Reinvention of Australasian Biogeography: Reform, Revolt and Rebellion [Paperback]

Biogeography, the study of the distribution of life on Earth, has undergone more conceptual changes, revolutions and turf wars than any other scientific field. Australasian biogeographers are responsible for several of these great upheavals, including debates on cladistics, panbiogeography and the drowning of New Zealand, some of which have significantly shaped present-day studies.

Australasian biogeography has been caught in a cycle of reinvention that has lasted for over 150 years. The biogeographic research making headlines today is merely a shadow of past practices, having barely advanced scientifically. Fundamental biogeographic questions raised by naturalists a century ago remain unanswered, yet are as relevant today as they were then. Scientists still do not know whether Australia and New Zealand are natural biotic areas or if they are in fact artificial amalgamations of areas. The same question goes for all biotic areas in Australasia: are they real?

Reinvention of Australasian Biogeographytells the story of the history of Australasian biogeography, enabling understanding of the cycle of reinvention and the means by which to break it, and paves the way for future biogeographical research.

The book will be a valuable resource for biological and geographical scientists, especially those working in biogeography, biodiversity, ecology and conservation. It will also be of interest to historians of science.


Foreword
Prologue
Acknowledgements

Chapter 1: Studying the Distribution of Life on Earth
The search for natural biotic areas
Cladistics: the search for natural taxa and their relationships
Cladistic biogeography: the search for natural areas and their relationships
What is an area? Establishing the cladistic biogeographic method
How to do cladistic biogeography (or how to start refols