Human Habitation and Culture
The area of the national park has been inhabited for more than 25,000 years. The forests of Lorentz encompass the traditional lands of eight indigenous ethnic groups, including the Asmat, Amungme, Dani, Sempan, and Nduga. Estimates of the current population vary between 6,300 and 10,000.
It is widely acknowledged that conservation management strategies for the park will have to incorporate the needs and aspirations of these peoples if the park is to succeed in protecting biodiversity. Moreover, cultural diversity is another important measure of success for the park.
Read more about this topic: Lorentz National Park
Famous quotes containing the words human, habitation and/or culture:
“... we’ve allowed a youth-centered culture to leave us so estranged from our future selves that, when asked about the years beyond fifty, sixty, or seventy—all part of the average human life span providing we can escape hunger, violence, and other epidemics—many people can see only a blank screen, or one on which they project fear of disease and democracy.”
—Gloria Steinem (b. 1934)
“An habitation giddy and unsure
Hath he that buildeth on the vulgar heart.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“Culture is the suggestion, from certain best thoughts, that a man has a range of affinities through which he can modulate the violence of any master-tones that have a droning preponderance in his scale, and succor him against himself. Culture redresses this imbalance, puts him among equals and superiors, revives the delicious sense of sympathy, and warns him of the dangers of solitude and repulsion.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)