Book Projects by Natale (Nat) Zappia
Book manuscript in progress. This study explores the evolution of food in the early North America... more Book manuscript in progress. This study explores the evolution of food in the early North America. It closely examines the political-economic, cultural, technological, and environmental transformations that helped create new food systems across the vast distances of the continent.
The Colorado River region looms large in the history of the American West, vitally important in t... more The Colorado River region looms large in the history of the American West, vitally important in the designs and dreams of Euro-Americans since the first Spanish journey up the river in the sixteenth century. But as Natale Zappia argues in this expansive study, the Colorado River basin must be understood first as home to a complex Indigenous world. Through three-hundred years of western colonial settlement, Spaniards, Mexicans, and Americans all encountered a vast indigenous borderlands peopled by Mojaves, Quechans, Southern Paiutes, Utes, Yokuts, and others, bound together by political, economic, and social networks. Examining a vast cultural geography including southern California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico, Zappia shows how this interior world pulsated throughout the centuries before and after Spanish contact, solidifying to create an autonomous, interethnic indigenous space that expanded and adapted to an ever-encroaching global market economy.
Situating the Colorado River basin firmly within our understanding of Indian country, Traders and Raiders investigates the borders and borderlands created during this period, connecting the coastlines of the Atlantic and Pacific worlds with a vast indigenous continent.
Edward Sherriff Curtis spent more than forty years photographing and documenting the Native peopl... more Edward Sherriff Curtis spent more than forty years photographing and documenting the Native peoples of North America, taking more than 40,000 photographs and amassing a staggering archive of documentary material about North American tribes and social groups. While many books have explored the artistic value of the images he created, "The Many Faces of Edward Sherriff Curtis" assesses his contributions to the field of anthropology. Curtis began documenting the Native peoples of North America in 1889. By this time, the U.S. government had pushed most Native Americans onto reservations and seemed determined to destroy their cultures and social organizations by forcibly removing their children to government boarding schools, by depriving them of the right to speak their languages and practice their religions, and by carving up tribal lands into ever smaller portions and giving away sizable pieces to non-Natives.Curtis believed that his generation might be the last to see and hear these Native people in the flesh. Scholars Steadman Upham and Nat Zappia examine eighty of Curtis' portraits within three contexts: the Native American in U.S. history, the history of Native peoples worldwide during the same period, and the individual subjects, whose portraits are arranged from youngest to oldest. Within the larger arena of U.S. and world history, the gravity, determination, humour, and dignity of Curtis' portraits become vitally clear. The people he photographed were, in many cases, suffering degradation and hardship, but their faces speak of purpose and hope. More than seventy years after Curtis created his last photograph, these portraits speak not of the 'vanishing Indian' he believed he was documenting for posterity but of the resilience of entire nations, which persist and even thrive in difficult circumstances.
Articles and Chapters by Natale (Nat) Zappia
Early American Studies, 2019
This article seeks to reimagine the multidirectional spread of maize and wheat production within ... more This article seeks to reimagine the multidirectional spread of maize and wheat production within the "Old Northwest" during the early period of U.S. nation-state formation. Using a food systems lens, this work reveals deep interconnections among indigenous and non-Native food commodities , land-use practices, and imperial objectives across North America. It also brings the "West" into the web of connections spun in the Atlantic world during and after the Age of Revolutions, highlighting "food frontiers" as agents of historical change influencing coastal urban development. The general custom has been, first to raise a crop of Indian Corn (maize), which, according to the mode of cultivation, is a good preparation for wheat; then a crop of wheat, after which the ground is respited (except from weeds, & every trash that can contribute to its foulness) for about eighteen months; and so on, alternately, without any dressing; till the land is exhausted; when it is turned out without being sown with grass seeds, or any method taken to restore it; and another piece is ruined in the same manner.
American Indian Culture and Research Journal, 2017
The Anthropology of Los Angeles: City, Image, and Politics, 2017
The environmental history of Los Angeles has (with good reason) been a story of land degradation,... more The environmental history of Los Angeles has (with good reason) been a story of land degradation, misuse, and missed opportunities. By more closely tracing the history of small-scale food production, horticultural practices, culinary pathways, and ethnic foodways, a counternarrative emerges that challenges our assumptions about our own relationship to the landscape of Los Angeles. Urban farming and agro-ethnic practices hold the power to educate us, stitch together our communities, and provide potential paths to economic sustainability. This chapter provides a brief history of some of these horticultural journeys that have shaped Los Angeles, focusing in particular on the region known as South LA.
Southern California Quarterly
This article explores Indigenous food exchange patterns prior to Afroeurasian colonization and co... more This article explores Indigenous food exchange patterns prior to Afroeurasian colonization and continuing today. It calls for the application of historical inquiry into early foodways-production, consumption, exchange, ecological adaptation-in the quest for solutions to looming global challenges of food justice, climate change, health, population, etc.
Winner of the 2017 Wayne D. Rasmussen Award for best article on agricultural history; appeared in... more Winner of the 2017 Wayne D. Rasmussen Award for best article on agricultural history; appeared in Environmental History 2016
California History, Winter 2014
Chapter in forthcoming edited volume, Uniting the Histories of Slavery (School of Advanced Resear... more Chapter in forthcoming edited volume, Uniting the Histories of Slavery (School of Advanced Research Press). Edited by James Brooks and Bonnie Smith.
