Colonialism and Landscape in the Americas: Material/Conceptual Transformations and Continuing Consequences

Abstract

Despite a congenital relationship between colonization and geographic scholarship, and despite the significance of colonial landscape transformation to current social and environmental challenges, a comprehensive geographic theory of colonialism and landscape remains incipient at best. In this article, a historical sketch provides some basic perspective on the scope appropriate to such a theory by outlining how the goals of scholarship on colonial landscape transformation have changed over the last century in relation to social and environmental context. The subsequent analysis compares and contrasts prior and existing conceptualizations of colonialism and landscape, each emphasizing particular elements and relationships at the expense of others but all thus jointly delineating what a more comprehensive framework must include. That analysis provides a preliminary basis for elaborating a comprehensive geographic theory of colonialism and landscape with an immediate focus on the Americas.