Becoming Wilderness
A Topological Study of Tarangire National Park, Tanzania 1890-2004



By Camill Arlin
December 2011
Stockholm University Press
Distributed by
ISBN: 9789186071691
226 pages, Illustrated
$87.50 Paper original

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Based on field and archival research, Becoming Wilderness analyses the fluid constructs of game preservation and their effect within networks and landscapes on the west of Tarangire National Park from the late 19th Century until the present. History writing on African protected areas often argues that these spaces constitute an imperial imposition of wilderness. This thesis queries the notion of an "imposition of wilderness" and suggests that vast tracts of Tanzania's protected areas have in fact gradually become wilderness within heterogeneous networks, rotting themselves in ways that are far more tricky to oppose than had they suddenly been imposed. Through a topological investigation, it shows Tarangire's transformation from peripheral to central end the simultaneous transformation of peopled landscapes from centres to borderlands. As such it is a contribution to the understanding of root causes of conservation vs. People conflicts existing today.

Stockholm Studies in Human Geography No. 21

 

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