Successful Adaptation to Climate Change
Rating: Suzanne C Moser and Maxwell T Boykoff. (eds). 2103. Successful Adaptation to Climate Change. Routledge. ISBN 978 0 415 52500 8 It is fascinating to see how perspectives on climate change have altered over the course of decades. We have gone from the novel idea; it has gained widespread acceptance. We went from acceptance to a wider debate over the science and how it can be interpreted which looks, from the outside at least, two mutually opposed views struggling […]
Revolutions that made the Earth
Rating: Tim Lenton and Andrew Watson. 2013. Revolutions that made the Earth. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978 0 19 967346 9. One of the problems with geology teaching is that the size of the events and the timescales involved are often too great for the tyro to comprehend. Sometimes the problem is that there are just too many pieces to put together and what you really need is something that tells the big picture (in much the same way that […]
Reshaping Learning
Rating: Ronghuai Huang Kinshuk and J Michael Spector. (eds). 2013 Reshaping Learning: Frontiers of Learning Technology in a Global Context. Springer. ISBN 978 3 642 32300 3. Perhaps it is appropriate that this review should attempt something new on a book dedicated to exploring the new! In one tab I have my review post, on another I have an e-copy of the text currently with limited functions (possibly, mostly my own!). It will be an experience to see what happens […]
Making Sense of Nature
Rating: Noel Castree. 2014. Making Sense of Nature. Routledge. ISBN 978 0 415 54550 1 Many years ago I started a wildlife conservation course by asking students to construct a media campaign for a certain animal. My list was designed to be controversial because I didn’t care about the product, I cared about the process and thinking that went behind it. So, we had the panda (already been done, think of something new), rabbit (pest, hard to see beyond cartoons) […]
Human Impact on the Natural Environment
Rating: Andrew Goudie. 2013. The Human Impact on the Natural Environment: Past, present and future.7e. Wiley-Blackwell. ISBN 978 1 1185 7658 8 It has frequently been noted that to stay in print and updated for over 3 decades is somewhat of a feat; to remain a key text, considerably more so. And yet, Goudie has produced other, related, texts for the same publisher (Nature of the Environment, Changing Earth) and yet they haven’t caught the imagination in the same way. […]
Geographic Thought
Rating: Tim Cresswell. 2013. Geographic Thought – A Critical Introduction. Wiley-Blackwell. ISBN 978 1 4051 6939 4. I think it’s fair to argue two points in particular in relation to texts on the philosophy of geography: firstly, that such insights are essential in developing a critical perspective on the subject; and, secondly, that such thought usually intensifies rather than reduces the divisions in the subject. In terms of the former, such study should be seen as an integral part of […]
Dictionary of Environment and Conservation
Rating: Chris Park and Michael Allaby. 2013. Oxford Dictionary of Environment and Conservation.2e. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978 0 19 964166 6. This isn’t the first dictionary I’ve ever reviewed and I think it’s important that I continue because they need to be publicised, but there are certain inherent problems. Firstly, it’s a dictionary – what are you expecting? Normally, I can go through chapters, making points linking ideas and generally trying my best to highlight what I see as […]
First Migrants
Rating: Bellwood, Peter. 2013. First Migrants. Wily Blackwell. ISBN 978 4051 8908 8. One of the first topics I ever covered was human development. Fascinating. OK, maybe not when I was seen demonstrating brachiation by the Principal, but a good set of lessons nonetheless! It aroused my interest in the point that I’d previously buried in my thinking – human migration at the scale I was considering was an evolutionary process as well. The go-to text of the day was […]
Vegetation Ecology
Rating: Eddy van der Maarel and Janet Franklin. eds. 2013. Vegetation Ecology. 2e. Wiley-Blackwell. ISBN 978 1 4443 3889 8. Of course, the study of vegetation in ecology is one of the oldest parts of the discipline, as vegetation science is in many allied disciplines e.g. biogeography (although one of the first discrete texts was published only in 1974!). Nominally concerned with plant cover and the relationships with the environment, vegetation science has grown considerably as a discipline in recent […]
The Global Casino
Rating: Nick Middleton. 2013. The Global Casino: an introduction to environmental issues.5e. Routledge. ISBN. 978 1 4441 4662 2 At a time when there are so many specialist texts on matters dealing with environmental issues (usually with only one topic in mind) it’s good to see one that tackles so many different ones and impressive to see it through 5 editions and 18 years. Having seen a few of these earlier incarnations, a new arrival always piques interest. The basic […]
