Easter Island and the Environment: A Warning to the World
The progression of human development has come with its costs. The environment provides an array of resources available for use or appreciation. However, changing elements of this structure such as by removing trees can bring about unintended consequences. These alterations also can cause problems that cannot be fixed by the human population and as a result the population must cope with the loss if possible. The case study here shows how a remote system can be overwhelmed and be unable to support its inhabitants where it once was able to do so. This undesirable outcome more importantly can be avoided if measures are taken to avoid overuse of resources.
Ponting describes the historical background of Easter Island, which is a small island far off the coast of South America in the Pacific Ocean. Despite its desolate nature it is inhabited and the lives of this population show how resource use is important to survival both of the people living there and the ecosystem itself. The uses for the island varied over time but one period had evidence of a modern society despite the surrounding periods of primitive behavior. More than 600 stone statues were dispersed over the island. These sculptures had to been created by a society other than the more barbarous clans. However despite the advanced level of skill this society had it died out, showing that their skills were not sufficient to ensure their continued survival (Ponting, 1991).
Part of the difficultly in living on Easter Island was the initial scarcity of resources before humans began inhabiting the island. High temperatures and humidity coupled with bad drainage and no permanent streams made the island not well suit...
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...t can cause. The characteristics of the island such as its remoteness are less true elsewhere in the world and many areas are still teaming with animal and plant life. However, deforestation worldwide does occur and a smaller portion of the population than in prior time now does farming. As a result what farmland is available is at greater risk of being made unusable for food due to soil erosion and the less prevalent farming is to society with fewer people involved in it. Since the Easter Island society collapse happened quickly and was irreversible, it is important to avoid that sort of scenario happening on a worldwide basis since in that case there would be no easy method of migrating to an undamaged area.
References
Ponting, Clive. (1991). A Green History of the World: The Environment and the Collapse of Great Civilizations. New York: St. Martin’s Press.
The island is about 4 square miles and is today a place for tourism in the great lakes. Many thousands of years ago though this was a little piece of land with bluffs reaching high above its surroundings and was a merely a small piece of land surrounded by water. It was because of these bluffs the appearance of the island resembled a turtle and led to it being named “The Great Turtle” (Piljac, 1998). Currently the island reaches several hundred feet above the lake and it’s because of this geography that many nations saw this as a perfect military post and would be used over and over again throughout its history as such.
Walsh, Bryan. “America’s Food Crisis.” NEXUS. Eds. Kim and Michael Flachmann. Boston: Pearson, 2012. 166 – 173. Print.
Ponting, Clive. Ch.11 from "A Green History of the World," St. Martins Press, NYC, 1991
... harvest fruits and berries and grains from the island. This will supplement the food that can be grown and harvested on the island. Everyone on the island will share the food available equally. If a point comes where there is more food than what the people can eat, at that point we will dry grains, fruit, and vegetables for use later. Even meat can be thinly sliced and smoked and dried to preserve it.
Hip-Hop became characterized by an aggressive tone marked by graphic descriptions of the harshness and diversity of inner-city life. Primarily a medium of popular entertainment, hip-hop also conveys the more serious voices of youth in the black community. Though the approaches of rappers became more varied in the latter half of the 1980s, message hip-hop remained a viable form for addressing the problems faced by the black community and means to solve those problems. The voices of "message" hip...
In order for the reader to understand how colonization affected Ocean Island, the reader needs to understand the history of the Island. In Pearl Binder’s book, Treasure Islands: The Trials of the Banabans, she tells of what Ocean Island first looked like. Ocean Island, or Banaba, is one of the many islands in the Pacific. It is situated almost exactly on the equator. The whole island is three miles long and two and a half miles wide. The highest point of Banaba is 270 feet. The island was rocky but had quite a bit of land for growing crops. After living peacefully by themselves for a long time, the Banabans allowed travelers to enter their land, which changed their lives forever. Blackbirders, who are labor recruiters, came to Banaba in 1862 as a result of the Civil War happening in the U.S. (Binder). The need for cotton was in high demand so they needed workers to harvest it all. The blackbirders came and kidnapped strong young men from the villages to use them for working in Fiji, Honolulu, South America, and Queensland where enterprising planters had started cotton plantations. While slavery was ending in the U.S., it was just starting in the Pacific (Binder). At the end of the nineteenth century...
