Suchergebnisse

This paper examines the links between the material and symbolic nature of timber extraction during the Pacific Northwest (PNW) timber wars of the 1980s and 1990s. Applying Durkheim's work on religion and social solidarity, the authors consider a form of logger religion that emerged through many years of PNW timber production, shaping the identities of loggers and timber community dynamics. This paper proposes that forests are spaces that bridge the sacred and profane. Our evaluation examines a totemic meaning assigned to loggers originating from forest-based labour and reinforced by timber communities through rituals. Throughout the timber wars, loggers also developed a conflicted consciousness, stemming from their connection to and the destruction of forests. Given the character of logger religion that existed, the deployment of forest management and community development policies may not adequately re-create tacit relationships between the sacred and profane, previously damaged as a result of the drastic decline in timber production in the PNW.

AbstractAchieving human–carnivore coexistence is a growing challenge in an increasingly crowded world. In many cases, humans are already sharing landscapes with carnivores, but conditions promoting coexistence are not well understood. Coyotes (Canis latrans) are adaptable meso carnivores and their activities increasingly overlap with those of humans in urban environments. Does this overlap constitute coexistence? How do social variables situated within their rightful ecological contexts influence the potential for conflict? In this study, we explore aggregated social and land cover variables contributing to coexistence between humans and coyotes. We surveyed residents in four North Carolina cities on their perceptions, interactions and preferred management actions related to coyotes. We then modeled spatial patterns in urbanite interactions with and perceptions regarding coyotes and investigated how land cover characteristics may correlate with those perceptions. Our results suggest prior interactions and select land cover types may drive human coexistence with coyotes and contribute contextual understanding of urban socio-ecological systems to prevent conflict and effectively promote coexistence. Additional research that expands upon this study and explores spatial as well as temporal dimensions of human–wildlife coexistence is needed in diverse contexts.