Produktdetaljer
Biografisk notat
Brian C. Black, distinguished professor of history and environmental studies and division head of arts and humanities at Penn State Altoona, is the author or editor of several books, including the award-winning Petrolia: The Landscape of America’s First Oil Boom and Gettysburg Contested: 150 Years of Preserving America’s Cherished Landscape. His articles appear in the New York Times, the Conversation, USA Today, Junior Scholastic, and the Christian Science Monitor.Over the past 150 years, oil has become a ubiquitous part of modern life. Placing a strong emphasis on oil’s environmental impact, Brian Black explores the many ways oil production and consumption have shaped world history. Wide-ranging and engagingly written, Crude Reality is an indispensable starting point for understanding how the world got to be the way it is today and the forces that are shaping its ongoing evolution.
- David Painter, Georgetown University,
Brian Black is one of America’s leading historians of energy and the oil industry, and this updated book provides scholars and the general public a splendid guide to those subjects. It is concise, thoroughly researched, wide-ranging in focus, and as relevant to our times as history can be. And it’s good reading all the way!
- Donald E. Worster, University of Kansas,
Crude Reality is a sweeping and accessible survey of how modern industrial societies became ever more dependent on petroleum. A valuable primer for readers wanting to learn more about our petroleum predicament.
- Tyler Priest, University of Iowa,
Acknowledgments
Prologue
Introduction: Beginning as Black Goo
PART I: CULTURAL EXCHANGE, 1750–1890
Infrastructure: Drilling for Saltwater
1 From Black Goo to Black Gold
2 Crossing Borders to Increase Supply
3 Modeling Big Oil
Infrastructure: Shipping Crude throughout the Globe
PART II: GOING MOBILE, 1890–1960
Infrastructure: Pumping Gas
4 Hitting the Road
5 Marching for Petroleum: Supply and Weapons
Infrastructure: “Want Fries with That?”
PART III: THE GLOBALIZATION OF PETROLEUM DOMINANCE, 1960–PRESENT
Infrastructure: Big Science Helps Big Oil
6 Consuming Cultures
7 To Have and Have Not
Infrastructure: NYMEX and the Commodity of Crude
PART IV: LIVING WITH LIMITS AND ENERGY TRANSITIONS, 1980–PRESENT
Infrastructure: Climate Change Reveals a New World Order
8 “Extreme Oil,” Climate Change, and Geopolitics
Portrait of Addiction: U.S. Petroleum Use
Epilogue: Resource Curse: Time for an Oil Change?
Chronology of Petroleum in World History
Chronology of Spills
Notes
Bibliography
Index
As the world grows ever more closely linked, we are all appreciating the need to become internationally aware. World history offers the crucial connection to understanding past global links and how they influence the present. Edited by two of the leading historians in the field, this series expands that awareness by synthesizing world history for students, engaging general readers, and extending the boundaries for scholars.
Series Editors: John McNeill and Kenneth Pomeranz