Duke University Press Log

Bipartisan Policy Center Urges Research Into Geoengineering

Today the Bipartisan Policy Center's Task Force on Climate Remediation Research issued a report that urges the United States to step up research into geoengineering techniques that might help slow or stop the progress of global climate change. In interviews with the New York Times, "some of the panel members said they hoped that the mere discussion of such drastic steps would jolt the public and policy makers into meaningful action in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, which they called the highest priority." Climate change expert Orrin H. Pilkey believes "the potential for adverse side effects" in any geoengineering project is "high and unpredictable." His new book, Global Climate Change: A Primer, written with his son Keith C. Pilkey, features a chapter on geoengineering that lays out some of the potential technologies, such as seeding the oceans to provide cloud cover, carbon sequestration machines, and the pumping of aerosols into the stratosphere. Pilkey ultimately comes down against geoengineering, writing: "that climate change is so dire a challenge as to propel some in the scientific community to seriously consider geoengineering should scare us all the more. The anthropogenic climate change criss that we face requires a political rather than a geoengineering solution."

"Our Expanding Oceans" Exhibit Premiere and Book Signing

On June 23rd, the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences hosted the "Our Expanding Oceans" exhibit premiere with a reception and book signing. Scientist Orrin H. Pilkey and his son Keith C. Pilkey signed copies of their new book, Global Climate Change: A Primer (2011), with artist Mary Edna Fraser.

The exhibit will run from June 25th-November 6th and features more than 50 hand-dyed silk batiks by Mary Edna Fraser. The exhibit and accompanying book were developed by Mary Edna Fraser and Orrin H. Pilkey.

Here are a few photos from the book signing, lecture, and reception. To see more, please visit our Facebook Fan Page.

 

View of the outside of the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences.

 

 

 

Artist Mary Edna Fraser and co-authors Orrin H. Pilkey and Keith C. Pilkey sign copies of their new book, Global Climate Change: A Primer.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mary Edna Fraser and Orrin H. Pilkey's lecture. Mary Edna Fraser described the process by which she creates her colorful batiks, and Orrin H. Pilkey explained about global climate change.

 

 

The exhibit premiere and reception.

 

 

Time to Put an End to the Climate Change "Debate"

With the release of the Congressional report "America's Climate Choices," this week as well as the retraction of a much-cited scholarly critique of global warming, many environmentalists are hoping we can finally end the "debate" about climate change. The report, undertaken at Congress's behest by the National Research Council, begins by clearly stating what it sees as the facts:

"Climate change is occurring, is very likely caused primarily by the emission of greenhouse gases from human activities, and poses significant risks for a range of human and natural systems. Emissions continue to increase, which will result in further change and greater risks. Responding to these risks is a crucial challenge facing the United States and the world today and for many decades to come."

This is much the way that Orrin H. Pilkey and Keith C. Pilkey begin their important new book Global Climate Change: A Primer. They start with the premise that "global climate change is upon us. Of this there is no doubt among those who observe the Earth." Their book aims to give clear, straightforward information about climate change to students and general readers, so they can understand the challenges facing us and confront them appropriately. In response to the report Orrin H. Pilkey says, "Sea level rise can be seen as an opportunity and a challenge to redesign with nature. But if our society fails to accept the latest congressional report and other documents like it we will, instead of planning, respond to global changes as emergency disasters." We hope many will educate themselves and their leaders by reading this crucial new book.

Books for Earth Day

Happy Earth Day! Check out some of our recent and forthcoming titles in Environmental Studies to celebrate.

In Beyond the Sacred Forest: Complicating Conservation in Southeast Asia, scholars rethink the translation of environmental concepts between East and West, particularly ideas of nature and culture; what conservation might mean; and how conservation policy is applied and transformed in the everyday landscapes of Southeast Asia.

 

 

 

In The Struggle for Maize: Campesinos, Workers, and Transgenic Corn in the Mexican Countryside, Elizabeth Fitting argues that maize biodiversity in central and southern Mexico is threatened as much by rural out-migration as by the flow of genes from genetically modified to local corn varieties.