California History, Jan 2014
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, a... more JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].
Pacific Historical Review, May 2012
In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Spaniards, Mexicans, and Americans of the Far West fo... more In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Spaniards, Mexicans, and Americans of the Far West forged dynamic economies based on livestock, furs, and agriculture. Simultaneously, though, Natives in the borderlands between New Mexico and California expanded their economic and military power even as Californios and Nuevo Mexicanos emerged as dominant ruling classes. Through the formation and expansion of an indigenous captive-and-livestock raiding economy, the “Interior World” challenged the power of newcomers in the Far West. Understanding this raiding economy provides an important look at colonial exchanges from the indigenous perspective within the context of interregional trading networks and borderlands.
UC Press, 2012
In recent years, school and community gardens across Los Angeles have effectively combated diabet... more In recent years, school and community gardens across Los Angeles have effectively combated diabetes, obesity, and heart disease. In South Los Angeles, school gardens also serve overlooked communities, providing nutritious food, integrative education, and even green entrepreneurial skills to elementary and high school students. At the 24th Street Elementary School in West Adams, for example, children, parents, teachers, and administrators have enjoyed vegetables planted and harvested by its 932 enrolled students.
Since 2005, the Garden School Foundation (GSF) has assisted the 24th Street community in planting the ¾ acre kitchen garden and orchard. GSF is one of many non-profits, community organizations, and local businesses attempting to strengthen the economic viability of South Los Angeles through the power of gardens and food forests. Alongside many other organizations, GSF takes its cues from the needs and interests of local neighborhoods. Like any successful farmer, non-profits must listen and understand the local climate. Within the community and school gardens of South Los Angeles, this climate is looking increasingly favorable. This article explores the history and future of local foods in this region of Los Angeles.
McGraw-Hil, 2008
This is a co-authored chapter based on work completed at UCSC's Center for World History.
Th... more This is a co-authored chapter based on work completed at UCSC's Center for World History.
The larger text (edited by Carl Guarneri and James Davis) examines how larger global processes have had a role in each stage of American development, how this country's experiences were shared by people elsewhere, and how America's growing influence ultimately changed the world. By examining American history through a global lens, Carl Guarneri creates a framework that situates specific American events within the larger realm of world history.
Recent Book Reviews by Natale (Nat) Zappia
Book Review in HAHR, February 2016
Journal of Southern History, 2015
Uploads
Book Projects by Natale (Nat) Zappia
Situating the Colorado River basin firmly within our understanding of Indian country, Traders and Raiders investigates the borders and borderlands created during this period, connecting the coastlines of the Atlantic and Pacific worlds with a vast indigenous continent.
Articles and Chapters by Natale (Nat) Zappia
Since 2005, the Garden School Foundation (GSF) has assisted the 24th Street community in planting the ¾ acre kitchen garden and orchard. GSF is one of many non-profits, community organizations, and local businesses attempting to strengthen the economic viability of South Los Angeles through the power of gardens and food forests. Alongside many other organizations, GSF takes its cues from the needs and interests of local neighborhoods. Like any successful farmer, non-profits must listen and understand the local climate. Within the community and school gardens of South Los Angeles, this climate is looking increasingly favorable. This article explores the history and future of local foods in this region of Los Angeles.
The larger text (edited by Carl Guarneri and James Davis) examines how larger global processes have had a role in each stage of American development, how this country's experiences were shared by people elsewhere, and how America's growing influence ultimately changed the world. By examining American history through a global lens, Carl Guarneri creates a framework that situates specific American events within the larger realm of world history.
Recent Book Reviews by Natale (Nat) Zappia
Situating the Colorado River basin firmly within our understanding of Indian country, Traders and Raiders investigates the borders and borderlands created during this period, connecting the coastlines of the Atlantic and Pacific worlds with a vast indigenous continent.
Since 2005, the Garden School Foundation (GSF) has assisted the 24th Street community in planting the ¾ acre kitchen garden and orchard. GSF is one of many non-profits, community organizations, and local businesses attempting to strengthen the economic viability of South Los Angeles through the power of gardens and food forests. Alongside many other organizations, GSF takes its cues from the needs and interests of local neighborhoods. Like any successful farmer, non-profits must listen and understand the local climate. Within the community and school gardens of South Los Angeles, this climate is looking increasingly favorable. This article explores the history and future of local foods in this region of Los Angeles.
The larger text (edited by Carl Guarneri and James Davis) examines how larger global processes have had a role in each stage of American development, how this country's experiences were shared by people elsewhere, and how America's growing influence ultimately changed the world. By examining American history through a global lens, Carl Guarneri creates a framework that situates specific American events within the larger realm of world history.
Westminister Elementary School
24th Street School
Salvation Army Bell Shelter
Crenshaw High School
Whittier Boys And Girls Club Garden Program
UC Victory Garden Workshop, Earthworks Urban Farm
During my time as Executive Director, GSF was awarded numerous grants that supported infrastructure and programming. Foundation awards included:
Honda Foundation - http://corporate.honda.com/america/philanthropy.aspx?id=ahf
City of Los Angeles -
http://bpw.lacity.org/OCB/cbgrant/2009-10_CB_GRANT_AWARDEES.pdf
Share Our Strength -
http://bestpractices.nokidhungry.org"