Hunter Cowles                                                                                               250 words

INTD: Science Writing

In William Cronan’s article, “The Trouble with Wilderness,” Cronan constantly criticized the fact that a vast majority of our protected land (places such as national parks and wildlife reserves) are  actually stolen land from the Native Americans. Cronan said “The movements to set aside national parks and wilderness areas followed hard on the heels of the final Indian Wars, in which the prior human inhabitants were rounded up and moved onto a reservation”.Cronan felt it is unfair that we get to decide what happens with this land  since it wasn’t even ours to begin with.  Cronan would most likely have a very similar opinion towards our own campus since it was Native American  territory. Although our campus wouldn’t be categorized as the “complete wilderness”  that Cronan refers to several times in his article, a lot of the concepts are transferrable. The idea that the ivy on the Sturges Hall walls is constantly manicured and maintained , ties into Cronan’s beliefs that there is nothing natural about modern society’s perception of wilderness. Much like the national parks mentioned in Cronan’s article, our campus is also built on land stolen from the natives. Most people fail to realize what a significant impact Native American culture has on Geneseo.Cronan would most likely conclude that people are as destructive to the planet as we are to one another. Personally, I agree with Cronan since we have destroyed Native American culture by stealing their land and way of life.