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forestofgloryI have often wished to be some one with clear and simple vocation. Someone who knows what they want to be when they grow up. Someone who can combine all of their interests into one passion, one career. I don't think I'm there yet but for the moment I'm writing a thesis about an environmental history topic and finding it very satisfying. Lately I've been reflecting on how I became interested in the subject.
My interest in the environment is easy to trace. As small child I loved animals. I used to collect snails. My sister taught me to catch bees. I had subscriptions to ZooBooks and Ranger Rick. I took after school science classes. I went on nature hikes. In high school I took AP bio, and did very well on the exam despite taking it while very depressed. In community college I flirted with Physics, but came back to biology. I did my undergrad degree in Ecology.
MY on going interest in history is less clear. I don't remember thinking about history much in my primary education. I remember reading The Ohlone Way, and getting really into my 4th grade project about California Indians, but that is about it. In high school I took the required history course and remember enjoying parts of them. (I read The Communist Manifesto because in freshman history we have some type of model UN debate c1950 and I was was Russia.) In community college I didn't take any history classes -- I filled my social science requirements with geography and art history. I did write a paper about the Progressive movement in California for one of my English classes.
I did my undergrad in UK, where I was first introduced to chalk grasslands. I was totally blown away by these super diverse "semi-natural" ecosystems that where heavily impacted humans, so that removing human use of them reduced their diversity. It completely transformed the way I thought about wilderness and human-nature interactions.
Also while I was studying in England I was introduced to the work of Oliver Rackham, a historical ecologist. His work helped me better understand how people and nature had interacted in complex ways over time.
I graduated and went home still thinking about wilderness, but also about food. I'm always been concerned about the fact that there are so many hungry people in the world (It seems just wrong to me) and food movement was gathering momentum.
So then I spent two year being unemployed, and also thinking about my vocation. I started reading a lot more non-fiction for pleasure. It was during this period that I started the habit of always having one fiction and one non-fiction book going. (Before it was just fiction) An I started auditing geography classes at UC Berkeley. This started because of I had an internship that encouraged me to audit a class but I kept it up. I even joined a graduate reading group.
The summer before I started grad school I read Nature's Metropolis by William Cronon. This had been recommenced to me by one of the geography students, as good book for thinking about wilderness. And it is amazing -- it helped me to think about how our attitudes towards nature effect how we behave towards nature.
That first semester I took my adviser's planning history seminar, and I had to write a paper about something historical. So I started writing the paper that evolved into my thesis. I'm not sure why I stuck with it. I guess I was having fun, and I didn't have anything else I wanted to write about.
Anyways I really like writing my thesis and environmental history in general. It does seem to use a lot of the parts of my life. However since I don't want to be an academic I'm not sure how environmental history is going to feature in my life after graduation.
My interest in the environment is easy to trace. As small child I loved animals. I used to collect snails. My sister taught me to catch bees. I had subscriptions to ZooBooks and Ranger Rick. I took after school science classes. I went on nature hikes. In high school I took AP bio, and did very well on the exam despite taking it while very depressed. In community college I flirted with Physics, but came back to biology. I did my undergrad degree in Ecology.
MY on going interest in history is less clear. I don't remember thinking about history much in my primary education. I remember reading The Ohlone Way, and getting really into my 4th grade project about California Indians, but that is about it. In high school I took the required history course and remember enjoying parts of them. (I read The Communist Manifesto because in freshman history we have some type of model UN debate c1950 and I was was Russia.) In community college I didn't take any history classes -- I filled my social science requirements with geography and art history. I did write a paper about the Progressive movement in California for one of my English classes.
I did my undergrad in UK, where I was first introduced to chalk grasslands. I was totally blown away by these super diverse "semi-natural" ecosystems that where heavily impacted humans, so that removing human use of them reduced their diversity. It completely transformed the way I thought about wilderness and human-nature interactions.
Also while I was studying in England I was introduced to the work of Oliver Rackham, a historical ecologist. His work helped me better understand how people and nature had interacted in complex ways over time.
I graduated and went home still thinking about wilderness, but also about food. I'm always been concerned about the fact that there are so many hungry people in the world (It seems just wrong to me) and food movement was gathering momentum.
So then I spent two year being unemployed, and also thinking about my vocation. I started reading a lot more non-fiction for pleasure. It was during this period that I started the habit of always having one fiction and one non-fiction book going. (Before it was just fiction) An I started auditing geography classes at UC Berkeley. This started because of I had an internship that encouraged me to audit a class but I kept it up. I even joined a graduate reading group.
The summer before I started grad school I read Nature's Metropolis by William Cronon. This had been recommenced to me by one of the geography students, as good book for thinking about wilderness. And it is amazing -- it helped me to think about how our attitudes towards nature effect how we behave towards nature.
That first semester I took my adviser's planning history seminar, and I had to write a paper about something historical. So I started writing the paper that evolved into my thesis. I'm not sure why I stuck with it. I guess I was having fun, and I didn't have anything else I wanted to write about.
Anyways I really like writing my thesis and environmental history in general. It does seem to use a lot of the parts of my life. However since I don't want to be an academic I'm not sure how environmental history is going to feature in my life after graduation.
