Removing Mountains: Extracting Nature and Identity in the Appalachian Coalfields

(Paperback)

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Description

A coal mining technique practiced in southern West Virginia known as mountaintop removal is drastically altering the terrain of the Appalachian Mountains. Peaks are flattened and valleys are filled as the coal industry levels thousands of acres of forest to access the coal, in the process turning the forest into scrubby shrublands and poisoning the water. This is dangerous and environmentally devastating work, but as Rebecca R. Scott argues in Removing Mountains, the issues at play are vastly complicated.

Reviews

"Rebecca R. Scott takes us into the coalfields, mining the cultural poetics that give rise to conflicts over the meaning and significance of this disturbing technology. Her careful excavations reveal the roles that gender, race, and class play in shaping peoples sense of belonging both in their local environments and in the larger modern world. These are deepand sometimes deeply contradictorycultural processes that are all but invisible to those content to stay on the surface. Scott strips away the easy answers and finds hard questions underneath." Matt Wray, Temple University

Author Bio

Rebecca R. Scott is assistant professor of sociology at the University of Missouri.