Wetland human ecology
Kiviat, Erik
Thesis of Ph.D., The Union Institute, United States, 1991, 187 pages
1991
บทคัดย่อ
Wetlands, including marshes, swamps, bogs, mangroves, and annual floodplains of rivers, although variable, tend to be ecologically productive and spatiotemporally heterogeneous habitats. Wetlands offer water, travel corridors, cultivable soil, wild foods, fiber, fuel, and other concentrated resources, of which human use has been near-universal. Some cultures depend on food, fuel, or other materials from wetlands, and many of these wetland cultures live in wetland-dominated regions. The more time spent in or near wetlands, the greater the effects of wetland stressors and hazards such as biting flies; malaria and other water-related diseases; floods; soft, unstable, anaerobic soils; dense, harsh vegetation; travel barriers; and resource unpredictability. Is there a pattern of cultural adaptation to wetlands? How does this pattern vary with variation in wetland habitats? Are wetlands benign or harsh environments for humans? What benefits and costs are associated with wetland life? In an explora
tory, cross-cultural, ecological analysis I coded 19 environmental attributes and presence-absence of 157 culture traits for 19 non-industrialized wetland cultures worldwide, reconstructing pre-westernization lifeways from ethnographic sources. I cross-tabulated culture traits with environmental attributes and with a synthetic Environmental Harshness Index (EHI) based on these attributes. The statistical results and further qualitative survey indicate a wetland culture complex which includes, for example, canoes, emersion of activities above the water, and protection from biting flies. Few culture traits are wetland-endemic; most traits (e.g. pile shelter, mound cultivation) also occur on dryland where they serve different functions. Wetlands can be provident or harsh environments; the balance varies with environmental characteristics and cultural capabilities. Harshness of wetland habitats allows dominated peoples and splinter factions to take refuge from more powerful groups. Extensive, riverine, de
ltaic, and estuarine wetlands with mild climates, abundant freshwater, cultivable soils, productive fisheries, and abundant migratory water birds, have facilitated development of chiefdoms and state-level societies. Alteration of wetland environments by small-scale societies is quantitatively but not qualitatively different from alteration by complex societies. Wetland ecology helps explain declines of these societies due to siltation of irrigation works, soil salinization, severe floods, sedimentation processes, pre- and postharvest crop losses, and water-related diseases.