Study of rivers requires far more attention than generally given

Sharing our new section on Water – The study of rivers requires far more attention than has generally been given by historians or social scientists. Greetings from Pangsau. Pangsau is a blog run by few students as a collective effort to understand India’s North-East from diverse perspectives. On this Environment Day, we have started with a new section on Water and in our inaugural feature, Professor Leonard Andaya from University of Hawaii at Manoa speaks to Suraj Gogoi, one of our editors on the importance of a “water perspective” in writing histories of Southeast and South Asia. Link and excerpt from the article are mentioned below.
We will be delighted to receive your feedback on our initiative.
Excerpts – “Water is a very scarce resource, one that we really have to preserve. Yet this realisation hasn’t hit many people. The reason is that most of us approach any study from the land, seeing water as contributing to the land in various ways or serving people as a transport surface or a source of food and exotic products. Little thought is given to water as a focus of investigation in its own right. Rivers, for example, are seen as valuable in connecting communities, for hydropower, and for fish. What environmental studies have done is to reveal the importance of rivers and other forms of water to the earth and to humans. By studying the complexity of these natural elements, the environmentalists have encouraged those in the humanities and social sciences to look more closely at water. They have shown, for example, how a drop in the level of a river could have a severe impact on organisms and biota that depend on the river’s equilibrium. The reason is that the “river” is more than just the surface flow of water but incorporates the subterranean layers of water, as well as all the organisms that are part of the river system.”
(On behalf of Pangsau Collective)
Link – https://pangsau.com/2018/06/05/talking-water/
Parag Jyoti Saikia
Faculty, Access Academy
Asian University for Women
20/A M.M. Ali Road
Chittagong 4000
Bangladesh._
Posted by: Parag Jyoti Saikia <meandering1800@gmail.com>
– [WaterWatch] <WaterWatch@yahoogroups.com>