A History Of The Arctic

Download or read book A History of the Arctic written by John McCannon and published by Reaktion Books. This book was released on 2013-02-15 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bitter cold and constant snow. Polar bears, seals, and killer whales. Victor Frankenstein chasing his monstrous creation across icy terrain in a dogsled. The arctic calls to mind a myriad different images. Consisting of the Arctic Ocean and parts of Canada, the United States, Russia, Greenland, Finland, Norway and Sweden, the arctic possesses a unique ecosystem—temperatures average negative 29 degrees Fahrenheit in winter and rarely rise above freezing in summer—and the indigenous peoples and cultures that live in the region have had to adapt to the harsh weather conditions. As global temperatures rise, the arctic is facing an environmental crisis, with melting glaciers causing grave concern around the world. But for all the renown of this frozen region, the arctic remains far from perfectly understood. In A History of the Arctic, award-winning polar historian John McCannon provides an engaging overview of the region that spans from the Stone Age to the present. McCannon discusses polar exploration and science, nation-building, diplomacy, environmental issues, and climate change, and the role indigenous populations have played in the arctic’s story. Chronicling the history of each arctic nation, he details the many failed searches for a Northwest Passage and the territorial claims that hamper use of these waterways. He also explores the resources found in the arctic—oil, natural gas, minerals, fresh water, and fish—and describes the importance they hold as these resources are depleted elsewhere, as well as the challenges we face in extracting them. A timely assessment of current diplomatic and environmental realities, as well as the dire risks the region now faces, A History of the Arctic is a thoroughly engrossing book on the past—and future—of the top of the world.

Download or read book The Future History of the Arctic written by Charles Emmerson and published by PublicAffairs. This book was released on 2010-03-02 with total page 442 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Long at the margins of global affairs and at the edge of our mental map of the world, the Arctic has found its way to the center of the issues which will challenge and define our world in the twenty-first century: energy security and the struggle for natural resources, climate change and its uncertain speed and consequences, the return of great power competition, the remaking of global trade patterns In The Future History of the Arctic, geopolitics expert Charles Emmerson weaves together the history of the region with reportage and reflection, revealing a vast and complex area of the globe, loaded with opportunity and rich in challenges. He defines the forces which have shaped the Arctic's history and introduces the players in politics, business, science and society who are struggling to mold its future. The Arctic is coming of age. This engrossing book tells the story of how that is happening and how it might happen -- through the stories of those who live there, those who study it, and those who will determine its destiny.

Download or read book The Spectral Arctic written by Shane McCorristine and published by UCL Press. This book was released on 2018-05-01 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Visitors to the Arctic enter places that have been traditionally imagined as otherworldly. This strangeness fascinated audiences in nineteenth-century Britain when the idea of the heroic explorer voyaging through unmapped zones reached its zenith. The Spectral Arctic re-thinks our understanding of Arctic exploration by paying attention to the importance of dreams and ghosts in the quest for the Northwest Passage. The narratives of Arctic exploration that we are all familiar with today are just the tip of the iceberg: they disguise a great mass of mysterious and dimly lit stories beneath the surface. In contrast to oft-told tales of heroism and disaster, this book reveals the hidden stories of dreaming and haunted explorers, of frozen mummies, of rescue balloons, visits to Inuit shamans, and of the entranced female clairvoyants who travelled to the Arctic in search of John Franklin’s lost expedition. Through new readings of archival documents, exploration narratives, and fictional texts, these spectral stories reflect the complex ways that men and women actually thought about the far North in the past. This revisionist historical account allows us to make sense of current cultural and political concerns in the Canadian Arctic about the location of Franklin’s ships.

Download or read book The Arctic written by Richard Vaughan and published by History PressLtd. This book was released on 2007 with total page 365 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Focuses on the human inhabitants of the Arctic and their struggle for existence in one of the most inhospitable areas of the world. This book confirms the richness and diversity of the Arctics history, culture, wildlife and landscape and looks at its future.

Download or read book A History of Arctic Exploration written by Matti Laineman and published by Anova Books. This book was released on 2009 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With the character of the Arctic in a dramatic state of flux, and arguments over sovereignty once again rising to the surface, it is timely that a history of the exploration of this remote region be published. Wide-reaching in its scope and beautifully presented with artworks, maps and charts from the Nurminen Foundation and numerous European museums, private collections and archives, this is a full account of the many explorers from both East and West who attempted to find the North-West and North-East Passages, and to chart and document the region to enable the mythical North to gradually take shape and become part of the world picture. The story of man's skill and initiative in bringing an understanding to such an inhospitable part of the globe is described through the daring adventures of Viking sailors such as Erik the Red, navigators Barents and Bering, and explorers of the wilds such as Chelyuskin and Franklin. Equally, the stories of those disasterous voyages in search of the North-West and North-East Passages are presented in detail. The journeys of the great scientific explorers – Cook, Nordenskiold and Amundsen – remind the reader of the bravery of those who set their sights towards the uncharted North. Bravery and endurance were not sufficient for the almost incredible feats of Nansen and Peary. Success in extreme conditions was only achieved by those expeditions that appreciated the ferocity of nature and took example from the indigenous peoples – those who had lived in the North long before the coming of the Europeans.

Download or read book Defending the Arctic Refuge written by Finis Dunaway and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2021-04-12 with total page 343 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tucked away in the northeastern corner of Alaska is one of the most contested landscapes in all of North America: the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Considered sacred by Indigenous peoples in Alaska and Canada and treasured by environmentalists, the refuge provides life-sustaining habitat for caribou, polar bears, migratory birds, and other species. For decades, though, the fossil fuel industry and powerful politicians have sought to turn this unique ecosystem into an oil field. Defending the Arctic Refuge tells the improbable story of how the people fought back. At the center of the story is the unlikely figure of Lenny Kohm (1939–2014), a former jazz drummer and aspiring photographer who passionately committed himself to Arctic Refuge activism. With the aid of a trusty slide show, Kohm and representatives of the Gwich'in Nation traveled across the United States to mobilize grassroots opposition to oil drilling. From Indigenous villages north of the Arctic Circle to Capitol Hill and many places in between, this book shows how Kohm and Gwich'in leaders and environmental activists helped build a political movement that transformed the debate into a struggle for environmental justice. In its final weeks, the Trump administration fulfilled a long-sought dream of drilling proponents: leasing much of the Arctic Refuge coastal plain for fossil fuel development. Yet the fight to protect this place is certainly not over. Defending the Arctic Refuge traces the history of a movement that is alive today—and that will continue to galvanize diverse groups to safeguard this threatened land.

Download or read book Ancient People of the Arctic written by Robert McGhee and published by UBC Press. This book was released on 2001 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Palaeo-Eskimos have left far more than the hundreds of pieces of art recovered by archaeologists and the evidence of human ingenuity and endurance on the perimeter of the habitable world. Their most valuable legacy lies in the realization that these two things occurred together and were part of the same phenomenon. They provide an example of lives lived richly and joyfully amid dangers and insecurities that are beyond the imagination of the present world.