Desert Hawk Books

 

Biodiversity and Native America

Edited by
Paul Minnis
and
Wayne J. Elisens

 

256  pages
18 B&W Illustration
4 Line Drawings
4 Maps
5.5" x 8.5"
Hardcover

Quantity:   $34.95 & S/H

 

Exploring the relationship between Native Americans and the natural world, Biodiversity and Native America questions the widespread view that indigenous peoples had minimal ecological impact in North America. Introducing a variety of perspectives - ethnopharmacological, ethnographic, archaeological, and biological - this volume shows that Native Americans were active managers of natural ecological systems. The book covers groups from the sophisticated agriculturalists of the Mississippi River drainage region to the low-density hunter-gatherers of arid western North America.
     This book allows readers to develop accurate restoration, management, and conservation models through a thorough knowledge of native peoples' ecological history and dynamics. It also illustrates how indigenous peoples affected environmental patterns and processes, improving crop diversity and agricultural patterns.
     Contributors to this volume are Robert Bye, Richard I. Ford, Catherine S. Fowler, Gayle J. Fritz, Julia E. Hammett, Walter H. Lewis, Edelmira Linares, Gary Paul Nabhan, Sandra L. Peacock, Enrique Salmón, and Nancy J. Turner.

"Biodiversity and Native America is an important and timely book. Editors Paul Minnis and Wayne Elisens and the authors address numerous aspects of Native American plant use and plant knowledge in eastern and western North America, Mesoamerica, and South America. They succeed extremely well in demonstrating the remarkable levels of plant knowledge and landscape management displayed by a variety of indigenous populations in biotically diverse regions. This is a book that will appeal to both general and specialized audiences, including almost anyone interested in Native American lifeways." - Patty Jo Watson, coeditor of The Origins of Agriculture: An International Perspective

Paul E. Minnis is Professor of Anthropology at the University of Oklahoma. 
Wayne J. Elisens is Associate Professor of Botany at the University of Oklahoma.