Nature and Culture in the Andes

Abstract

This is a book of essays on the environmental history of the central Andes (Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia) written by a well-known geographer who has 35 years of Andean experiences and reflections behind him. Fieldwork is the main source for the book; the author has also used archival material and local published sources. The themes are quite diverse. There is an authoritative, convincing account of the biogeography of Andean trees (some of them “cultivated”), such as the Buddleia (quishuar), Polylepis, and Podocarpus, and of the historical processes of deforestation, with some interesting information on eucalyptus plantations since the late nineteenth century. The book also includes an attractive chapter on very remote valleys in the Peruvian jungle margin, where recent research shows that the Incas built terraces for the cultivation of coca, although later on haciendas failed to maintain marketable production there. There is an intriguing essay on the reason that llamas and alpacas were and are not milked, which cannot be lactose intolerance because this disinclination is shared with Asiatic peoples who thrive on some milk products.There is a chapter on the historical demography and the incidence of malaria in Mizque (in the lowlands of Cochabamba in Bolivia), a topic of wide relevance for the whole region, since it helps to explain patterns of settlement at different altitudes. However, I do not understand why the export of the bark of chinchona trees (used to cure malaria fever), which began in Loja in the 1630s and extended elsewhere, is not seen by Gade as a common Andean theme. In the final essay on Carl Sauer’s contribution to the study of Andean crop diversity, the author strongly defends the Andean peasantry against modernist notions of development. He writes, “The new ideal is to build on aboriginal achievements of the past, including ridged fields, bank terrace systems, irrigation works, and the inventory of native crops and animals” (p. 211). Current debates on in situ conservation, coevolution of seeds (and animal species), and “farmers’ rights” are appropriately taken into account by Gade.Rural themes dominate the book. There is little on the environmental history of cities (for instance, on water supply, patterns of urban planning or non-planning, coping with risks such as earthquakes, use of energy), apart from a fascinating chapter on the history of the arrival and multiplication of rats in Guayaquil, with a discussion of public health issues. The topic of disease is discussed throughout the book. The chapter on Guayaquil’s abundant rats does not refer to changes in rains and water levels in the city because of periodic El Niños, and there is nothing in the book on strategies for coping with El Niño rains in areas such as the Piura desert. Surely, El Niño has a global significance, with roots in Andean historical geography. There is nothing on fisheries or on guano. There are some good pages on Potosí, but there is no specific chapter on environmental mining conflicts, certainly a great theme of Andean ecological-economic history. Thus the book is not yet “the” environmental history of the central Andes, but it contains some very good materials and ideas towards such a enterprise. Indeed, Gade does not present the book as environmental history but as historical cultural geography or cultural historical ecology, with emphasis on “culture.” Its main purpose is to forward our understanding of Andean identity, although there is nothing in the book on historical and geographical sociolinguistics, surely an important issue for identity. The quest for a cultural identity rests on the symbolic force of natural, agricultural, and “processed” objects, such as chicha and guinea pigs, chuno and coca, the spectacled bear and the mountain tapir, the chaquitaclla (foot plough) and the poncho, the potato, the maca and the quinoa. This book is a well-written introduction to the environmental history of the central Andes, more valuable than a textbook, because it is written to reflect the author’s personal well-informed search for the essence of lo andino.

Cite this work

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 21 citations exist upstream.