Historical Ecology in the Pacific Islands: Prehistoric Environmental and Landscape Change

 
 

Historical Ecology in the Pacific Islands: Prehistoric Environmental and Landscape Change

Patrick V. Kirch, Terry L. Hunt

Yale University Press

1997

 

Natural scientists, archaeologists, and geographers here present recent research findings on the ecological history of the Pacific Islands, challenging earlier views that the Pacific Islands underwent dramatic environmental change only after Western contact. A rich array of case studies shows that Indigenous people had profound and often irreversible effects on the landscapes and biotas before European colonization.