The Past, Present, and Future of Traditional Resource and Environmental Management

Dados Bibliográficos

ID19003614
AutoresD Lepofsky (0000-0002-1858-0432, Simon Fraser University, autor correspondente)
Ano2009
Volume29
Fascículo2
Páginas161-166
Data de publicação2009-09-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoJournal of Ethnobiology (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0278-0771 • E-ISSN: 2162-4496
EditoraSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.2993/0278-0771-29.2.161
OpenAlexW2078456287
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas41
Referências citadas12

We live in a world where biological and cultural diversity are being lost at dizzying rates. As ethnobiologists we know that losses of diversity in both of these realms are inextricably intertwined. The loss of habitats and species, in combination with a plethora of socio-political factors, prevents local and indigenous peoples from interacting with their surrounding environments in traditional ways (e.g., Deur, Turner et al., Weiser and Lepofsky this volume). Traditional practices are important not just because they are often efficient or sustainable ways to harvest and tend economically important resources, but because, for many peoples, these traditional practices are inseparably linked to cultural heritage and cultural survival. Understanding and documenting these practices also can be critical for modern conservation efforts since they often rely on understanding how ecosystems functioned in non-industrial settings, the role of humans in modifying environments, or how human-environmental interactions changed through time and space (e.g., Heckenberger et al. 2003; Pauly 2001; Weiser and Lepofsky this volume). Given that humans had a hand in modifying most landscapes worldwide, understanding the role of humans in ecosystem history is a fundamental first step in managing ecosystems today. This volume arose out of the awareness that 1) there is a welded link between cultural and biological preservation, and 2) there can be considerable benefit in bringing together the ecological knowledge and practice of local and indigenous peoples with current efforts to understand, manage, and conserve today’s ecosystems (e.g., Frazier 2007; Johnson et al. 2005; Lertzman this volume; Lyman and Cannon 2004; Willis et al. 2004). The authors in this volume bring together these topics by examining past, present and future human-environmental interactions that fall under the rubric ‘‘traditional resource and environmental management’’ (TREM; Fowler and Lepofsky in press). Following the lead of others, Kay Fowler and I define TREM as ‘‘the application of traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) to maintain or enhance the productivity, diversity, availability, or other desired qualities of natural resources or ecosystems’’. The term traditional here means the knowledge and practice that are passed down inter-generationally. There is nothing static implied by the term. Rather, it recognizes that such knowledge and practice are built over generations of experimentation and observation about what works given particular cultural and ecological settings (e.g., Berkes and Turner 2006). Sometimes this ecological knowledge emerges from an intimate relationship with one’s surroundings that

Archaeology · Environmental planning · Environmental resource management · Geography · Amazonian Archaeology and Ethnohistory · Computer Science · Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management · Environmental Science · Indigenous Studies and Ecology