J. R. McNeill

John Robert McNeill (born October 6, 1954) is an American environmental historian, author, and professor at Georgetown University. He is best known for "pioneering the study of environmental history".[1] In 2000 he published Something New Under the Sun: An Environmental History of the Twentieth-Century World, which argues that human activity during the 20th century led to environmental changes on an unprecedented scale, primarily due to the energy system built around fossil fuels.

J. R. McNeill
Born
John Robert McNeill

(1954-10-06) October 6, 1954
Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
ParentWilliam H. McNeill
AwardsHeineken Prize (2018)
Academic background
Alma materSwarthmore College
Duke University
Academic work
DisciplineHistory
Sub-disciplineEnvironmental history
InstitutionsGeorgetown University
Notable worksSomething New Under the Sun (2000)

Life and career

McNeill was born on October 6, 1954, in Chicago, Illinois. His father was the noted University of Chicago historian William H. McNeill, with whom he published a book, The Human Web: A Bird's-eye View of World History, in 2003.[2] He attended the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools.

McNeill received his BA from Swarthmore College in 1975, then went on to Duke University where he completed his MA in 1977 and his PhD in 1981.[3]

In 1985 he became a faculty member at Georgetown University, where he serves in both the History Department and the Walsh School of Foreign Service. From 2003 he held the Cinco Hermanos Chair in Environmental History and International Affairs, until he was appointed a University Professor in 2006. He has written 7 books and edited or co-edited 17. He has held two Fulbright Awards, a Guggenheim fellowship, a MacArthur Grant, and a fellowship at the Woodrow Wilson Center. He was president of the American Society for Environmental History (2011–13) and headed the Research Division of the American Historical Association, as one of its three Vice Presidents (2012–15).[3] He was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2017, awarded the Heineken Prize in History in 2018, and served as president of the American Historical Association in 2019.

Research

McNeill focuses on environmental history, a field in which he has been recognized as a pioneer.[1] In 2000, he published his best-known book, Something New Under the Sun: An Environmental History of the Twentieth-Century World, which argues that human activity during the 20th century led to environmental change on an unprecedented scale. He notes that before 1900, human activity did change environments, but not on the scale witnessed in the 20th century. His analysis of the reasons behind the scale of modern environmental change foregrounds fossil fuels, population growth, technological changes, and the pressures of international politics.[4] His tone has been praised for being dispassionate, impartial, and lacking the moral outrage that often accompanies books about the environment.[5][6][7]

In 2010, he published Mosquito Empires: Ecology and War in the Greater Caribbean, 1620–1914, where he argues that ecological changes brought by a transition to a sugar plantation economy increased the scope for mosquito-borne diseases like yellow fever and malaria, and that "differential resistance" between local and European populations shaped the arc of Caribbean history. Specifically, he says that it helps explain how Spain was able to protect its Caribbean colonies from its European rivals for so long and also why imperial Spain, France, and Britain ultimately lost their mainland empires in revolutionary wars in the Americas late 18th and early 19th centuries.[8][9][10] The book won the Beveridge Prize from the American Historical Association, a PROSE award from the Association of American Publishers, and was listed by the Wall Street Journal among the best books in early American history.[3]

In 2016 McNeill and co-author Peter Engelke published The Great Acceleration: An Environmental History of the Anthropocene Since 1945. The "Great Acceleration" of the title refers to the initial decades of the Anthropocene, which is a proposed era of greater human interference in the Earth's ecology.[11] McNeill has also written a world history textbook, The Webs of Humankind (2020). He is working on an environmental history of the Industrial Revolution.

Awards and honors

Bibliography

Books
  • The Atlantic Empires of France and Spain: Louisbourg and Havana, 1700-1763. Chapel Hill: UNC Press, 1985, ISBN 978-0-807-86567-5.
  • The Mountains of the Mediterranean World: An Environmental History. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992, ISBN 978-0-521-52288-5.
  • Something New Under the Sun: An Environmental History of the 20th-Century World. New York: Norton, 2000, ISBN 978-0-140-29509-2.
  • With William H. McNeill. The Human Web: A Bird's-eye View of World History. New York: Norton, 2003, ISBN 978-0-393-92568-5.
  • Mosquito Empires: Ecology and War in the Greater Caribbean, 1620–1914. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010, ISBN 978-0-521-45910-5.
  • With Peter Engelke. The Great Acceleration: An Environmental History of the Anthropocene Since 1945. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2016, ISBN 978-0-674-54503-8.
  • The Webs of Humankind: A World History. New York: W.W. Norton, 2020 (2 vols.) ISBN 978-0-393-42877-3
  • With Philip Morgan, Matthew Mulcahy and Stuart Schwartz. Sea & Land: An Environmental History of the Caribbean. New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022. ISBN 9780197555453

Articles

McNeill, J.R. "Peak Document and the Future of History," American Historical Review 125(2020), 1-18.

References
  1. G. John Ikenberry (May–June 2003). "Capsule Review: The Human Web: A Bird's-Eye View of World History". Foreign Affairs. Retrieved 1 February 2018.
  2. "William H. McNeill, Pioneering World Historian, 1917–2016". University of Chicago News. 11 July 2016. Archived from the original on 17 May 2019. Retrieved 1 February 2018.
  3. "John McNeill". Walsh School of Foreign Service. Georgetown University. Archived from the original on 2 February 2018. Retrieved 1 February 2018.
  4. Lewis, Martin W. (January 2000). "Reviewed Work: Something New under the Sun: An Environmental History of the Twentieth-Century World by J. R. McNeill". Geographical Review. 90 (1): 147–149. doi:10.2307/216186. JSTOR 216186.
  5. Teresi, Dick (25 June 2000). "It's Been Hell on Earth". New York Times. Retrieved 1 February 2018.
  6. Richard N. Cooper (July–August 2000). "Capsule Review: Something New Under the Sun". Foreign Affairs. Retrieved 1 February 2018.
  7. Soluri, John (Fall 2002). "Something New Under the Sun: An Environmental History of the Twentieth-Century World (review)". Journal of Social History. 36 (1): 183–185. doi:10.1353/jsh.2002.0109. S2CID 145114354.
  8. J. R. McNeill (18 October 2010). "Malarial mosquitoes helped defeat British in battle that ended Revolutionary War". Washington Post. Retrieved 1 February 2018.
  9. Espinosa, Mariola (Winter 2011). "Mosquito Empires: Ecology and War in the Greater Caribbean, 1620–1914 (review)". Journal of Interdisciplinary History. 41 (3): 483–484. doi:10.1162/JINH_r_00140. S2CID 195826775.
  10. Dillman, Jefferson (October 2012). "Review of McNeill, J. R., Mosquito Empires: Ecology and War in the Greater Caribbean, 1620-1914". H-Caribbean, H-Net Reviews. Retrieved 1 February 2018.
  11. Peter Engelke; J.R. McNeill (21 April 2016). "Earth Day: Are we at the beginning of a new geological era?". Washington Post. Retrieved 1 February 2018.
  12. "2010 Award Winners". PROSE Awards. Retrieved 1 February 2018.
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