scholarly journals Environmental change and human impacts on terrestrial ecosystems of the sub-Antarctic islands between their discovery and the mid-twentieth century

2009 ◽  
Vol 143 (1) ◽  
pp. 33-44 ◽  
Author(s):  
P Convey ◽  
M Lebouvier
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Environmental Change ◽  
Human Impacts ◽  
Terrestrial Ecosystems

scholarly journals Responses of nitrogen concentrations and pools to multiple environmental change drivers: A meta‐analysis across terrestrial ecosystems

2019 ◽  
Vol 28 (5) ◽  
pp. 690-724 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kai Yue ◽  
Yan Peng ◽  
Dario A. Fornara ◽  
Koenraad Van Meerbeek ◽  
Lars Vesterdal ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Change ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Terrestrial Ecosystems ◽  
Nitrogen Concentrations

Anthropology and the Anthropocene: Criticisms, Experiments, and Collaborations

2020 ◽  
Vol 49 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-82 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew S. Mathews
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Change ◽  
Human Impacts ◽  
Ecological Models ◽  
World Systems ◽  
Temporal Scales ◽  
The World ◽  
Capitalist World ◽  
Natural Histories ◽  
Historical Epoch

The Anthropocene, a proposed name for a geological epoch marked by human impacts on global ecosystems, has inspired anthropologists to critique, to engage in theoretical and methodological experimentation, and to develop new forms of collaboration. Critics are concerned that the term Anthropocene overemphasizes human mastery or erases differential human responsibilities, including imperialism, capitalism, and racism, and new forms of technocratic governance. Others find the term helpful in drawing attention to disastrous environmental change, inspiring a reinvigorated attention to the ontological unruliness of the world, to multiple temporal scales, and to intertwined social and natural histories. New forms of noticing can be linked to systems analytics, including capitalist world systems, structural comparisons of patchy landscapes, infrastructures and ecological models, emerging sociotechnical assemblages, and spirits. Rather than a historical epoch defined by geologists, the Anthropocene is a problem that is pulling anthropologists into new forms of noticing and analysis, and into experiments and collaborations beyond anthropology.

scholarly journals Human impacts and Anthropocene environmental change at Lake Kutubu, a Ramsar wetland in Papua New Guinea

2021 ◽  
Vol 118 (40) ◽  
pp. e2022216118 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kelsie E. Long ◽  
Larissa Schneider ◽  
Simon E. Connor ◽  
Niamh Shulmeister ◽  
Janet Finn ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mineral Resource ◽  
Environmental Change ◽  
Papua New Guinea ◽  
Human Impacts ◽  
Wetland Management ◽  
New Guinea ◽  
Ecosystem Dynamics ◽  
Resource Extraction ◽  
Human Populations ◽  
Ramsar Wetland

The impacts of human-induced environmental change that characterize the Anthropocene are not felt equally across the globe. In the tropics, the potential for the sudden collapse of ecosystems in response to multiple interacting pressures has been of increasing concern in ecological and conservation research. The tropical ecosystems of Papua New Guinea are areas of diverse rainforest flora and fauna, inhabited by human populations that are equally diverse, both culturally and linguistically. These people and the ecosystems they rely on are being put under increasing pressure from mineral resource extraction, population growth, land clearing, invasive species, and novel pollutants. This study details the last ∼90 y of impacts on ecosystem dynamics in one of the most biologically diverse, yet poorly understood, tropical wetland ecosystems of the region. The lake is listed as a Ramsar wetland of international importance, yet, since initial European contact in the 1930s and the opening of mineral resource extraction facilities in the 1990s, there has been a dramatic increase in deforestation and an influx of people to the area. Using multiproxy paleoenvironmental records from lake sediments, we show how these anthropogenic impacts have transformed Lake Kutubu. The recent collapse of algal communities represents an ecological tipping point that is likely to have ongoing repercussions for this important wetland’s ecosystems. We argue that the incorporation of an adequate historical perspective into models for wetland management and conservation is critical in understanding how to mitigate the impacts of ecological catastrophes such as biodiversity loss.

