Back to Nature

The Arcadian Myth in Urban America
Erscheinungsjahr 1990
ISBN: 978-0-8018-4013-5
Verlag: Johns Hopkins University Press

Buch, Englisch, 264 Seiten, Format (B × H): 140 mm x 216 mm, Gewicht: 377 g

Peter J. Schmitt describes the many ways in which America's urban middle class became involved with nature from the turn of the century to shortly after World War I, and he assess the influence of the "Arcadian myth" on American culture. With sympathy and gentle irony, he surveys the manifestations of the American love affair with the country: summer camps, the beginnings of wildlie protection and the conservation crusade, landscaped cemeteris, "Christian ornithology," and wilderness novels. The Arcadian drive reflected urban values, as the city-dweller sought virtue in nature. Landscape gardening, country clubs, national parks, and scenic turnoffs imposed the industrial ethic of order, neatness, and regularity on natural landscaps. Nature study and anthropomorphic animal stories taught moral values to children.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Schmitt, Peter J.

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Soziologie | Soziale Arbeit Spezielle Soziologie Stadt- und Regionalsoziologie
• Geowissenschaften Umweltwissenschaften Umweltschutz, Umwelterhaltung
• Naturwissenschaften Biowissenschaften Biowissenschaften Biowissenschaften, Biologie: Sachbuch, Naturführer
• Geisteswissenschaften Architektur Garten- und Landschaftsarchitektur

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Foreword, by John R. Stilgoe
Preface
Preface to the First Edition
Introduction
Chapter 1. Back to nature
Chapter 2. The Literary Commuter
Chapter 3. Birds in the Bush
Chapter 4. Nature Fakers
Chapter 5. This Elegant Art
Chapter 6. Keep Off the Grass
Chapter 7. Arcadia Comes to School
Chapter 8. Bluebirds and Beansprouts
Chapter 9. The Customary Thing
Chapter 10. Backwoods Brotherhoods
Chapter 11. Children's Fiction and the Out-of-Doors
Chapter 12. The Wilderness Novel
Chapter 13. The Church in the Wildwood
Chapter 14. Nature and the Camer
Chapter 15. The Search for Scenery
Chapter 16. The Search for Solitude
Chapter 17. The New Frontier
Notes
Selected REadings since 1969
Index

Über Autor(innen)

Schmitt, Peter J.
Peter J. Schmitt is professor of history at Western Michigan University.