 

 

Global Climate Change: A Primer, by Orrin H. Pilkey and Keith C. Pilkey, takes on climate change deniers in an outstanding and much-needed primer on the science of global change and its effects. Suitable for students or interested laypeople, it's illustrated with gorgeous full-color reproductions of batiks by artist Mary Edna Fraser. Available in July.

 

See all the rest of our environmental studies titles here!

 

 

 

Dorceta E. Taylor Wins Outstanding Publication Award

Congratulations to Dorceta E. Taylor, author of The Environment and the People in American Cities, 1600s-1900s: Disorder, Inequality, and Social Change, for winning the Outstanding Publication Award from the Environment and Technology Section of the American Sociological Association. The Outstanding Publication Award is given in alternate years for publications of special noteworthiness in the field of environmental sociology.

2011 pricing now available, new acquisitions announced

2011 pricing now available

2011 pricing for Duke University Press single journal titles and electronic collections is now available at the newly redesigned Library Resource Center at dukeupress.edu/library.

e-Duke Journals Scholarly Collections

Duke University Press offers two collections of journals in the humanities and social sciences. The Standard collection includes 32 titles; Expanded includes 37.

ASLO and Duke University Press partner to launch Limnology and Oceanography: Fluids and Environments; journal issues call for papers

Duke University Press and the American Society of Limnology and Oceanography (ASLO) partnered to launch the journal Limnology and Oceanography: Fluids and Environments. The journal, which will explore the link between fluid dynamics and aquatic system processes and will be offered in an online-only format, begins publication in late 2010.

Edited by Josef Daniel Ackerman at the University of Guelph, Limnology and Oceanography: Fluids and Environments will feature interdisciplinary limnology and oceanography research focusing on the interactions of fluid. To accommodate dynamic observations and model development, the journal will allow appendixes and supporting online materials such as databases and videos.

“We’re looking forward to partnering with an academic publisher for Limnology and Oceanography: Fluids and Environments,” says Carlos Duarte, ASLO president. “As a publisher of forty journals available electronically, Duke University Press brings significant expertise to our new online journal, as well as a shared mission to advance scholarship in the growing field of limnology and oceanography.” 

FHS Article Wins Alice Hamilton Prize

The American Society for Environmental History has selected Richard Keyser’s “The Transformation of Traditional Woodland Management: Commercial Sylviculture in Medieval Champagne" for the Alice Hamilton Prize for best article in environmental history. The article was published in the Summer 2009 (32:3) issue of French Historical Studies.

The article, which explores medieval economic growth in Champagne and the late medieval and early modern French state’s role in shaping forest exploitation, is available for download at no cost.

For more information about French Historical Studies, please visit dukeupress.edu/fhs.

Abalone Gets Endangered Species Status

The black abalone, a Pacific coast mollusk that is a central feature in many Pacific coast Native tribes' cultures, was granted endangered species status this week. The abalone used to be abundant along the California coast but a withering syndrome, apparently caused by rising ocean temperatures, has caused their numbers to dwindle. In Abalone Tales, Les Field collaborates with many Native co-authors to look at the place of the abalone in California and Native history and culture. The essays in the book shed light on abalone’s role in cultural revitalization, struggles over territory, tribal appeals for federal recognition, and connections among California’s Native groups.

Brazil's Environment Minister Steps Down

Marina Silva, the Environment Minister in Brazil, has stepped down according to the BBC News.  She was a staunch defender of the Amazon rainforests and, according to the BBC, "Correspondents say Ms Silva's resignation will reinforce a perception that President Lula is more concerned with economic development than conservation."
Brazil's environmental efforts at both the state and local level are the subject of Kathryn Hochstetler and Margaret E. Keck's 2007 book Greening Brazil:  Environmental Activism in State and Society.  The book challenges the claim that environmentalism came to Brazil from abroad, and retells the story of environmentalism in Brazil from the inside out, analyzing the extensive efforts within the country to save its natural environment, and the interplay of those efforts with transnational environmentalism.