{"id":{"repo_id":"uiuc","oai_identifier":"oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/92751"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/uiuc/oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/92751","repository":{"repo_id":"uiuc","name":"University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign","base_url":"https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh"},"display":{"title":"The rhetoric of ecological restoration: Ethnography in the Cook County Forest Preserves","abstract":"This research is an exploration of how people socially construct nature through the work of natural resource management. Using participant observation, interviews, and content analysis, I explored the experiences of staff and volunteers in the Cook County Forest Preserves to understand how they experienced and acted upon nature. In the first part, I look at how participants talked about naturalness and the contexts in which these definitions were invoked. My conclusions were that although ecological restoration requires massive human involvement in nature, it does not necessarily remove the nature-culture divide, and that naturalness is a political term applied to desirable pieces of material nature to serve desired ends. In the second part, I looked at knowledge production and the unique ways practitioners in the Cook County Forest Preserves engaged in both scientific and experiential forms of knowledge production. Practitioners used notions of science to gain validity while also disavowing the constraints of scientific methods when managing sites. I theorized that this was in part due to the incompatibility between science which seeks general principles and management which seeks site-specific solutions. I argue for a situated and reflexive natural resource management practice which makes use of both experiential and scientific modes of knowledge production in decision making.","abstract_html":"This research is an exploration of how people socially construct nature through the work of natural resource management. Using participant observation, interviews, and content analysis, I explored the experiences of staff and volunteers in the Cook County Forest Preserves to understand how they experienced and acted upon nature. In the first part, I look at how participants talked about naturalness and the contexts in which these definitions were invoked. My conclusions were that although ecological restoration requires massive human involvement in nature, it does not necessarily remove the nature-culture divide, and that naturalness is a political term applied to desirable pieces of material nature to serve desired ends. In the second part, I looked at knowledge production and the unique ways practitioners in the Cook County Forest Preserves engaged in both scientific and experiential forms of knowledge production. Practitioners used notions of science to gain validity while also disavowing the constraints of scientific methods when managing sites. I theorized that this was in part due to the incompatibility between science which seeks general principles and management which seeks site-specific solutions. I argue for a situated and reflexive natural resource management practice which makes use of both experiential and scientific modes of knowledge production in decision making.","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Evans, Nicole M."],"institution":"University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign","degree_name":"M.S.","degree_level":"Thesis","degree_discipline":"Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Miller, Craig A.","Stewart, William","Gottlieb, Alma","Kuo, Frances"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2016,"date_issued":"2016-11-10T17:50:06Z","date_published":"2016-11-10T17:50:06Z","updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:26:35Z","subjects":["Social construction of Nature","Cook County Forest Preserves","Natural Resource Management","Ethnographic Methods","Human Dimensions of Natural Resource Management","Social Construction of Knowledge"],"languages":["en"],"rights":["Copyright 2016 Nicole M Evans"],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"http://hdl.handle.net/2142/92751","outbound_label":"Handle","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Miller, Craig A.","Stewart, William","Gottlieb, Alma","Kuo, Frances"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Evans, Nicole M."]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date","label":"Dc Date","values":["2016-11-10T17:50:06Z","2016-07-07","2016-08"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["text"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["M.S."]},{"key":"thesis:institution_name","label":"Thesis Institution Name","values":["University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["Social construction of Nature","Cook County Forest Preserves","Natural Resource Management","Ethnographic Methods","Human Dimensions of Natural Resource Management","Social Construction of Knowledge"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["en"]},{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["Copyright 2016 Nicole M Evans"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["http://hdl.handle.net/2142/92751"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description","label":"Description","values":["This research is an exploration of how people socially construct nature through the work of natural resource management. Using participant observation, interviews, and content analysis, I explored the experiences of staff and volunteers in the Cook County Forest Preserves to understand how they experienced and acted upon nature. In the first part, I look at how participants talked about naturalness and the contexts in which these definitions were invoked. My conclusions were that although ecological restoration requires massive human involvement in nature, it does not necessarily remove the nature-culture divide, and that naturalness is a political term applied to desirable pieces of material nature to serve desired ends. In the second part, I looked at knowledge production and the unique ways practitioners in the Cook County Forest Preserves engaged in both scientific and experiential forms of knowledge production. Practitioners used notions of science to gain validity while also disavowing the constraints of scientific methods when managing sites. I theorized that this was in part due to the incompatibility between science which seeks general principles and management which seeks site-specific solutions. I argue for a situated and reflexive natural resource management practice which makes use of both experiential and scientific modes of knowledge production in decision making.","Submission original under an indefinite embargo labeled 'Open Access'. The submission was exported from vireo on 2016-11-09 without embargo terms","The student, Nicole Evans, accepted the attached license on 2016-07-05 at 07:56.","The student, Nicole Evans, submitted this Thesis for approval on 2016-07-05 at 08:07.","This Thesis was approved for publication on 2016-07-07 at 08:43.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #9751 on 2016-11-09 at 10:22:43","Made available in DSpace on 2016-11-10T17:50:06Z (GMT). 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Using participant observation, interviews, and content analysis, I explored the experiences of staff and volunteers in the Cook County Forest Preserves to understand how they experienced and acted upon nature. In the first part, I look at how participants talked about naturalness and the contexts in which these definitions were invoked. My conclusions were that although ecological restoration requires massive human involvement in nature, it does not necessarily remove the nature-culture divide, and that naturalness is a political term applied to desirable pieces of material nature to serve desired ends. In the second part, I looked at knowledge production and the unique ways practitioners in the Cook County Forest Preserves engaged in both scientific and experiential forms of knowledge production. Practitioners used notions of science to gain validity while also disavowing the constraints of scientific methods when managing sites. I theorized that this was in part due to the incompatibility between science which seeks general principles and management which seeks site-specific solutions. I argue for a situated and reflexive natural resource management practice which makes use of both experiential and scientific modes of knowledge production in decision making.","Submission original under an indefinite embargo labeled 'Open Access'. The submission was exported from vireo on 2016-11-09 without embargo terms","The student, Nicole Evans, accepted the attached license on 2016-07-05 at 07:56.","The student, Nicole Evans, submitted this Thesis for approval on 2016-07-05 at 08:07.","This Thesis was approved for publication on 2016-07-07 at 08:43.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #9751 on 2016-11-09 at 10:22:43","Made available in DSpace on 2016-11-10T17:50:06Z (GMT). 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