Participation Type
Paper
Presentation #1 Title
Mountains and Cities in World History
Presentation #1 Abstract or Summary
The 42nd Annual Appalachian Studies Conference looks “at the larger region of Appalachia through the experiences of our cities and financial centers”, by exploring “the tensions around maintaining sustainable urban development alongside rural culture and history”. I am a historian interested in long-term developments, and the main focus in my research are mountain regions in Europe, and to a certain extent, on other continents. I would like to use this background to present some aspects of the mountain-urban-connections in world history. The paper starts with a look at global statistics relating to the present time. Then we turn to three continents and their history in the last five hundred years: Europe (on the example of the Alps and their surroundings), Latin America (with the Andean civilization); and Southeast Asia (on the controversial debate about the upland region Zomia). This brief overview suggests that there were many urban-mountain-configurations in world history. The variety defies easy generalization, yet the urban centers emerge as important economic and cultural factors in all cases. The cities were significant even when they were not present in a particular region in conspicuous numbers and sizes.
At-A-Glance Bio- Presenter #1
Jon Mathieu earned his doctorate in history and his habilitation at the University of Berne. He taught in Switzerland and abroad, and directed historical and interdisciplinary projects. The main focus of his research concerns mountain regions in Europe and other continents. He was the founding director of the Institute of the History of the Alps at the University of Ticino 2000 to 2005, and co-editor of the multilingual journal Histoire des Alpes – Storia delle Alpi – Geschichte der Alpen. From 2006, he was professor of modern history at the University of Lucerne and lecturer in environmental history at the ETH Zurich. He held positions in academic institutions such as the International Human Dimensions Programme on Global Environmental Change (member of Swiss commitee) and the Swiss National Science Foundation (member of the Research Council). Jon Mathieu was awarded prizes, including the King Albert I. Mountain Award 2008. His latest single-authored books on mountain regions in English are: The Third Dimension. A Comparative History of Mountains in the Modern Era (Cambridge: The White Horse Press, 2011) and The Alps. An Environmental History (Oxford: Polity Press, 2019). The second focus of Mathieu’s research concerns the history of family and kinship. Since May 2018, he is an emeritus, and has embarked on new research and publication projects.
Mountains and Cities in World History
The 42nd Annual Appalachian Studies Conference looks “at the larger region of Appalachia through the experiences of our cities and financial centers”, by exploring “the tensions around maintaining sustainable urban development alongside rural culture and history”. I am a historian interested in long-term developments, and the main focus in my research are mountain regions in Europe, and to a certain extent, on other continents. I would like to use this background to present some aspects of the mountain-urban-connections in world history. The paper starts with a look at global statistics relating to the present time. Then we turn to three continents and their history in the last five hundred years: Europe (on the example of the Alps and their surroundings), Latin America (with the Andean civilization); and Southeast Asia (on the controversial debate about the upland region Zomia). This brief overview suggests that there were many urban-mountain-configurations in world history. The variety defies easy generalization, yet the urban centers emerge as important economic and cultural factors in all cases. The cities were significant even when they were not present in a particular region in conspicuous numbers and sizes.