The Island is used to battles and struggles for independence. Even going back as far as the 16th century when the Conquistadors had control of the island, the Indigenous people that lived on the Island called Taínos, united and revolted against the Spaniards. But only armed with spears, and bows they were no match for the flintlock weapons, cannons, and steel breastplate of the Conquistadors. In time the Spaniards all but wiped out the Taíno population and culture, and took control of the Island. Remnants of Taíno genes still exist due to the in...
In the words of rapper Busta Rhymes, “hip-hop reflects the truth, and the problem is that hip-hop exposes a lot of the negative truth that society tries to conceal. It’s a platform where we could offer information, but it’s also an escape” Hip-hop is a culture that emerged from the Bronx, New York, during the early 1970s. Hip-Hop was a result of African American and Latino youth redirecting their hardships brought by marginalization from society to creativity in the forms of MCing, DJing, aerosol art, and breakdancing. Hip-hop serves as a vehicle for empowerment while transcending borders, skin color, and age. However, the paper will focus on hip-hop from the Chican@-Latin@ population in the United States. In the face of oppression, the Chican@-Latin@ population utilized hip hop music as a means to voice the community’s various issues, desires, and in the process empower its people.
Bulliet, Richard W. Earth and Its Peoples: a Global History. 5th ed. Vol. 1. Boston, MA: Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2011. Print.
Hip hop is both a culture and a lifestyle. As a musical genre it is characterized by its hard hitting beats and rhythms and expressive spoken word lyrics that address topics ranging from economic disparity and inequality, to gun violence and gang affiliated activity. Though the genre emerged with greater popularity in the 1970’s, the musical elements involved and utilized have been around for many years. In this paper, we will cover the history and
Hip-Hop is produced on the role of coercion and power. The diversity of the culture supposes to create meaning not chaos. Social order is maintained by domination, and the power of the song lyrics. The black youth is more likely to be victimized by crime than any other group. Hip-Hop influence the music that we listen to that a new artist can directly affect how we dress, talk, dance and etc. For example, “prison inspired hip-hop styles like sagging black pants and oversized t-shirts” (Baxter & Marina 2008, 110). Sending a culture shock across the country, some may believe it could be a good thing and others may believe it could be a detriment to our youth and
Through the progression of the last several decades, Hip Hop has transformed into a culture and artistic phenomenon that has impacted youth culture throughout society. Hip Hop and the academia surrounding the culture reflects the social, cultural, political, and historic truths of the hip hop generation, speaking to these young individuals in a dialect that they understand. The studies of the hip hop culture influence society to understand the perspectives that are not necessarily considered to be traditional within a standard curriculum.
Across the world teens feel like they’re losing their voice. In an Independent article, a magazine I found online, Geraldine says “Rates of depression and anxiety among teenagers have increased by 70 percent in the past 25 years” With such a high percentage teens feel like no one can help them and that they have no one to talk to about their problems so they tend to start breaking away from their families and depend more on music. Hip Hop gives teens a chance to feel like they have someone to talk to or someone who understands what they’re going through because a lot of what the artists rap about are life situations that they’ve gone through throughout their lives. Not everyone will understand the message of Hip Hop. “Over the years the instruments change, but the message is the same… They’re telling us something. Our children can hear it” (Mcbride 11) Rappers all have different skills, but it’s all based on telling a story. As long as Rappers tell a story all they need is the right people to listen to those stories, in this case, teens are the people that really understand the message. Hip Hop does sometimes talk about violence but it’s not always about violence, it’s what people make it seem like and if the older generations don’t listen to rap or Hip Hop then they will associate rap with gangs but what they won’t know is that it’s also about
Hip hop is a subculture and global movement that started in the South Bronx, New York City during the late 1970s. In a post-civil rights era, where deindustrialization dominated, where racism and discrimination still existed, hip hop gave discriminated youths a chance to voice their opinions, and address their struggles in America. It created jobs for African-Americans and has forever transformed America’s politics and culture. Since then, it has only spread worldwide. The culture of hip hop has made its way to other countries such as Germany, South Korea, Australia, Africa, etc., becoming a global phenomenon. The issue, however, is that hip hop is often misunderstood, and seen only as the stereotypes society and mainstream hip hop perpetuates.
Overall, Robinson Crusoe’s ship crashing on the island forever changes the ecology, and biodiversity. Robinson colonized the island by introducing invasive species, European crops, and enclosing areas of the island. This colonization would lead to the islands decent in, wildlife habitation, and biodiversity. Although, these concerns would change the ecosystem on the fictional island they are the signs of colonization, and improvement in the lives of the inlands inhabits.