Hita_Unnikrishnan_Envt_History_Assignment_02

We have read many studies spanning different spatial scales and time. Some have even discussed importance of scale (local, regional, national and global) and time to their studies and for research in general. Based on the readings so far and your own experience, detail how the question of scales influences research and conclusions. Give at least two examples from the readings (from the beginning of the course). You are strongly encouraged to discuss the importance of 'scale' for your research, though this is not necessary. In case you do, you need to give only example from the readings. Response: The past shapes and moulds the present into what we see and that in turn exerts its influence upon the future. Landscapes and events are not static entities and influence each other at temporal and spatial scales far more than are apparent at the time of their presence or occurrence. This importance of spatial and temporal scales that influence and shape ecology as we know it today, has come to be recognized by the academic fraternity, who are increasingly discussing these concepts in their studies. Less recent ecological work has tended to treat the landscapes they study as being homogenous and static entities uninfluenced by no other variability apart from those identified by objectives of the study. The studies themselves have been performed on a representative landscape and by virtue of these inbuilt assumptions of homogeneity and invariability, have also been extrapolated to larger and therefore more heterogeneous landscapes, often with disastrous policy implications. The reliance on equilibrium based models of study has also enforced this notion and thus you have a whole gamut of policy measures such as the creation of protected areas, enclosed conservation units, often with little regard to the human dimensions of the problem, both on a temporal as well as spatial scale. Various readings that we have explored in the environmental history course have approached a problem from different scales, often with differing impact on the reader. Worsters Dust Bowl examined the creation of the American dustbowl and its impacts and consequences from a lens that covered the whole of the American continent. Carsons Silent Spring also dealt with the problem at a global scale. Guhas Unquiet Woods on the other hand examined the issue of peasant resistance from the perspective of a small geographical location Kumaon. These
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studies also examined the problem posed from different temporal scales by examining the effect the past has on the present and its possible impacts upon the future scenario. The scale that is chosen for a particular study also determine the possibility of extrapolating the results obtained over a wider landscape a question that we have addressed through a couple of readings on the importance of sugar and chocolate within the European society. Mintzs

Sweetness and Power examined the production and consumption of sugar in the English Society that spanned across Britain as well as her colonies. It looked at consumption patterns over a large scale without detailing the individual preferences of the people consuming the product. The study also made for a convincing account of how sugar occupied the place it does in modern society. It depicted the way in which native knowledge was appropriated and given a whole new uniqueness within the English culture. On the other hand, Norton Marchs Tasting Empire, while looking also at the hybridization and appropriation of indigenous knowledge by the British as well as the culture of chocolate consumption within the English home society. The study explored the individual consumer culture of the Britons in their homeland and sought to address the issue of why chocolate occupied the status that it did. While drawing on numerous comparisons with Mintz, the study restricted itself only to consumption of chocolate and that too within England itself. It did not make sense therefore for the authors to actually compare the study with another that dealt with a completely different scale and draw conclusions that relied upon such an inappropriate comparison. For my research, I will be looking at urban marginalized communities within the city of Bangalore and the effects of climate change and urbanization upon them. I would be looking at their access to resources and the politics of their access to it. I would examine the questions of who are slum dwellers and the labeling and creation of a distinct slum culture and how that identity created is used by state machinery in order to grant or deny them access to certain amenities or rights. I would be examining in this context the historical evolution of slums in the city and how that has impacted the landscape as is apparent today. The question of scale becomes important in my study as some of the questions I am posing are very context specific and there are dangers involved in extrapolating such locally specific data to a much larger landscape. However other issues such as the labeling of slums as well as the creation of a slum
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identity are issues that may find parallel among other marginalized communities. I thus would have to exercise caution over the scales that I am using to answer certain questions as well as the scale that I would interpret the results from and draw conclusions of. It would also help me exercise caution about the projection of my results and the policy recommendations I might make based upon the study that I have conducted as they could have far reaching consequences that my study would not have foreseen. I do think that the scale you choose is thus very important, it is also important to realize that events are also triggered by regional events as well as global. For a study it thus makes sense to remember a quote by Anais Nin, who said There are very few human beings who receive the truth, complete and staggering, by instant illumination. Most of them acquire it fragment by fragment, on a small scale, by successive developments, cellularly, like a laborious mosaic.