58 pages • 1 hour read
Charles FishmanThe Big Thirst
Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 2011A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
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24-Hour Water
24-hour water refers to water that is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Although water is so freely available in developed countries, nations like India have to limit allocation and availability due to poor management and infrastructure. The book presents 24-hour water as something of double-edged sword: A lack of 24-hour water exacerbates poverty and illness, but overly cheap 24-hour water has changed attitudes in developed nations such as these populations largely take it for granted, leading to waste.
Big Dry
The Big Dry was a drought event in Australia. Fishman discusses the drought to demonstrate that insufficient water is an issue that plagues even developed nations like Australia, and to examine how such scarcity affects both the population and the economy.
Water Illiteracy
Fishman uses the term water illiteracy to describe the general population’s ignorance about water, including the pervasive use of water in industry and the hidden expenses that go into ensuring access to clean water. Fishman argues that widespread water illiteracy has enabled people to take the resource for granted.
Water Insecurity
Fishman describes concerns about the availability of water as water insecurity. This insecurity affects individuals, such as farmers and families, as well as corporations and nations. Water insecurity can lead to water conflicts, but Fishman also believes that worries about water can lead to better management of it.
Water-Mark
Each person has a water-mark, which refers to the amount of water a person uses every day. Fishman contends that most people are completely unaware of their water-marks, partly because water in developed nations is so cheap and so readily available that we can afford to ignore its cost. One way to improve our relationship with water, to ensure it remains safe and accessible in the future, is to increase our awareness of our individual water-marks, of how much water we use per day and how we use it.
Water Scarcity
Fishman presents water scarcity as the diminishing availability of water that is cheap, abundant, and safe. He notes that water “isn’t becoming more scarce, it’s simply disappearing from places where people have become accustomed to finding it” (19). He also warns against a future in which water may be safe and abundant but expensive, or cheap and abundant but unsafe. Either type of water scarcity will have dire consequences for populations the world over.
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