Future Environments of South America

2007 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas T. Veblen ◽  
Kenneth R. Young
Keyword(s):  
South America ◽  
Environmental Change ◽  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Human Impacts ◽  
Southern Oscillation ◽  
Physical Geography ◽  
Tierra Del Fuego ◽  
South American ◽  
Policy Options ◽  
Natural Processes

An important goal of this book has been to provide a comprehensive understanding of the physical geography and landscape origins of South America as important background to assessing the probabilities and consequences of future environmental changes. Such background is essential to informed discussions of environmental management and the development of policy options designed to prepare local, national, and international societies for future changes. A unifying theme of this book has been the elucidation of how natural processes and human activities have interacted in the distant and recent past to create the modern landscapes of the continent. This retrospective appreciation of how the current landscapes have been shaped by nature and humans will guide our discussion of possible future trajectories of South American environments. There is abundant evidence from all regions of South America, from Tierra del Fuego to the Isthmus of Panama, that environmental change, not stasis, has been the norm. Given that fact, the history, timing, and recurrence intervals of this dynamism are all crucial pieces of information. The antiquity and widespread distribution of changes associated with the indigenous population are now well established. Rates and intensities of changes related to indigenous activities varied widely, but even in regions formerly believed to have experienced little or no pre-European impacts we now recognize the effects of early humans on features such as soils and vegetation. Colonization by Europeans mainly during the sixteenth century modified or in some cases replaced indigenous land-use practices and initiated changes that have continued to the present. Complementing these broad historical treatments of human impacts, other chapters have examined in detail the environmental impacts of agriculture (chapter 18) and urbanism (chapter 20), and the disruptions associated with El Niño–Southern Oscillation events. The goal of this final synthesis is to identify the major drivers of change and to discuss briefly their likely impacts on South American environments and resources in the near and medium-term future. Our intent is not to make or defend predictions, but rather to identify broad causes and specific drivers of environmental change to inform discussions of policy options for mitigating undesirable changes and to facilitate potential societal adaptations to them.

A late Holocene record of human impacts on tropical environments from non-pollen palynomorphs, Albertine Rift, western Uganda

2019 ◽  
Vol 93 ◽  
pp. 172-186 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lawrence M. Kiage ◽  
Meghan Howey ◽  
Joel Hartter ◽  
Michael Palace
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Change ◽  
Human Impacts ◽  
Forest Disturbance ◽  
Fungal Spores ◽  
Fungal Spore ◽  
African Region ◽  
Albertine Rift ◽  
Elemental Geochemistry ◽  
Tropical Environments ◽  
Western Uganda

AbstractNon-pollen palynomorphs and elemental geochemistry data from Lake Kifuruka in western Uganda provide evidence of environmental change in the tropical African region since the beginning of the Holocene. The multi-proxy record presented here shows that dry conditions dominated the end of the Pleistocene evidenced by calcium enriched sediments and suppressed fungal taxa activity. Moist conditions dominated the early Holocene and persisted until just after 1960 cal yr BP. Elevated frequencies of individual fungal spore taxa associated with herbivory and soil erosion, including Sordaria-type, Sporormiella-type, Chaetomium-type, and Glomus-type, about 4300 cal yr BP suggests a significant environmental change that could be linked to human activities. A convergence of multiple proxy data, including microscopic charcoal, elemental geochemistry, and fungal spores, strongly support the occurrence of anthropogenic forest disturbance in the Albertine Rift about 4300 cal yr BP.

scholarly journals A Radiocarbon Chronology for Human-Induced Environmental Change on Mangaia, Southern Cook Islands, Polynesia

Radiocarbon ◽  
1991 ◽  
Vol 33 (3) ◽  
pp. 317-328 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. V. Kirch ◽  
J. R. Flenley ◽  
D. W. Steadman
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Change ◽  
Anthropogenic Disturbance ◽  
Human Impacts ◽  
Island Ecosystems ◽  
Palynological Analysis ◽  
Cook Islands ◽  
Significant Evidence ◽  
Radiocarbon Chronology ◽  
Age Determinations

A suite of 23 14C age determinations, from a well-stratified rockshelter and from 3 pollen cores on Mangaia Island is reported. The rockshelter has yielded significant evidence for avifaunal extinctions during the period cal. A.D. 1000-1600. The Lake Tiriara pollen cores span a period from ca. 6500 cal. b.p. to the present, and palynological analysis of the TIR 1 core indicates major anthropogenic disturbance on the island's vegetation after ca. 1600 cal. B.P. These sites, and the radiocarbon ages associated with them, provide the first chronologically secure evidence for human impacts on the island ecosystems of the southern Cook Islands.

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