Becoming Native To This Place (The Blazer Lectures for 1991) [Hardcover]

Wes Jackson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 24, 1994

" The New World -- this empty land dazzlingly rich in forests, soils, rainfall, and mineral wealth -- was to represent a new beginning for civilized humanity. Unfortunately, even the best of the European settlers had a stronger eye for conquest than for justice. Natives were in the way -- surplus people who must be literally displaced. Now, as ecologist West Jackson points out, descendants of those early beneficiaries of conquest find themselves the displaced persons, forced to vacate the family farmsteads and small towns of our heartland, leaving vacant the schools, churches, hardware stores, and barber shops. In a ringing cry for a changed relation to the land, Jackson urges modern Americans to become truly native to this place -- to base our culture and agriculture on nature's principles, to recycle as natural ecosystems have for millions of years. The task is more difficult now, he argues, because so much cultural information has been lost and because the ecological capital necessary to grow food in a sustainable way has been seriously eroded. Where to begin? Jackson suggests we start with those thousands of small towns and rural communities literally falling down or apart. We have no money to pay for the process and little cultural awareness to support it, but here are the places where a new generation of homecomers -- people who want to go to a place and dig in -- can become the new pioneers, operating on a set of assumptions and aspirations different from those of their ancestors. These new pioneers will have to "set up the books" for ecological community accounting. If they dig deep enough and long enough, urges Jackson, a new kind of economy will emerge. So will a rich culture with its own art and artifacts.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Ideas seem to advance in waves upon the modern mind, and one of the concepts cresting at present is the notion of place. This recent swell could be charted back to Daniel Kemmis's 1992 book Community and the Politics of Place as well as his more recent meditation on the inhabitation of cities (The Good City and the Good Life). Wendell Berry's A Place on Earth continued the theme, as has Alan Thein Durning's recent book This Place on Earth. Wes Jackson, a bioligist by training, applies the notion of place to a rethinking of ecological and agricultural policy. His hope is that the concept of place will seep deeply into our thoughts and affect the very way we inhabit the world. In effect, Jackson argues for inverting the slogan "think globally, act locally": when we think of the whole Earth on a local level as a group of loved places rather than territory or resource pools, then we will be headed in the right direction. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

From Publishers Weekly

Environmentalist and former MacArthur fellow Jackson argues for a shift to economic and lifestyle paradigms based on ecology.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 136 pages
• Publisher: The University Press of Kentucky (May 24, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0813118468
• ISBN-13: 978-0813118468
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.8 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,206,794 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #8 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Urban Planning & Development > Rural Planning
  • #96 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Urban Planning & Development > Environmental Planning

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Alternative perspective on human interaction with the earth, June 19, 2000

By 

"jimgthr" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Becoming Native to This Place (Paperback)

Very easy reading, short book.

Wes Jackson describes a growing perspective that we need to interact symbiotically with the earth rather than considering the earth a "resource" at our disposal. He mixes philosophy with actual personal experiences to further illustrate the story.

The fact that he began the Land Use Institute in Kansas and is still and active participant lends credibility to his dialog.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Doesn't live up to the title., August 10, 2009

By 

Settler (Missouri) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Becoming Native to This Place (Paperback)

Wes Jackson is writing with the huge disadvantage of a great title, and I have to say I value all the thought and meditation the title provokes more than the content of the book, which starts with some promise but then wanders off into the woods. He tells you early on that he's going to get lost in the woods when he says that we need to have our "evolutionary/ecological worldview inform our decisions."

Part of the problem is that the title is hopeful, but the book reads like more of a wandering lament or critique of our situation for which the author ultimately has no compelling answers.

That said, the first chapters do provide some useful information on the history of agriculture in the US and the Soviet Union. Particularly interesting is his view that the failure of Soviet agriculture (because much of it was based upon Communist ideology, including ideas about plant heredity) produced in the West the contrary view that philosophy should have no bearing whatsoever on agriculture. Jackson does want philosophy and moral reflection to influence our thinking about agriculture, but he still leaves us ungrounded in any worldview that can provide moral compulsion for care of the earth.

Skip this book in favor of any of the following:

Living at Nature's Pace, Farming and the American Dream, by Gene Logsdon
The Unsettling of America: Culture and Agriculture, by Wendell Berry
The Omnivore's Dilemma, A Natural History of Four Meals, by Michael Pollan

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars very good, August 17, 2009

By 

Aydin Ayten - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

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This review is from: Becoming Native to This Place (Paperback)

During this period of history, perhaps as had always been , the sense of belonging to a place is a kind of lost concept. In that regard this book gives some hints on how to become native to a place and get this concept right.