science

  • Javelinas and Texas Ebony Trees in South Texas

    Texas Ebony trees (Ebenopsis ebano) is a species of legume native to South Texas. These trees produce large bean pods (see below) that ripen and fall to the ground. They provide food to javelinas (Pecari tajacu) and other wildlife. Using the last five years of iNaturalist javelina sightings, I am examining the relationship between javelinas

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  • “Of Peccaries and People: Perception and Politics in the Texas Hill Country” RAI Anthropology and Conservation Conference Talk 2021

    On October 27, I presented some of my preliminary research at the Royal Anthropological Institute’s 2021 Anthropology and Conservation conference at the “Living with Diversity in a More-than-human World” panel. In this talk, I discuss a multispecies community in the Texas Hill Country, centering on human-javelina relations.

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  • “Of People and Peccaries: Perception and Politics in the Texas Hill Country” Transcript (RAI Anthropology and Conservation 2021)

    Presentation Slides: INTRODUCTION On my first day of fieldwork, I climbed a steep hill where my collaborator, Roger, reported a group of javelinas lived on his property. As I crested the hill, I noticed shapes obscured in the shade of the Ashe juniper trees. Unsure at first, I was met by a musky smell followed

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  • My Reflections Two Years After Surviving a Classroom Shooting

    Today marks two years since a classroom shooting happened while teaching my final class at University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Six students were shot, two of which did not make it. I wrote about my thoughts and experience a few days after it occurred: The Story of a Mass Shooting Survivor and Anthropologist I’ve

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  • A Brief Lindbergh Update

    One of my more popular posts of late has been The Fall and Rise of Lindbergh: A Javelina Story. In that post, I tell the story of a javelina in one of the groups that I work with in the Texas Hill Country. In brief, Lindbergh was outcast from their group and I recount the

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  • The Fall and Rise and Lindbergh: A Javelina Story

    I have been working with javelinas in Texas for nearly a year. My first encounter with them occurred at Big Bend National Park and I have since visited groups all over Texas. The group that I am currently most fond of–partially because they are easiest to hang out with and partially because of the wonderful

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  • Shadows, Ambiguity, and More-Than-Human Politics

    I am currently working on a manuscript exploring the ways that both literal and metaphorical shadows produce ambiguity in more-than-human communities. In order to be participating members of these communities, we have to find ways to engage in a politics that bridges evolutionary, ontological, and perceptual barriers. I attempt to do so through the ethnographic

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  • Adventures with Peccaries: pt. 1

    I am currently in the early stages of designing a multispecies project working with the Cofán, an Indigenous people of Amazonian Ecuador, and two species of peccaries (white-lipped and collared) that inhabit the forest. Peccaries are medium-sized artiodactyls that superficially resemble pigs. However, these are American originals! They differ in many substantial ways from pigs,

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  • Upcoming Pilot Research

    Upcoming Pilot Research

    As of today I have submitted all of the required paperwork (IACUC, Occupational Health, Special Use Permit Application) . I will be collecting data on behavior and the use of space by collared peccaries/javelinas (Tayassu tajacu) at Laguna Atascosa Wildlife Refuge. This pilot study will support a larger research project in Ecuador on multispecies relations

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