To Master the Boundless Sea: The U.S. Navy, the Marine Environment, and the Cartography of Empire (2018)
Smith, Jason W. (Author)
The University of North Carolina Press
Physical Details: 280
Language: English
As the United States grew into an empire in the late nineteenth century, notions like "sea power" derived not only from fleets, bases, and decisive battles but also from a scientific effort to understand and master the ocean environment. Beginning in the early nineteenth century and concluding in the first years of the twentieth, Jason W. Smith tells the story of the rise of the U.S. Navy and the emergence of American ocean empire through its struggle to control nature. In vividly told sketches of exploration, naval officers, war, and, most significantly, the ocean environment, Smith draws together insights from environmental, maritime, military, and naval history, and the history of science and cartography, placing the U.S. Navy's scientific efforts within a broader cultural context.By recasting and deepening our understanding of the U.S. Navy and the United States at sea, Smith brings to the fore the overlooked work of naval hydrographers, surveyors, and cartographers. In the nautical chart's soundings, names, symbols, and embedded narratives, Smith recounts the largely untold story of a young nation looking to extend its power over the boundless sea.
...MoreReview Sasha Davis (2020) Review of "To Master the Boundless Sea: The U.S. Navy, the Marine Environment, and the Cartography of Empire". Journal of American History (pp. 1065-1065).
Review William Fowler (2019) Review of "To Master the Boundless Sea: The U.S. Navy, the Marine Environment, and the Cartography of Empire". Imago Mundi: A Review of Early Cartography (pp. 225-226).
Review Evan Wilson (2019) Review of "To Master the Boundless Sea: The U.S. Navy, the Marine Environment, and the Cartography of Empire". Isis: International Review Devoted to the History of Science and Its Cultural Influences (pp. 188-189).
Review Evan Wilson (2019) Review of "To Master the Boundless Sea: The U.S. Navy, the Marine Environment, and the Cartography of Empire". Isis: International Review Devoted to the History of Science and Its Cultural Influences (pp. 188-189).
Similar Citations
Article
R. L. France;
(2018)
Illustration of an 1857 “Sea-Serpent” Sighting Re-Interpreted as an Early Depiction of Cetacean Entanglement in Maritime Debris
(/isis/citation/CBB817395622/)
Book
Lukas Engelmann;
Christos Lynteris;
(2020)
Sulphuric Utopias: A History of Maritime Fumigation
(/isis/citation/CBB525197034/)
Thesis
Brock, Darryl Erwin;
(2014)
American Empire and the Scientific Survey of Puerto Rico
(/isis/citation/CBB001567604/)
Chapter
Katharine Anderson;
(2016)
Robert-Jan Wille Marine Meteorology: Observing Regimes and Global Visions, 1918–1939
(/isis/citation/CBB728255232/)
Book
John Moore;
(2017)
The Clyde: Mapping the River
(/isis/citation/CBB114394939/)
Chapter
Vetter, Jeremy;
(2012)
Field Life in the American West: Surveys, Networks, Stations, and Quarries
(/isis/citation/CBB001210267/)
Chapter
Antony Adler;
(2016)
The Hybrid Shore: The Marine Station Movement and Scientific Uses of the Littoral, 1843–1910
(/isis/citation/CBB583932056/)
Chapter
Rodolfo John Alaniz;
(2016)
A Conflict of Interests: How International Marine Science Practices Shaped the Nineteenth-century Biotic Debate
(/isis/citation/CBB154167668/)
Book
Bates, Charles C.;
Hanssen, G. L.;
(2005)
Hydro to Navoceano: 175 Years of Ocean Survey and Prediction by the U.S. Navy, 1830--2005
(/isis/citation/CBB000950007/)
Chapter
Veronica Ghizzi;
(2010)
Si durabit tregua intra aquam et nos: fiumi e castelli mantovani nel trecento
(/isis/citation/CBB180053135/)
Chapter
Massimo Mussini;
(2010)
Governo delle acque nel territorio reggiano fra medioevo e rinascimento
(/isis/citation/CBB348854805/)
Book
Yang, Daqing;
(2010)
Technology of Empire: Telecommunications and Japanese Expansion in Asia, 1883--1945
(/isis/citation/CBB001250900/)
Article
Wilko Graf von Hardenberg;
(2021)
Making a Stable Sea: The Littorals of Eighteenth-Century Europe and the Origins of a Spatial Concept
(/isis/citation/CBB999265001/)
Article
Wilko Graf von Hardenberg;
(2020)
Measuring zero at sea: On the delocalization and abstraction of the geodetic framework
(/isis/citation/CBB264654698/)
Article
Megan Barford;
(2017)
D.176: Sextants, Numbers, and the Hydrographic Office of the Admiralty
(/isis/citation/CBB878342734/)
Article
Felix Lüttge;
(2023)
Seas of Data; or, The Oceanographer in the Archive
(/isis/citation/CBB566939636/)
Book
S. Max Edelson;
(2017)
The New Map of Empire: How Britain Imagined America before Independence
(/isis/citation/CBB626996313/)
Article
Coen, Deborah R.;
(2011)
Imperial Climatographies from Tyrol to Turkestan
(/isis/citation/CBB001034573/)
Book
Daniel Foliard;
(2017)
Dislocating the Orient: British Maps and the Making of the Middle East, 1854-1921
(/isis/citation/CBB192403503/)
Book
Kobayashi, Shigeru;
(2011)
Pictures of Foreign Countries: Japanese Empire's Maps on Asia
(/isis/citation/CBB001550705/)
Journal of Historical Geography
Isis: International Review Devoted to the History of Science and Its Cultural Influences
History of Science
Configurations: A Journal of Literature, Science, and Technology
Archives of Natural History
Be the first to comment!