The Contributions of the Sino-European Survey Expeditions to the Understanding of the Environmental History of Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia
Type
fundamental research project
Start Date
June 1, 2006
End Date
November 1, 2007
Status
completed
Keywords
- Environmental history
History of cartography
History of cartography
history of geography
science policy
travels and exploration
scientific expeditions
environmental history
climate change
Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia (China
1912-1949)
Chinese Central Asia
Description
This project is concerned with the cartographic fieldwork conducted between the two world wars, and the ways in which the humanities and geosciences have contributed to the study of Central Asia. To comprehend how archeologists, historians, geographers and cartographers have influenced the development of theories on "the geographical pivot of history," we will propose an account of a remarkable expedition that explored the Gobi desert. The environment of the Gobi, the second largest desert in the world, has changed so dramatically since the Cretaceous period that the previously subtropical region is now experiencing the most continental climate in the Old World. Formed in this region every spring, giant sandstorms hit northern China and close the airports of Korea and Japan. Dust from the dry lakes of Edsin-gol even color the Californian sky. What NASA has called the most degraded landscape on Earth used to be the natural environment of the flourishing oases of the Silk Road. Agriculture was practiced there 2000 years ago but mysteriously disappeared after the 15th century. Mapping what happened to the oases, rivers and terminal lakes at the foot of the snow-clad Qilianshan Mountains would help understand how local communities adjusted to life-threatening changes.
Leader contributor(s)
Forêt, Philippe
Partner(s)
Institute of Cartography, ETH Zurich, Gerda Henkel Foundation, Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study, Institute of Archaeology, University College London
Funder
Topic(s)
History of cartography
history of geography
science policy
travels and exploration
scientific expeditions
environmental history
climate change
Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia (China
1912-1949)
Chinese Central Asia
Method(s)
Archival research
analysis of visual records
fieldwork techniques in geography
Range
Institute/School
Range (De)
Institut/School
Principal
Philippe Forêt
Eprints ID
215239
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Item type:Publication, The role of Central Asia in the discovery of global warming(2009-11-11)The review of precise field maps and photographs should help me reconstruct not only the environmental and cultural history of Central Asia, but also the scholarly debate on climate that occurred during the first three decades of last century. I will very specifically investigate expedition reports because these publications exemplify the methodological guidelines enforced by the scholarly community. I will indeed argue that Stein's Explorations in Turkestan or Hedin's Sino-Swedish "Scientific Expedition to the North-western Provinces of China" provide a useful framework to analyze the first debate on global warming.Type:presentation - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
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Item type:Publication, Lost in the desert: seven years of trans-disciplinary work in the Gobi(2006-11-23)Type:presentation - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
Item type:Publication, Les frontières du Central Asia Atlas de Sven Hedin : Un exemple de dilemne politiqueType:journal articleJournal:Le Monde des CartesIssue:187 - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
Item type:Publication, Is the Earth drying up? : The enigma that survey expeditions to Chinese Central Asia tried to solve(2007-10-26)Geographers begun to probe new theories on climate change at the turn of the 20th century. In this paper I will explain how the concept of global warming was discussed and proofs of global warming examined well before the early 1960s - this would be the date given by Weart for the discovery of global warming, when an American astrophysicist at the University of Colorado at Boulder noticed that the sky in the Rocky Mountains was no longer as bright as it used to be. Cartography has played a more crucial role in the discovery of global warming than atmospheric chemistry has. I can present here only one example of the significance of cartography: the survey of the western half of China (the two Mongolias, Inner and Outer, the provinces of Gansu and Ningxia, Eastern Turkestan or Xinjiang, and Tibet) that accompanied debates held in London on the desiccation of the Earth.Type:presentation - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
Item type:Publication, The desiccation of the Earth : The climate change that the survey expeditions in Chinese Central Asia mapped from the 1900's to the 1930's(2007-08-04)The exact meaning given to the cartographical information collected on Central Eurasia just after Halford J. Mackinder called the region the "geographical pivot of world history" is fascinating because it forces us to reconsider the role played by maps in the development of climate and environmental studies. I am especially interested in seeing how Pyotr Kropotkin's theory on climate change, which the Royal Geographical Society of London vigorously debated in 1904 and 1914, was validated by the map-based study of the relief and climate of Chinese Central Asia. Kropotkin believed he had found in its receding lakes and growingly arid landscape evidence to support "the Desiccation of Eur-Asia." More attention should thus be granted to the cartographic work done by Europeans in Mongolia and Turkestan (the provinces of Inner and Outer Mongolia, Ningxia, Gansu and Xinjiang) during the first three decades of the 20th century. This paper, which will retrace the history of the survey of the region, will illustrate, update and thematize the chronological account that Erik Norin gave in Vol. 48 of the Sino-Swedish Expedition. I will attempt to: 1. Describe the various expeditions sent to comprehensively map the terrain and document the environmental history of the region, 2. Explain how maps led the contemporary debate on climate change, and how they were read by the preeminent geographers of the time (Kropotkin, Huntington, Hedin, and Gregory, especially), 3. Ascribe a cause to the discrepancy I have noticed between assumptions on climate, the topographical observations made in situ, and the resulting maps and atlases, 4. And conclude on the importance of positioning any cartographic enterprise within its historical context. My conclusion would amplify Chris Perkins' observations in his seminal "Cartography - Cultures of mapping: power in practice" article (Progress in Human Geography 28-3). I hope this topic will generate a discussion on the rich interaction we have seen between mapping activities, scientific objectives, and political agendas. My paper may also be seen as a prelude to the history, not yet fully written, of the Chinese, Soviet and Sino-Soviet expeditions that explored the whole of Central Asia.Type:presentation - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
Item type:Publication, The books of the Black CityIn May 1909, a group of horsemen were seeking shelter as a violent sandstorm blocked out the skies above the Gobi desert. Colonel Pyotr Kuzmich Kozlov and his cossacks entered the ruins of Karakoto, the Black City. The Russian officer noted in his journal that it was here, in 1209, that an entire garrison had committed suicide by slitting their throats while the city was not even under siege. What explanation can there be for this mass suicide? As he was contemplating this question, his men drew him from his thoughts: in a corner tower they had found some books that they wanted to use to make a fire. Kozlov examined them and managed to make out some of the archaic writing of the Tanguts who were wiped out by Genghis Khan. The following morning, they discovered thousands of books that described in great detail the long agony of the city.Type:newspaper articleJournal:A Book of Unspeakable ThingsIssue:1 - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
Item type:Publication, Gobi desertSeveral entries ("Gobi desert," "Ellsworth Huntington," "Lop Nor," "Tianshan Mountains") in The Encyclopedia of World Geography, by Robert W. McColl, ed., Golson Books, 2005.Type:book sectionJournal:The Encyclopedia of World GeographyVolume:Volume 1 - Some of the metrics are blocked by yourconsent settings
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