Grasslands Grown: Creating Place on the U.S. Northern Plains and Canadian Prairies

by Molly P. Rozum

Published by: University of Manitoba Press

Imprint: University of Manitoba Press

Sales Date: 2021-08-01

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CA$34.95
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Published: August 2021

Product Details

Imprint: University of Manitoba Press

Page Count: 504 Pages

Dimensions: 6.00 x 9.00

504 Pages, 6.00 x 9.00 x 1.30 in

Paperback

CA$34.95

ISBN: 9780887559525

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Description
Authors
Contents
Reviews
Awards

In Grasslands Grown Molly P. Rozum explores the two related concepts of regional identity and sense of place by examining a single North American ecological region: the U.S. Great Plains and the Canadian Prairie Provinces. All or parts of modern-day Alberta, Montana, Saskatchewan, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Manitoba form the center of this transnational region.

As children, the first postconquest generation of northern grasslands residents worked, played, and traveled with domestic and wild animals, which introduced them to ecology and shaped sense-of-place rhythms. As adults, members of this generation of settler society worked to adapt to the northern grasslands by practicing both agricultural diversification and environmental conservation.

Rozum argues that environmental awareness, including its ecological and cultural aspects, is key to forming a sense of place and a regional identity. The two concepts overlap and reinforce each other: place is more local, ecological, and emotional-sensual, and region is more ideational, national, and geographic in tone. This captivating study examines the growth of place and regional identities as they took shape within generations and over the life cycle.

Molly P. Rozum is associate professor and Ronald R. Nelson Chair of Great Plains and South Dakota History at the University of South Dakota. She is the coeditor of Equality at the Ballot Box: Votes for Women on the Northern Great Plains and editor of Small-Town Boy, Small-Town Girl: Growing Up in South Dakota, 1920–1950.

List of Illustrations Acknowledgements Introduction: Looking Northwest from La Vérendrye Hill Chapter 1: Parents’ Choice: Taking Root on the Northern Grasslands Chapter 2: Small Worlds: Animal Friends, Foes, and Place Rhythms Chapter 3: Sensing Grasses, Grains, Waters, Woods, Rocks, and Snow Chapter 4: “The Purple Hills Beckoned”: Growing Up, Travel, Education, and Region Chapter 5: “Old Woman Who Never Dies” and “Old Man’s Garden”: Settler and Indigenous Relations Over the Generations Chapter 6: “All is so still—so big, I scarce can speak”: New Literature and Settler Society Aesthetics Chapter 7: “Surely Grass Is the Great Mother of All Plains Agriculture”: Agricultural Adaptation and Grasslands Conservation Chapter 8: “All that Vast Region of Grass Land”: The United States, Canada, and Changing Cultural Geography Conclusion: Looking Across the Line from the Prairies and Plains Notes Bibliography Index

“A subtle, sensitive, and sophisticated transnational history of settler place-making that transforms our understanding of the Great Plains. Grasslands Grown’s exceptional exploration of environment and experience will interest readers everywhere. This brilliant book is a must-read.”
Michael J. Lansing

“Grasslands Grown will become a standard in Great Plains studies. The work is profoundly important.”
Thomas D. Isern

“Rozum artfully presents the different personalities. . . . I can’t think of a book I have read in the last ten years that weaves in so many voices across such disparate, tangible, variegated experiences. Rozum is a lucid, often poetic writer, and her insights into humanity are many.” Susan N. Maher

"The assortment of voices and experiences captured in the text is as vast as the pre-settlement grasslands... Rozum’s book is clear, engaging, and well argued. It deserves a place on the bookshelves of scholars who study settler placemaking, the North American grasslands, the northern borderlands, and the ways the interaction of culture and environment fosters senses of place and regional identity creation." Anthony Carlson, H-Environment

"Rozum opens a useful and provocative discussion about both historic land ownership and land use, as well as cross-border culture... This is a stimulating book." Francis M. Carroll, Prairie History