Distorted History: Understanding Environmental Collapse

1. HONR 229L: Climate Change: Science, Economics, and Governance Prologue and The Maya Your name here 5 September 2019

2. Great if you can lead a discussion of the prologue, even though this was not covered on the Admission Ticket for today’s class meeting. The prologue works in a theme that history is often distorted by the bias of those who tell the story. a) lead a class discussion of examples of history being distorted by those who tell the story (i.e., ask the students to address this in their own words) b) then relate your impression of how this theme of the prologue works in the real world. Best IMHO if you use bulleted phrases (fine to use sub-bullets), with a graphic or two.

3. The prologue states “eventually, I arrived at a five-point framework of possible contributing factors that I now consider in trying to understand any putative environmental collapse”. Please prepare a slide (or two) that lists these five-points, and contains a phrase or two under each of the points explaining how it will be used in the book Here, IMHO, you can revert to lecture mode rather than discussion lead mode. But proceed as you see fit!

4. The prologue works states “climate change was even more of a problem for past societies … than it is today”. Maybe ask the class for examples, then summarize the reasons Diamond states this is the case.

5. Please address using bulleted phrases, organized as you see fit, the main points Jared Diamond conveyed about The Maya in this chapter (i.e., first question of the Admission Ticket) In other words, what was the chapter about ?!? Feel free to use illustrations, either from the book, included here for convenience or from another source. If from another source, please use attribution to the website. And … try your best to do this in “discussion lead” mode rather than “lecture mode”: i.e., can survey the class for their views of the high level story of the chapter, before giving your own view.

6. If you’d like, fine to also work your way through the other Admission Ticket questions, such as the main point Diamond is trying to convey about the fall of the Maya in this chapter (second admission ticket question)

7. Consider also addressing using bulleted phrases organized as you see fit, a discussion about something new you learned upon reading this chapter (admission ticket question 3). Be specific if you can … i.e., nearly all of us have heard of the Maya, but what about the Maya was new to you upon reading this chapter? Again, try your best to engage the class in a discussion 

8. Finally, can lead a discussion about how the history of the Maya may be applicable to the situation faced in the future by the world’s population, with respect to global warming (last admission ticket question) Hint: climate change will likely lead to variations in precipitation patterns! When food production gets scarce, people get unhappy.

9. Feel free to alter, ad lib, change in any way you’d like provided the topic is about the Maya and the material mainly draws upon the reading. You have 45 mins to use as you see fit! Use the maps and figures as you see fit. If you don’t use, you are welcome to delete from the PPT file you provide. And, you can almost certainly easily find better, color figures on line. Good luck!