CLAG Private Sector and Government award for 2005: Charles C. Mann

Figure 1.

The Conference of Latin Americanist Geogra phers is pleased to present its Private Sector and Government Award for 2005 to journal ist Charles C. Mann. This award is made "in recognition of contributions to enhancing and disseminating knowledge of the geography of Latin America to government or the pri vate sector."

Mann graduated with a degree in biol- ogy and mathematics from Amherst College in 1976. Most of his professional life since then has been as a journalist, currently as a correspondent for Science and The Atlantic Monthly, but with contributions also to The New York Times, The Washington Post, Paris- Match, Der Stern, Forbes, Smithsonian, Geo, and National Geographic, among various other magazines and newspapers. Many of his writings are of direct relevance to geography. He has traveled widely throughout Latin America and has published such articles as "The Khipu Code," "Earthmovers of the Amazon," "Mexican Biotechnology," "The Oldest Civilization in the Americas," "Unnatural Abundance," and on Amazonian dark earths. He has co-authored books on The Second Creation (on physics), The Aspirin Wars (on drugs and money), Noah's Choice (on endangered species), and At Large (on the internet). Besides his journalistic endeavors, Mann has written for television, including "Law and Order," and served as editorial coordinator for several best-selling books of photography.

For this considerable body of work, his previous honors include the American Bar Association's Silver Gravel, the Margaret Sanger Award, the Alfred P. Sloan Science Writing Prize, the American Institute of Physics Award for Science Writing, and Publisher's Weekly Best Book of the Year. He has been a National Magazine Award finalist four times. Mann's writing conveys a palpable sense of wonder and engagement. He expresses himself on the printed page with clarity and precision, and thus appeals widely to the general public and teachers. His sound scholarship has been commented on by academics. He bridges journalism and scholarship better than most journalists and most scholars who attempt it. He reads in depth, interviews at length, and takes care to present conflicting views of often complex issues and events.

Mann first came to our attention when he was working on the cover story, "1491," for the March 2002 edition of The Atlantic Monthly. Because that story epitomizes geography at its synthesizing best, a forum was organized to discuss its contents at the CLAG Meeting in Tucson in 2003. Mann subsequently expanded the piece into a full-fledged book, 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus (Alfred Knopf, 2005). Another forum, on 1491 the book as opposed to "1491" the article, was held at the CLAG Meeting in Morelia in 2005. For this outstanding work of popular historical geography alone, most of which pertains to Latin America, Mann warrants the recognition that CLAG's Enlaces Award encompasses. His sustained output, however, on subjects dealing with social and environmental change sets him apart. It's one thing to have an idea; it's another thing entirely to work hard and keep at it until the idea becomes a reality. Lots can happen, or nothing at all, in the dark inter-regnum. T. S. Eliot put it better than anyone else we know: "Between the idea and the reality falls the shadow." Shadows in one form or other fall on every writer, even distinguished men-of-letters like T.S. Eliot. There is no guaranteed way for any writer to keep producing, but being a journalist helps foster a resolute sense of discipline, which in turn sees copy make deadlines and be transformed into print.

One of us recalls a conversation with the late James Parsons, who, before becoming a legendary figure in Latin American geography, himself cut his teeth as a journalist. "I've no time for people who tell me they love to write," Parsons quipped. "What I love is the feeling of having written." We invoke that recent past tense most warmly in relation to Mann's felicitous synthesis, 1491. Mann is not only a journalist whose commitment and dedication...