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swidden - What does it mean?

Definition of 'swidden'

English

Noun

(en-noun)
  • an area of land that has been cleared by cutting the vegetation and burning it; slash and burn
  • :* {{quote-magazine
    • |date= |year=2009 |month=Jul/Aug |first= |last= |author=Roger Atwood |coauthors= |title=Maya Roots |volume=62 |issue=4 |page= |magazine=Archaeology |publisher= |issn= |url= |passage=These facts reinforced the view that the Maya drew their basic sustenance from corn, most of it grown on slash-and-burn plots known as swiddens . }}
  • :* {{quote-magazine
    • |date= |year=2007 |month=Fall |first= |last= |author=F. L. (Rick) Bein |coauthors= |title=Food Garden Capacity and Population Growth: A Case in Papua New Guinea. |volume=50 |issue=2 |page=28-33 |magazine=Focus on Geography |publisher= |issn= |url= |passage=Kamiali Village is a community of swidden horticulturists and fishers lying 80 kilometers in a south-southeasterly direction along the coast from the City of Lae, Papua New Guinea. }}

    Verb

    (en-verb)
  • to clear an area of land by cutting and burning
  • :* {{quote-news
    • |date=2009-02-13 |first= |last= |author=Drake Bennett |authorlink= |coauthors= |title=The mystery of Zomia |newspaper=The Boston Globe |city=Boston |publisher= |quotee=James Scott citation |page= |passage=The reason, Scott says, is that swiddening provides a freedom that fixed agriculture does not. }}

    Derived terms

    * swiddener

    See also

    * burn-beat, slash and burn

    References

    Diamond, Jared (2004). Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed , page 163. ISBN 0670033375. Sprenger, Guido. "Out of the ashes: Swidden cultivation in highland Laos." Anthropology Today 22.4 (August 2006), 9-13. Izikowitz, K.G. (1979 [orig. 1951]). Lamet: Hill peasants in French Indochina. New York: AMS Press.

    Similar to 'swidden'

    sudden, sweeten, sadden, shaitan, sateen, shitton, showdown, sodden, shitten, sitten, shutdown, shodan, shotten, shiten, seitan, sitdown, sodian, shodden, siddown, shaytan, suddain, skiathon, setten, skaddon, setdown, sation, sithen, sowdan, sodion