About the Journal
Lookouts, published by the University of Idaho Press, is the first journal devoted to structures built for observation—physical posts conceived as interfaces between humans and nature. Its guiding paradigm is the fire lookout tower: scattered across American mountain peaks as a fixed-point fire detection structure, it embodies exactly the kind of human-nature interface the journal explores, drawing together perspectives that range from forest management to poetry. In that spirit, Lookouts publishes scholarly essays, interviews, conference proceedings, and reports across the humanities, with particular attention to the history of the built environment, phenomenology, and land ethics.
Current Issue
Lookouts Issue 1
This first issue seeks to gather essays that trace the historical emergence of lookouts as a proxy for forest management. Its close engagement with the American fire lookout tradition stems from the 1st National Interdisciplinary Lookout Conference, held at the University of Idaho in April 2024. The contributors represent a wide range of perspectives on the subject, including historians, enthusiasts, practitioners, organizers, and academics. Their essays address the past, present, and future of the fire lookout, and together they reflect the breadth of the lookout community.
Editors
Michael Decker
Andrea A. Dutto
Executive Editor
Devin Becker
Advisory Board (1st NILC)
Billy Cooter
Cat House
Mike Guerin
Gary Weber
