ABSTRACT
This chapter sets the stage for an understanding that the places that compose the Niger Delta are products of ongoing sociohistorical processes. The human dimension of the process of landscape transformation was largely indigenous in pre-colonial times. However, the logic and trajectory of the dynamics of change encountered an extremely opposing logic and culture with the onset of colonialism, and, more important for us, oil capitalism. Both local communities and global capitalists have struggled to construct and use the environment in ways that each deemed beneficial. For this reason, the chapter attempts to explore the dynamic relationship between cultures and nature in time. It describes the social construction of the larger Niger Delta region. Many books on the Niger Delta, and the Ogoni, fail to delineate the dynamic relationship between nature and culture. As a result, how human culture shapes biodiversity and the transformation of the Niger Delta landscape is left hidden.
