Culture, Technology, and the Creation of America's National Parks

Download or read book Culture, Technology, and the Creation of America's National Parks written by Richard A. Grusin and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2004-04-22 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Richard Grusin's innovative study investigates how the establishment of national parks participated in the production of American national identity after the Civil War. The creation of America's national parks is usually seen as an uncomplicated act of environmental preservation. Grusin argues, instead, that parks must be understood as complex cultural technologies for the reproduction of nature as landscape art. He explores the origins of America's three major parks - Yosemite, Yellowstone, and Grand Canyon--in relation to other forms of landscape representation including photography, mapping, travel writing and fiction.