Dust

October 9, 2023
Owens—whose newsletter, Disturbances, expounded on the science and cultural history of dust—debuts with a sweeping study of how small particles—broadly defined to include sand, smoke, and nuclear fallout—have influenced human history. Chronicling the centuries-long campaign to curb air pollution in London, Owens notes that in 1579 Queen Elizabeth I “banned coal-burning in London when Parliament was sitting” to reduce the proliferation of soot, a problem that worsened during the Industrial Revolution in the 19th century. The 1930s Dust Bowl, Owens explains, started after white colonizers clearing prairies for farmland loosed the arid soil and caused 100 million acres in the central U.S. to fill with “roiling black clouds, seething with static electricity, the air so thick with dirt you couldn’t see your own hand in front of your face.” Owens also discusses “modernity’s invention of cleanliness in the home,” contending “people used not to give a damn about dust” until the acceptance of the germ theory of disease led to a wave of moralizing hygiene crusaders in the 1880s who “swept into the houses of the poor... in order to instruct the less fortunate” on cleaning up. Owens’s prose is often lyrical and her wide-ranging analysis highlights dust’s overlooked historical significance, though the broad scope can sometimes make this feel a bit unfocused. Still, it’s a competent and persuasive study of the big impact of small particles.