Korte beschrijving/Annotatie

A groundbreaking perspective on energy history that reveals the early modern home, and not industry, as the first major driver of fossil-fuel adoption

Tekst achterflap

This book explores how the homes of ordinary city dwellers sparked our modern dependence on fossil fuels. Drawing on a rich variety of sources, including probate inventories, household manuals, personal journals, medical treatises and contemporary artwork, it reveals how households in the early modern Low Countries embraced peat and coal to fuel new standards of warmth, light and domesticity. Yet, with these new home comforts came rising indoor pollution, intensified and gendered housework and, ultimately, a quiet shift in humanity’s relationship with nature. Bridging the histories of environments, material culture and consumption, Fossil Consumerism offers a reinterpretation of the historical roots of global warming, finding these not in the industrial mill, but in the intimate, overlooked spaces of the home. This book is essential reading for anyone interested in the everyday origins of the Anthropocene.

Slogan/Promotie

This book explores how the homes of ordinary city dwellers sparked our modern dependence on fossil fuels. Drawing on a rich variety of sources, including probate inventories, household manuals, personal journals, medical treatises and contemporary artwork, it reveals how households in the early modern Low Countries embraced peat and coal to fuel new standards of warmth, light and domesticity. Yet, with these new home comforts came rising indoor pollution, intensified and gendered housework and, ultimately, a quiet shift in humanity’s relationship with nature. Bridging the histories of environments, material culture and consumption, Fossil Consumerism offers a reinterpretation of the historical roots of global warming, finding these not in the industrial mill, but in the intimate, overlooked spaces of the home. This book is essential reading for anyone interested in the everyday origins of the Anthropocene.

Biografie

Wout Saelens is a postdoctoral researcher at the Centre for Urban History of the University of Antwerp and the Social History of Capitalism research group of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel. His research interests focus on the (early) modern histories of consumption, energy, pollution, political ecology and popular environmentalism.

Inhoudsopgave

List of Illustrations List of Figures List of Tables Preface Introduction Chapter 1. Energy and environment in the early modern Low Countries Chapter 2. The energy revolution comes home Chapter 3. The culture of the home fire Chapter 4. Flows of energy, flows of work in the household Chapter 5. The rise of fossil consumerism Conclusions Notes Bibliography Index

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