The Mississippi River Anthropological Analysis

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The Mississippi River is largely a tool for human comfort and consumption. It’s natural processes are used to create wealth in a capitalist market. Americans have “made the Mississippi” over and over again through hydraulic alteration, geologic alteration and even firstly, with social alterations since the land was first colonized. The ancient water corridor was used as a boundary, a separation of land, but soon became a “backbone”, something integral and center to livelihood. The anthropocene notion consists of recognizing these shifts in uses, these rich histories that have been made again and again. Then, the lens of the anthropocene analyzes these themes in a completely different light. It is a lens that recognizes that humans indeed are …show more content…
Collectively these breaks allow for anthropocentric processes such as water reservoirs for communities, recreation areas, flood control for agriculture, and large freight transportation (Romano 117). Programs such as these are now highly threaded into many livelihoods across the United States. The constrainment of the river has built communities where locks and dams lie, they are landmarks of trade and wealth. On this same accord, the anthropocene aesthetic is seen emerging adjacent to these locks and dams in places like Minneapolis. The previous industrial riverside architecture and infrastructure from flour milling has been revolutionized into an artistic and public space. Here, citizens walk over the Mississippi on the Stone Arch Bridge, outlooking St. Anthony Falls where previously wealth driven infrastructure, is now repurposed as a beautiful physical history fastened in time. Not only lock and dam No. 1, but throughout the Mississippi, lie 26 opportunities for the symbol of the new anthropocene epoch to be carried out as post industrial park typology (Tucker s. 89, …show more content…
As he speaks to the driftwood making its way to the shores of Africa, we can further read into how the Mississippi has deep ties to the lives of so many not native to this continent. The era of slavery is rooted to plantations adjacent to the Mississippi. Today as systemic racism still persists in our American society it is often tied to environmental displacement. Rob Nixon illustrates this in his book Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor, “the violence wrought by climate change, toxic drift, deforestation, oil spills, and the environmental aftermath of war takes place gradually and often invisibly. Slow violence exacerbates the vulnerability of ecosystems and of people who are poor, disempowered, and often involuntarily displaced, while fueling social conflicts that arise from desperation as life-sustaining conditions erode” (Tucker s. 31, 2018). Here lies an entirely new opportunity for the river to become a space for societal progress we move into the “fourth river” What kinds of stories can be written for those who deserve them
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