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Ruth A. Morgan

Ruth A. Morgan

Ruth A. Morgan is a Lecturer at the National Centre for Australian Studies at Monash University.

Ruth Morgan reviews ‘The Empire of Climate: A history of an idea’ by David N. Livingstone

October 2024, no. 469 • 25 September 2024
The birth seasons of the Democrat and Republican presidential candidates may be one of the few details of the nominees that have escaped close scrutiny in the lead-up to November’s election. Such a neo-Hippocratic political analy-sis might also consider their general body types, genealogies, dispositions, and partners, according to the approach of a 1943 study, Lincoln-Douglas: The weather as de ... (read more)

Ruth A. Morgan reviews 'Slick Water' by Andrew Nikiforuk

March 2016, no. 379 • 25 February 2016
In January 2016, Canadian Jessica Ernst had her day in court. Lawyers for the former oil industry insider debated whether she could sue the Alberta energy regulator over her claim that hydraulic fracturing had so badly contaminated her well that the water could be set on fire. This hearing in the Supreme Court of Canada is the latest chapter in Ernst's twelve-year battle against Alberta Environmen ... (read more)

Ruth A. Morgan reviews 'The Australian Archaeologist's Book of Quotations' edited by Mike Smith and Billy Griffiths

October 2015, no. 375 • 30 September 2015
The Australian Archaeologist’s Book of Quotations is a veritable time-traveller’s guide for making sense of a continent, a nation, and its people. The editors, archaeologist Mike Smith and historian Billy Griffiths, have served up a smorgasbord of archaeological appetisers, with a feast of pithy insights into how Australians are coming to terms with ancient Australia. If Smith’s Archaeology ... (read more)

Ruth A. Morgan reviews 'The Handbook' by Jane Rawson and James Whitmore

October 2015, no. 375 • 25 September 2015
Although the mantra ‘Don’t panic, but get prepared’ guides Jane Rawson and James Whitmore’s handbook for Surviving and Living with Climate Change, they certainly do not paint a pretty picture of climate-change Australia. The scenarios are alarming: Australia will be hotter, drier in some parts, wetter in others, with more frequent bushfires, floods, and heatwaves. Some parts of Australia a ... (read more)

Ruth A. Morgan reviews 'The Rise and Fall of Gunns Ltd' by Quentin Beresford

May 2015, no. 371 • 27 April 2015
Since the loss of Lake Pedder, the Apple Isle has been the site of some of Australia’s most famous environmental battles: Franklin River, Farmhouse Creek, Wesley Vale, Styx Valley. In the Tamar Valley near Launceston, tensions continue to simmer over the future of the Gunns Pulp Mill – even in the wake of the collapse of its original proponent, Gunns Ltd, in September 2012. That Gunns and its ... (read more)

Ruth A. Morgan reviews 'Flooded Forest and Desert Creek: Ecology and history of the River Red Gum' by Matthew J. Colloff

November 2014, no. 366 • 01 November 2014
In July 2009 I toured the Murray-Darling Basin and northern Queensland with a group of American college professors to see firsthand how the waterways of these regions were faring. By this time, south-eastern Australia had been in drought for nearly a decade, reducing its rivers and creeks to mere trickles. Aboard the MV Kingfisher, we explored the wetlands of the Barmah Choke, the narrowest sectio ... (read more)