Shawn William Miller

As a historian, I ask questions about the meaningful places that we share in common: namely, in my case, Brazil’s forests, Rio de Janeiro’s streets, and now, the Western Hemisphere’s multitude of roads. Most of our historical commons—farms, forests, rivers, and grasslands—have been in rapid decline, transformed into private property. However, roads and streets, our quintessential modern commons, have seen a rapid expansion that only seems to accelerate. Roads, I argue, hold both the blessings of free movement and the power over human overeach.

I grew up on the Pan-American Highway. So have most Americans, even if they are unaware of it. In 1966, the US declared its entire interstate system as part of the Pan-American Highway. My childhood suburb lay along the former Pacific Highway, the world’s longest piece of pavement in the 1920s.

Like my father, an autobody technician, I have had a love hate relationship with cars. The freedom of the road, a path that belongs to me, the taxpayer, offers a certain thrill. And while my dad called the car a necessary evil, he loved the open road, and he spent a lot of time on it by choice. And there was hardly a place on Earth that he could not drive to, if he had the time and inclination.

I learned to engage with nature from a parentage of fisherman, cannery workers, and lumbermen. For them, nature was a both a livelihood and an escape. Nearly always, we arrived by car. Today, for my fun, I try to go a little more slowly. I cycle along Utah’s desert lakes and up her alpine canyons, canoe flatwater, teach a course on local birdwatching, and bake bread. I have chaired our community’s agricultural commission that has worked to conserve acres of farmland from being overrun by development that always starts with roads.

My previous books include The Street is Ours: Community, the Car, and the Nature of Public Space in Rio de Janeiro, as well as An Environmental History of Latin America, which won the Elinor G. K. Melville Prize.