Rubbish!: The Archaeology of Garbage PDF
Preview Rubbish!: The Archaeology of Garbage
T H t A R C ~H A E ll L 0 G Y 0 F " G / TRTB A GE . WHAT OUR GARBAGE WILLIAM RATHJE & CULLEN MURPH CANADA $31.00 Along with death and taxes, garbage is one of life's great certainties. Whether it c omes in the form of old newspapers, bottles and cans, thrown-away food, or the overflow of basements and attics, our collective trash demands to be confronted — not only as an ecological conundrum, but as a mirror of modern life and the American character, one that reflects us all in enlightening and surprising ways. It i s from the discards of former civilizations that archaeologists have reconstructed much of what life was like in the past, and it i s through its examination of today's garbage that Rubbish! takes an unexpect- ed and revelatory look at the present. For the past twenty years the University of Arizona's Garbage Project has been sifting, sorting, and classifying the detritus of our lives — all told, a quarter of a million pounds of garbage. This "hands-on" analysis, coupled with survey data and other research, has yielded insights into politics, economics, and demographics, into history, and into the ineradicable quirks of human behavior. Excavated from landfills or exam- ined fresh from the truck, garbage offers a reality check, telling us how we really act, what we really consume. Some of the unusual findings of recent garbage research reveal that: ' W hile it h as long been a cliche that children don't eat their vegetables, adults are just as guilty; fresh produce is the biggest contributor to food waste in our garbage. When questioned about their eating habits, people consistently downplay their consumption of such items as cottage cheese, liver, and tuna. Their gar- bage tells a different story. • After Halloween, garbage contains lots of candy wrappers but almost no candy. After Valentine's Day garbage also contains lots of candy wrappers — most often with the candy still inside. (continued on back flap) »0Q c" 1 RUBBISH! Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2011 http://www.archive.org/details/rubbisharchaeoloOOrath RUBBISH! THE ARCHAEOLOGY OF GARBAGE William Ra th j e and Cu 11 e n M urphy HarperCollinsPublishers To the memory of Thomas Price rubbish! Copyright © 1992 by William Rathje and Cullen Murphy. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information address HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., 10 East 53rd Street, New York, NY 10022. HarperCollins books may be purchased for educational, business, or sales promotional use. For information, please call or write: Special Markets Department, HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., 10 East 53rd Street, New York, NY 10022. Telephone: (212) 207-7528; Fax: (212) 207-7222. FIRST EDITION Designed by Ruth Kolbert LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA Rathje, William Rubbish! : the archaeology of garbage / W illiam Rathje and Cullen Murphy. — 1st ed. p. cm. ISBN 0-06-016603-7 1. Garbage Project (University of Arizona) 2. Refuse and refuse disposal — Research — New York (N.Y.) 3. Refuse and refuse disposal — United States — Case studies. I. Murphy, Cullen. II. Title. TD793.3.R38 1992 363.72'8'097471— dc20 91-50452 92 93 94 95 96 DT/RRD 10 987654321 I (D IS U U B9 V 1 PART I An I ntroduction to t he G arbage Project 1. Yes, Wonderful Things 3 2. Garbage and History 30 3. What We Say, What We Do 53 PARI II The landfill Excavations 4. Into the Unknown 81 5. The Myths of Biodegradation no PART III Interlude: Diapers and Demographics 6. A Garbage Census? 133 7. The Diaper Dilemma 151 PARI IV Garbage and the F uture 8. The Technological Fix 171 9. Closing the Loop 188 10. Life-style Override 214 11. The Ten Commandments 234 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 246
The list of books you might like
