African Americans and Wildlands: A Case Study in Alabama, USA

ABSTRACT Human beings change landscapes and their culture is embodied by landscapes. It is generally assumed that African Americans have a negative impression of wildlands. This assumption is tested by the information about distribution of African American population and wildlands from all 67 counties of Alabama in USA. The results indicate that with the increase of African American population across counties, the total area of National Park, State Park and National Wildlife Refuges decreased. It is same for the total area of National Forest, State and County Forest. With the increase of African American population in counties, both the number of birding trail and the length of hiking trail decreased, but the relationships were not statistically significant. If all the wildlands information is represented by an integrated index of wildness (IW), then IW decreased significantly with the increase of African American population across counties. The sociohistorical factors (e.g., African American’s mythology, slavery, and segregation) and the socioeconomic condition might be the possible mechanisms. This study indicates that culture is important to landscape pattern and change, also ecological education is necessary to the African American communities