Contributors
Introduction - Middle East Environmental History: The Fallow
between Two Fields, Alan Mikhail
1. The Eccentricity of the Middle East and North Africa's
Environmental History, J.R. McNeill
2. History and Animal Energy in the Arid Zone, Richard W.
Bulliet
3. The Little Ice Age Crisis of the Ottoman Empire: A Conjuncture
in Middle East Environmental History, Sam White
4. Fish and Fishermen in Ottoman Istanbul, Suraiya Faroqhi
5. Plague and Environment in Late Ottoman Egypt, Alan Mikhail
6. Through an Ocean of Sand: Pastoralism and the Equestrian Culture
of the Eurasian Steppe, Arash Khazeni
7. Enclosing Nature in North Africa: National Parks and the
Politics of Environmental History, Diana K. Davis
8. Building the Past: Rockscapes and the Aswan High Dam in Egypt,
Nancy Reynolds
9. The Rise and Decline of Environmentalism in Lebanon, Karim
Makdisi
10. State of Nature: The Politics of Water in the Making of Saudi
Arabia, Toby C. Jones
11. Expanding the Nile's Watershed: The Science and Politics of
Land Reclamation in Egypt, Jessica Barnes
Bibliography
Index
Alan Mikhail is Professor of History at Yale University. He is the author of Nature and Empire in Ottoman Egypt: An Environmental History, which won the Roger Owen Book Award from the Middle East Studies Association and the Samuel and Ronnie Heyman Prize from Yale University.
"[M]uch of the material the collection presents is interesting, and
its range is impressive, from considerations of the environment's
effect on the longevity of empires to estimates of the size of the
typical daily catch enjoyed by fishermen in medieval
Istanbul."--Foreign Affairs
"[W]ell-sourced, well-written, well-argued, and often quite
interesting. The scholars, editor, and publishers are to be
commended."--Middle East Media and Book Reviews
"A readable and widely sourced text that can be used with
confidence by anyone eager to teach the subject at the high school
or college level. The overall standard is so high, so thought
provoking and drawn so much from recent research as to resist most
of the usual types of criticism directed towards edited
works."--Roger Owen, International Journal of Turkish Studies
"In many ways the book provides a refreshing look from a rather new
vantage point at a topic that this reviewer had thought was fairly
well known and understood. The histories of many of the areas or
countries within MENA have clearly been shaped through the power
and control of their environmental histories and these studies will
open up many new avenues of academic research which have been
neglected in the past or even hidden from view
altogether."--Stephen
Upex, Landscape History
"Water on Sand, edited by Alan Mikhail, is a diverse and engaging
collection of works that bring environmental history to the
forefront of the study of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA)
in a compelling way. The essays that compose the book cover a
significant swath of time-from the twelfth to the twentieth
centuries-as well as a vast geographic space, and they deliver a
persuasive call to utilize environmental history as a tool to
understand the
history of this region better."--Teaching History
"A welcome contribution to the field Water on Sand breaks new
ground by introducing MENA into the global field of environmental
history...The ten essays that are largely based on primary research
cover much new ground, literally and metaphorically speaking. Some
of the authors are rooted in environmental history, while others
reread their research in social, economic, or cultural history and
relate it to environmental issues. The result is a rich
composition of studies."--Gunnel Cederlöf, American Historical
Review
"Clear and engaging...This fascinating volume provides an excellent
overview of how environmental perspectives can enrich Middle East
studies, thanks to contributions from leading scholars in the
fields of global environmental and Middle East history...This
collection is richly rewarding for students, specialists and
general readers interested in understanding the Middle East and
North Africa in comparative and historical perspective."--Middle
East Reseach
and Information Project
"A major contribution to world environmental history. Highly
recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through
researchers/faculty."--CHOICE
"The significance of a MENA environmental history is both local and
global...[T]hus the significance of this book. The story of MENA
remains incomplete without a MENA's environmental history, and the
global story of the environment, and by implication the global
historical narrative, remains similarly incomplete without a MENA's
environmental history."--Arab Studies Quarterly
"Well-sourced, well-written, well-argued, and often quite
interesting...A valuable addition to the library of any scholar of
the MENA interested in how environmental studies might pertain to
their particular subfield...in addition to providing a great deal
of material to reflect upon for scholars of other disciplines
within MENA studies."--Middle East Media and Book Reviews
Online
"One of the oldest cradles of human civilization, and now the site
of fierce conflicts over land, water, and oil, the Middle East and
North Africa region have much to tell us about the long-term
relation between humans and nature. In these diverse, intelligent
essays that relation defines the region in a compelling new light
and gives it a global significance."--Donald Worster, University of
Kansas and Renmin University of China
"Prefaced by a thoughtful, carefully annotated essay, Water on Sand
offers stimulating insights by a group of distinguished scholars
into the neglected subject of Middle Eastern environmental history.
The book contains both wide-ranging thematic essays and focused
research reports on environmental subjects ranging from North
Africa and Turkey to the Arab World and Central Asia. It
represents, as its title suggests, a renewed and important catalyst
for
environmental studies in a region historically known for its two
great river systems and fragile ecology and more recently for
population pressures on and political conflicts over scarce
resources."--Stephen F.
Dale, author of The Muslim Empires of the Ottomans, Safavids, and
Mughals
Ask a Question About this Product More... |