AMERINDIAN CONSERVATIONIST

I'M WONDERING WHAT ARCHAEOLOGICAL EVIDENCE SUPPORTS THE IDEA OF AMERINDIAN
CULTURES BEING CONSERVATIONISTS?  THERE ARE FAR TOO MANY SITES SUCH AS
HEAD-SMASHED-IN NEAR ALBERTA, CANADA TO ASSUME THAT BECAUSE A CULTURE IS
AMERINDIAN IN NATURE, IT IS ALSO CONSERVATIVE.
SABRINA
P.S. IM OF NATIVE BLOOD SO DON'T ASSUME IM MAKING A RACIST REMARK.

--On Wed, Feb 3, 1999 8:45 PM -0500 "Jeffrey L. Beatty" <Beatty.4@osu.edu>
wrote: 

> At 11:45 AM 2/3/99 -0800, K.P. Moseley wrote:
> 
>>	In my experience, the notion we have from Amerindian cultures, of
>>indigenous ideologies & practices favorable to conservation and so on,
>>did not hold in tropical Africa. Rather, the mindset tends to be quite
>>ambivalent and certainly unsentimental about "nature," and positively
>>hostile towards forests, the site of  both physical and ritual danger.
>>This no doubt reflects the relatively recent settlement of the West (and
>>Central?) African forests (the Pygmies aside), and the challenge such
>>primary forests presented  to slash-and-burn 
>>agriculturalists.
>>
> 
> It might be of interest to you that Jules Nyerere's writings (I'm not able
> to provide a citation now unfortunately, since I got this information
years
> ago in a conversation) make the argument that the nation-state based upon
> territory is an idea foreign to African culture.  This, he argues, is so
> because of the nomadic ways of life of Africa's indigenous peoples.
> Communities would simply relocate to new areas when resources in a
> particular area became sparse.  Such practices as these don't seem likely
> to conduce to great respect for nature.
> 
> This might be consistent with your suggestion above.  In any event,
> Nyerere's writings are a potential source of African discussion of the
> issue you raise.
> 
> 
> --
> Jeffrey L. Beatty
> Doctoral Student
> Department of Political Science
> The Ohio State University
> 2140 Derby Hall
> 154 North Oval Mall
> Columbus, Ohio 43210
> 
> (o) 614/292-2880
> (h) 614/688-0567
> Email:  Beatty.4@osu.edu
> ___________________________________________________
> Sapere aude!--"Have courage to use your own reason"
>             Immanuel Kant, "What Is Enlightenment?"
>