Chapter 7 - Desert, Island, Ocean, Swamp

Summary

This chapter explores the role of environmental change and the emergence of ecocritical critique in Asian American literatures from 1930 to 1965. From the development of industrialized agriculture to the deployment of military technologies like the atomic bomb and Agent Orange, the environmental changes wrought by technological advances in war, commerce, and communication during this period played a key role in driving and directing migrations within and across the Pacific both in this era and in the decades to come. By considering the roles that terraqueous environments and ecologies have played in shaping critical debates over nation, empire, and race, this chapter posits that an ecocritical approach to Asian American studies can demonstrate how mid-twentieth-century attitudes toward the regulation and legislation of US land and sea territories reflects or refracts implicit beliefs about the state of nature, the natural boundary of the state, and who (or what) might belong within it.