Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
cities in Southern Europe had an ef
cient water supply and existing systems were
subject to poor operating conditions. Moreover, this public involvement was not
always put in practice in France or in the United States, and nowadays questions of
public management of water supply systems are still a topic of local political
debates. The problem moved, after 1945, in the postcolonial world and in Latin
America. Lastly, water was seen in the twentieth century as a resource which had to
be exploited to provide the human beings a better future: water-diversion projects
appealed to political authorities. Environmental history of former authoritarian
regimes, where archives recently became available (former Communist European
countries) reveal how hydraulic projects, embodied by gigantic dams and reser-
voirs, were used to af
rm the prestige of the State. Control of nature was thus an
expression of political power. It also created networks of specialists (engineers,
scientists), who contributed to
rst environmental criticisms, in the absence of any
grassroots movement.
Legends, storytelling, songs and many other cultural facts were attached to some
waterscapes, mainly wetlands and rivers. The Ganges continues to be important in
Hinduism. In the Topic of Genesis, in Greek Mythology, rivers structure the
landscape and many myths and stories explore the healing or evil dimensions of
water. Rivers have often been idealized in literature and the visual arts, for instance
in Russia with references to
”
(Mississippi).
39
The Rhine was also important for German conservationists and
nationalists; a Nazi of
“
”
“
Mother Volga
and in the USA to
Old Man River
of
the nation. Water resources protection in the Rhine valley became also a grounding
issue for the modern ecological movement. The folklore surrounding water is
extremely rich, from the huge rivers just mentioned above, to little ponds or
fountains that were linked with faeries, witches or healing waters. In the nineteenth
century, hundreds of artists painted panoramas of rivers, ponds, or seashores.
Riverscapes presented Romantic features such as waterfalls and gorges (especially
the Middle Rhine). What is interesting to be noticed is that in the twentieth century,
stereotypes about water resources, like rivers, were used both by conservationists
and developers: in Germany, each side drew on Romantic imagery of German
rivers and on the tourist potential of the river they had in mind (
cial referred to it in 1941 as the
“
pulsating life
'
s vessel
”
“
natural environ-
ment
”
vs arti
cial lakes created for hydroelectricity) to support their respective
positions.
Within the different civilizations, the perception of water evolved across cen-
turies. In the Western world, during the Early Modern Period, cleanliness was
provided by the change of clothing and the whiteness of clothes, rather than by
bathing and using water to clean the body. Then, the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries drastically changed the human relationship to water resources: hygienists
pointed out the necessity to provide pure water to human bodies in order to avoid
diseases; the rise of mandatory schooling, home economics classes and enrollment
39
Some cultural studies can be read in Mauch and Zeller (
2009
).
