This book examines how ideas about place and space have been transformed
in recent decades. It offers a unique understanding of the ways in which
postcolonial writers have contested views of place as fixed and
unchanging and are remapping conceptions of world geography, with
chapters on cartography, botany and gardens, spice, ecologies, animals
and zoos, and cities, as well as reference to the importance of
archaeology and travel in such debates. Writers whose work receives
detailed attention include Amitav Ghosh, Derek Walcott, Jamaica Kincaid,
Salman Rushdie, Michael Ondaatje and Robert Kroetsch. Challenging both
older colonial and more recent global constructions of place, the book
argues for an environmental politics that is attentive to the concerns
of disadvantaged peoples, animal rights and ecological issues. Its range
and insights make it essential reading for anyone interested in the
changing physical and human geography of the contemporary world.