| The Galapagos Islands are often referred to as a "natural laboratory" or "evolutionary Eden"---one of the world's few remaining bastions of "pristine" nature. Yet the images such depictions evoke stand in stark contrast to recent declarations of a crisis brought on by increases in tourism, migration, and invasive species that threaten the archipelago's unusual biodiversity and the very isolation that allowed for its evolution. In popular presentations, this crisis is framed as a classic battle of Man against Nature. However, drawing on research conducted in the islands over the past three summers, I challenge such framings of the crisis, arguing that frameworks that purify Nature and Culture are not only poor descriptions of the current crisis in the Galapagos Islands, but are themselves productive of the crisis. |
