Author Description

This volume is the second in the UK-originated series, Antony Orme and Andrew Goudie, eds., Physical Environments of the World, following The Physical Geography of Africa (Feb. 1996). The aim of the series is to present a "relatively durable statement of physical conditions on the continents" written by a team of specialists. In common with the other volumes in the series the book is divided into three parts: (I) systematic coverage of the main components of the physical environment, (II) regional treatment based on the biome concept, and (III) human responses to the physical landscape. The book is intended to fill a void in recent geographic literature by providing an interpretive work that integrates knowledge "across the environment" while placing recent discoveries in a human context. Using tectonism as an example, Orme writes that this topic "will not be viewed as an end in itself, but as a series of processes and crustal adjustments that have significant implication for climate change and plant and animal migrations." The contributing authors are among the most active and best in their fields in the United States and Canada.