Mary Hufford

Water, earth, and fire: Land use and environmental planning in the New Jersey Pine Barrens

Each major chapter in this land-use planning case study begins with an introductory overview of the historical and ecological context of land-use patterns and the resources on which people depend. Juxtaposed with these scientific analyses is a series of profiles of area residents and their view of the Pine Barrens. The concluding chapters present recommendations designed to help develop a regional plan for the area.

Carnival time in the Kingdom of Coal

This essay examines the ideas of carnival and the carnivalesque in relation to a modern social formation, which, cued by the name of its central figure, is referred to in this article as the Kingdom of Coal. Conjured incessantly from disjunct social perspectives on fossil fuel extraction and energy production, the Kingdom of Coal offers a grounded example of what Charles Taylor terms the ‘modern social imaginary’. Carnivalesque maskings and unmaskings dramatize a struggle for publicly relevant subjectivity in the United States. Social bodies constructed through such carnivalesque tropes as the grotesque body, the slaying of the king, and (ecologically) gay materiality articulate profoundly different stakes across class lines. Emulating the public space needed for critical reflection on such imaginaries, this essay experimentally brings into dialogue voices kept rigidly separated in channels of environmental decision-making and the national media. Mikhail Bakhtins concepts of monologic and dialogic modes of communication, and the related concepts of classical and grotesque bodies and ecologies, drawn from his theorizing of carnival, are key.

Thresholds to an Alternate Realm

Folklorists tend to study cultures and communities by paying close attention to stylized genres or traditional expressive behaviors. In recent decades as the emphasis in the field of folklore has shifted from studies that are text centered to studies that are more context oriented, a number of folklorists have turned their attention to the interrelations of tradition and environment. Of all genres attached to places, narratives and place names traditionally have drawn the most attention from folklorists. In particular, folklorists have long sensed a deep connection between legendry and topography (Dorson, 1971) and have undertaken studies of migratory legends, and the role of physical settings, in nurturing narrative traditions (Honko, 1981; Moss, 1983). Gradually the collection and study of folklore as static migratory items has developed into the investigation of the reciprocity between traditional genres and their settings (Allen, 1990). Folklore, which “vivifies place” is seen to be inspired and reinforced by distinctive physical features in the local setting (Moss, 1983). Lauri Honko notes that when “milieu dominants” as he calls such features, are constituted as places, their names become a powerful means of perpetuating local tradition (Cochrane, 1987; Honko, 1981). Other scholars have explored ways in which communities use traditional materials both to enhance their sense of belonging within a locale or region and to distinguish themselves from outsiders (Jones, 1976).