Carson Fellow Robert Gioelli highlights how central city residents in the United States dealt with increasing environmental problems in the 1960s and 1970s. He focuses on three case studies—St. Louis, Chicago, and Baltimore—in order to determine how urban renewal plans and highway development shaped the lives and environmental understanding of the residents, who were often minorities. Robert Gioelli is a historian of the modern United States with a specific interest in how the perception and experience of the urban environment has shaped social movements, politics, and policy.

The transition from socialism to post-socialism has affected many aspects of life in Eastern Europe. By using anthropological participant-observer methodologies, Carson Fellow Stefan Dorondel looks at how this shift impacted land use in these regions; he considers both how people change in relation to the landscape and vice versa. Stefan Dorondel is an anthropologist interested in post-socialist land tenure systems and in land use change.

Climate had a key role in shaping the settlement and development of the West in the United States, according to Carson Fellow Lawrence Culver. By using historical sources, including government land surveys and travel accounts from settlers, Culver demonstrates the important role climate played for both survival and profit in the westward expansion process. Lawrence Culver is an associate professor in the Department of History at Utah State University, where his areas of research and teaching include the cultural, environmental, and urban history of the USA.

Carson Fellow Gijs Mom describes his work on the automobile, which he sees as a vehicle for understanding how people in the early twentieth century both perceived and conquered nature. Mom relies on sources such as literature and films to determine how the car was driven and how driving changed the way that people experienced nature. Gijs Mom is a historian of technology, teaching and researching at Eindhoven University of Technology as Program Director for Mobility History.

Visit the RCC virtually! Shot in Munich, this film outlines the goals of the Rachel Carson Center for Environment and Society, highlights the research of the international Carson Fellows, profiles different types of events, and introduces the Center’s digital Environment & Society Portal.

Climate had a key role in shaping the settlement and development of the West in the United States, according to Carson Fellow Lawrence Culver. By using historical sources, including government land surveys and travel accounts from settlers, Culver demonstrates the important role climate played for both survival and profit in the westward expansion process. Lawrence Culver is an associate professor in the Department of History at Utah State University, where his areas of research and teaching include the cultural, environmental, and urban history of the USA.

The intersection between neuroscience and history frames Carson Fellow Edmund P. Russell’s research project. Russell looks as the role of functional magnetic resonance imagining (FMRI) in historical research, especially with regard to its effect on human understanding of different types of environments. Edmund P. Russell is an associate professor at the Department of Science, Technology, and Society and the Department of History at the University of Virginia. His research focuses on environmental history and the history of technology.

In a unique approach to exploring transformations in land use, Carson Fellow Anne Milne uses poetry from the laboring class in eighteenth century Britain to understand different perceptions of nature during this era. These poets were often described as “natural geniuses.” Milne considers how nature figured in the representation of these poets as individuals; her work also aims to track changes in land use. Anne Milne is an ecocritic who specializes in restoration and eighteenth-century British literature. She currently teaches in the Bachelor of Arts and Sciences Program at the University of Guelph, Canada.

How have US American ideas about nature conservation influenced the conception of nature in China? Carson Fellow Hou Shen bases her research around the nature writings of three well-known American writers—Henry David Thoreau, Aldo Leopold, and Rachel Carson—in order to demonstrate how the idea of preserving nature for humans and for other species has been interpreted and transformed in Chinese culture. Hou Shen is currently an assistant professor at the history department of the Renmin University of China in Beijing. She explores the introduction, reception, and transformation of American ideas of nature conservation and its practices in China.

Carson Fellow Lajos Rácz explains the importance of climate history for the overall history of early modern Hungary. Documented climate data has only been in existence since the nineteenth century; therefore, Rácz reconstructs the pre-nineteenth century Hungarian climate from primary sources like diaries and letters. He uses such historical climate data in order to analyze how climate impacted the manner of everyday life during this era. Lajos Rácz is a professor at Szeged University and a visiting professor at Central European University, Budapest. He has specialized in climate and environmental history research since 1985.