Among the most productive ecosystems on earth, wetlands are also some of the most vulnerable. Australian Wetland Cultures argues for the cultural value of wetlands. Through a focus on swamps and their conservation, the volume makes a unique contribution to the growing interdisciplinary field of the environmental humanities. The authors investigate the crucial role of swamps in Australian society through the idea of wetland cultures. The broad historical and cultural range of the book spans pre-settlement indigenous Australian cultures, nineteenth-century European colonization, and contemporary Australian engagements with wetland habitats. The contributors situate the Australian emphasis in international cultural and ecological contexts. Case studies from Perth, Western Australia, provide practical examples of the conservation of wetlands as sites of interlinked natural and cultural heritage. The volume will appeal to readers with interests in anthropology, Australian studies, cultural studies, ecological science, environmental studies, and heritage protection.
List of Figures Acknowledgments Credits Pt I Australian Wetland Cultures The Swamp Nandi Chinna Racecourse Lagoon, Uralla, New South Wales John C. Ryan Ch 1 Introduction to Australian Wetland Humanities: Thinking About (and With) Swamps John Charles Ryan and Li Chen Ch 2 Rainbow Serpent Anthropology, or Rainbow Spirit Theology, or Swamp Serpent Sacrality and Marsh Monster Maternity? Rod Giblett Ch 3 Artist and Swamp: Wetlands in Australian Painting and Photography Rod Giblett Ch 4 Poet and Swamp: Wetlands in Australian Verse John Charles Ryan Ch 5 Plant and Swamp: The Biocultural Histories of Five Australian Hydrophytes John Charles Ryan Pt II Western Australian Wetland Cultures Beeliar Nandi Chinna Three Wetland Poems by John Kinsella, Dedicated to J.P. Quinton Poem for the Gathering The Trees Along Bibra Lake Resisting from Within the Green Tent at Bibra Drive, Beeliar (For James) Ch 6 Environmental Activism and Wetlands Conservation in Western Australia Philip Jennings Ch 7 Where Fanny Balbuk Walked: Reenvisioning Perth's Wetlands John Charles Ryan, Danielle Brady, and Christopher Kueh Ch 8 The Cultural Significance of Wetlands: Perth's Lost Swamps to the Beeliar Wetlands Danielle Brady and Jeffrey Murray Ch 9 Swamp-philia and Paludal Heroism: The Passion of Wetland Conservationists in Australia and Elsewhere John Charles Ryan and Li Chen Power of Deluge Glen Phillips Ch 10 Epilogue: Twenty-Five Years of Wetland Studies in the Humanities Rod Giblett About the Contributors
