ABSTRACT
The climate conference, entitled The Atmosphere: Endangered and Endangering, took place at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, Research Triangle Park, North Carolina in April 1975. Margaret Mead appears to have been the only anthropologist at the conference and perhaps the only social scientist as well, in a meeting that was largely attended by physical and natural scientists and public health experts. Some of the work done in historical ecology also has served as a precursor to the anthropology of climate change. The School of American Research in Santa Fe held an advanced seminar on historical ecology in October 1990. This chapter includes the Historical Ecology that resulted from the seminar touches on topics related to climate change. Archaeologist Carol Crumley, for example, defines historical ecology as the practice of globally relevant archaeology, ethnohistory, ethnography, and related disciplines. A small group of climate anthropologists have also functioned as precursors of the anthropology of climate change.
