Nature Shock: Getting Lost in America (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9780300227147)

An award-winning environmental historian explores American history through wrenching, tragic, and sometimes humorous stories of getting lost

"Fascinating. . . . Underlying . . . is a deep belief in the importance of collaboration and cooperation between humans and their environments, as well as between humans and other humans."--Robert Macfarlane, New York Review of Books

The human species has a propensity for getting lost. The American people, inhabiting a mental landscape shaped by their attempts to plant roots and to break free, are no exception. In this engaging book, environmental historian Jon Coleman bypasses the trailblazers so often described in American history to follow instead the strays and drifters who went missing.

From Hernando de Soto's failed quest for riches in the American southeast to the recent trend of getting lost as a therapeutic escape from modernity, this book details a unique history of location and movement as well as the confrontations that occur when our physical and mental conceptions of space become disjointed. Whether we get lost in the woods, the plains, or the digital grid, Coleman argues that getting lost allows us to see wilderness anew and connect with generations across five centuries to discover a surprising and edgy American identity.

Author: Jon T. Coleman
ISBN-10: 0300227140
ISBN-13: 9780300227147
Publisher: Yale University Press
Language: English
Published: 08/12/2020
Pages: 360
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 1.41lbs
Size: 9.30h x 6.30w x 1.10d

Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 06/15/2020
Publishers Weekly 06/22/2020