Arts & Sciences

Research & Teaching Interests

Applied cultural (cognitive/environmental) anthropology; anthropological methods and theory; agriculture, conservation, and ritual; behavior and folk knowledge; technology and pedagogy; Belize, Internet, Madagascar, and the United States.

Current Research

My core interest is understanding how humans interpret their environment and how their interpretations may influence their practices. In short, I have focused on the ethnoecology of agricultural development. I use both qualitative and quantitative methods to explore how cultural models vary within and between groups. Specifically, my ethnoecological ethnography has been applied to assisting the transition from swidden to irrigated agriculture in Madagascar and agricultural development in both California and Kentucky. I am now focusing my research on sugar cane farmers in Belize.

Academic Degrees

• Ph.D. University of Connecticut
• M.A. California State University, Fullerton
• B.A. California State University, Fullerton
• A.A. Orange Coast College

Courses

• ANT 100 Cultural Anthropology
• ANT 100H Honors Cultural Anthropology
• ANT 245 Peoples of Latin America & the Caribbean
• ANT 275 Language and Culture
• ANT 309 Peoples of Africa
  
• ANT 325 Applied Anthropology
• ANT 340 Ethnographic Methods
• ANT 342 Quantitative Methods in Anthropology
• ANT 345 Environmental Anthropology
• ANT 365 Ethnographic Field School
  
• ANT 401 Culture Theory
• ANT 565 Advanced Ethnographic Field School

Accolades

• 2012-14 Treasurer, Society for Anthropological Sciences, American Anthropological Association
• 2011 Outstanding Advisor Award, Northern Kentucky University
  
• 2010-date Associate Editor, Contemporary Journal of Anthropology and Sociology

Selected Publications

• 2012 Malagasy Swidden Agriculture: The Influence of Conservation Organizations on Indigenous Knowledge. Kentucky Journal of Anthropology and Sociology 2(2):37-54.
• 2009 Vary Gasy: Meanings of Rice and Implications for Agricultural Development in Eastern Madagascar. Plantes et sociétés dans l’océan Indien occidental [Plants and People in the Western Indian Ocean]. Etudes Océan Indien 42/43:243-56.
• 2006 Swidden Agriculture and Conservation in Eastern Madagascar: Stakeholder Perspectives and Cultural Belief Systems. Conservation and Society 4(2):287-303.

Associated Websites

• Center for Applied Anthropology