Wetlands and culture

Wetlands have shaped and inspired our cultural lives across the span of human history. Humans have also handled and shaped wetlands for good or ill through cultural practices across this span. In this chapter Gearey and Giblett invite the reader to consider the myriad ways in which these wetland cultures have occurred. These include the material culture of wetlands – the artefacts, tools, infrastructure and technologies which demonstrate human agency in these landscapes across time – and their non-tangible components – the ideas, social norms, moral and ethical codes which determine how wetlands are valued and used, expressed through art, rhetoric, law, religion, music, folklore and storytelling. This chapter aims to communicate humanity’s connected and complex relationship/s with these dynamic, banal, seductive, elusive ecosystems which are so fundamental to life on Earth.