind of change might be for good or ill, are shaped by the interaction of localised experience and the wider forces of transformation. Local Places, Global Processes examines how these relationships have been shaped in Britain over time in three ways. First, through essays addressing influential ways of understanding and debating questions of ‘the state of nature’. These are complemented by case studies on conservation, landscape change and management, and how perceptions of environmental change have emerged or been discarded over time. Chapters also draw on a series of site-based workshops that brought together historians, landscape managers and artists to discuss and reflect on particular sites: Wicken Fen in Cambridgeshire, owned by the National Trust and the first British nature reserve; the Quantock Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in Somerset, England’s first AONB and a landscape enriched by Romantic association; and the landscape of Kielder Water and Forest, a land of superlatives in Northumberland in north-eastern England – the largest planted forest and artificial lake in northern Europe.
The multi-disciplinary approach draws together the exchanges, artworks and writing assembled at these workshops and afterwards. This opens up how being in a place, and engaging with ideas attached to it, shape perceptions of the environment. It provides resources with which landscape managers can think about their tasks and engage various publics in discussion about future environments in light of these histories of place. Rather than a history of these three places, this is history written from them.
The multi-disciplinary approach draws together the exchanges, artworks and writing assembled at these workshops and afterwards. This opens up how being in a place, and engaging with ideas attached to it, shape perceptions of the environment. It provides resources with which landscape managers can think about their tasks and engage various publics in discussion about future environments in light of these histories of place. Rather than a history of these three places, this is history written from them.
Table of Contents
List of Figures
Abbreviations
1. Introduction: Local Places, Global Processes: In Search of the Environment
Paul Warde, Peter Coates and David Moon
2. Three Places
Peter Coates, Paul Warde and David Moon
ENVIRONMENT AND LANDSCAPE
3. The EnvironmentPaul Warde4. Landscape Character Assessment and the Quantocks during the Nuclear AgeEmma-Jane Preece5. The Curious Case of the Missing History at KielderRichard Oram6. Birds and Squirrels as HistoryT. C. Smout7. The ‘Nature’ of ‘Artificial’ Forests?Chris Pearson
B. PLACES
8. Not All Those Who Wander are Lost: Walking in the Quantock HillsMarianna Dudley9. An Amphibious Culture: Coping with Floods in the NetherlandsPetra J. E. M. van Dam10. Names and PlacesPaul Warde11. Constructing the Kielder Landscape: Plantations, Dams and the Romantic IdealJill Payne12. The Kielder Oral History Project: Three Case StudiesLeona Jayne Skelton13. Wild Britannia: Environmental History, Wildlife Television and New Publics in BritainRobert A. LambertART INSERTS14. John Clare, Drainage and PrintmakingCarry Akroyd15. Landscape and the Artist in Twenty-First Century BritainJenny Graham16. Kielder: A Planned WildernessPeter Sharpe
C. BEAUTY AND AESTHETICS
17. Beauty and the Aesthetics of Place, Nature and EnvironmentPeter Coates18. Light on Landscape: An Antipodean ViewLibby Robin19. ‘Beauty and the Motorway – The Problem for All’: Motoring through the Quantocks Area of Natural BeautyTim Cole20. The Beautiful and the GlobalPetra J. E. M. van Dam21. Reservoirs, Military Bases and Environmental Change: Joining the DotsChris Pearson22. Species Conservation at Kielder: Animating Place with AnimalsDuncan Hutt
D. CHANGE, CHOICE AND FUTURES
23. Environmental Change: A Local Perspective on Global ProcessesDavid Moon and Leona Jayne Skelton24. Hidden History: Kielder’s Early Modern LandscapeMatt Greenhall25. Waterlands to WonderlandsPaul Warde26. Kielder Dam and ReservoirJonty Hall27. Kielder ForestGraham Gill28. National Trust: ‘Wicken Fen Vision’ (2009) [extracts]29. Kielder Water and Forest Park: The City in the CountryChristine McCulloch30. Nature, Cultural Choice and HistoryT. C. Smout31. Concluding ReflectionsDavid Moon, Peter Coates and Paul WardeAcknowledgementsTimeline of Events
List of Contributors
