research interests

Haiti, Haitians, Haitian Creole, the Caribbean, Latin America, NGOs, Development Anthropology, Anthropology of Development, Ecological Anthropology, Environmental Anthropology, Political Ecology, Vodou (voodoo), Visual Anthropology; ethnographic film, agriculture, farmers, forestry, deforestation, reforestation, trees, restoration ecology, remote sensing, GIS, GPS, statistical analysis, Social Network Analysis, public policy creation and implementation, matrix thinking, anthropological theory, research methods, research design...

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announcements

02/2012 - SAVE THE DATE: April 18: Vodou and Santeria: an Anthropological Overview, by Dr. Gerald Murray

Dr. Murray is Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at the University of Florida. He has over three decades of field work in fifteen different countries. His most extensive research experience has been in Haiti and the Dominican Republic where he planned and directed major agroforestry projects, analyzed land tenure patterns and explored agrarian, ritual, and healing systems. Dr. Murray has written three books, 27 articles and book chapters, and 59 applied anthropological reports. He also has studied fifteen languages (some extinct) and has interviewed and/or conversed in eight.

Venue: This presentation will occur at the Santa Fe College campus. All Spring 2012 lectures will take place from 3:30-5:00 p.m. in P-260

02/2012 - I will be presenting my post-earthquake Haiti research at the 59^th Annual Meeting of the Southeastern Council of Latin American Studies (SECOLAS), The Struggle for Democracy in Latin America. Panel moderated by anthropologist Dr. Gerald Murray.

02/2012 - I have been elected as student board member (2012-2014) to the Society for Anthropological Sciences.

01/2012 - I will be co-hosting the annual Club Creole (Haitian Student Association) Gala event, on January 27^th.

11/2011 - I will be premiering my new mini-ethnographic film on Vodou and trees at the Plants and Religion symposium this December.

10/2011 - Some photos (here, and here) from my research have been entered in an AAA photo contest.

10/2011 - Submitted a 2-part panel entitled GIS, GPS, and Remote Sensing in Anthropological Research to the annual Society for Applied Anthropology meetings in Baltimore.

10/2011 - I will be contributing a short film and some photos on Vodou and trees, through the Vodou Archive Project in the Digital Library of the Caribbean at University of Florida.

9/2011 - Check out my new mini-documentary about Haitian Creole Scrabble.

9/2011 - Elected as the graduate student representative to the Research and Scholarship Council, in the University of Florida faculty senate. The council's area encompasses University policies and procedures relating to research and scholarship, including university-wide research and scholarship initiatives and strategies; research grants and contracts; research infrastructure; and other matters relating to funding or producing scholarship.

8/2011 - Elected as graduate student representative to the Culture and Agriculture section of the American Anthropological Association.

8/2011 - My paper was accepted for the American Anthropological Association annual meeting in Montreal. PAPER: History, Energy, and the Earthquake: The Shaping of the Rural Haitian Energyscape, and the Effects of the Earthquake On Energy Imaginaries (Panel: COME HELL OR HIGH WATER: LEGACIES AND LANDMARKS IN THE CULTURES OF ENERGY). Read the paper abstract here (note: you will need to click the link in the upper-left hand corner)

7/2011 - Vodou Songs in Haitian Creole and English, to which I contributed, is now available from Temple.

6/2011 - Received funding through the Innovation through Institutional Integration (I-Cubed) program--a joint venture of the University of Florida and the National Science Foundation (NSF). This funding will allow me to bring a team of 2 undergraduates and 2 doctoral students to Haiti next summer, to assist me with my dissertation research. Learn more about I-Cubed here, and here.

5-6/2011 - Spent the summer in Haiti, researching the relationship between Vodou and trees.

4/19/2011 - Here is a preliminary look (1 and 2) at my GIS analysis of forest cover related to proximity to major roads, in Aken, Haiti.

NEW - I am looking for partners and funding to help produce Espwa Fe Viv (Hope Makes Us Live): a documentary film about Haitians and trees. Please contact me if you would like to partner in this film production.

3/31/2011 - Elected to a two-year student leadership position in the Society for Applied Anthropology (SfAA): SfAA student vice-president (2011-2012); SfAA student president (2012-2013). Check out our student blog.

03/20/2011 - Received National Science Foundation (NSF) one-time international travel award to conduct research on Haitian symbolism and imbued meaning in trees, in rural Haiti this summer.

-The University of Florida is looking to hire 2 Haitian Creole TAs.

3/01/2011 - Dr. Louise Ivers (1, 2, 3), head of mission for Zanmi Lasante (Partners in Health) and assistant professor at Harvard Medical School will be meeting with our own Haiti Working Group.

-Served as a research associate for a new documentary film about Haiti called Hands That Feed.

1/13/2011 - I am attending and serving as a Student Assistant for the annual Sunbelt Conference, hosted by the International Network for Social Network Analysis. Click here for the program.

12/22/2010 - I will be chairing a panel entitled, From Afghanistan Through Haiti to Katrina: Policy Lessons for Future Disasters at the 2011 Society for Applied Anthropology meeting, in Seattle, WA. Preliminary program here.

10/27/2010 - Interviewed by the Gainesville Sun for an article about the affect of the cholera outbreak on research at UF. Article re-posted here on the Florida State University System.

10/15/2010 - Submitted a paper entitled, After the Earthquake, New Mouths to Feed: How Rural Haitians Shouldered an Unprecedented Urban Out-migration, for presentation at the Society for Applied Anthropology annual meeting, in Seattle, Washington.

10/11/2010 - I will be presenting a paper at the Haitian Studies Association annual meeting, entitled, 30 Years After a Tree-planting Project: A Political Ecology Perspective on Behavior and Land Changes in Rural Haiti, at Brown University. Program schedule here.

07/18/2010 - I am headed to the NSF sponsored Summer Institute in Research Design (SIRD), with H. Russell Bernard, Jeff Johnson, and Susan Weller.

06/15/2010 - I am headed to Haiti in a couple of weeks to do research on earthquake induced changes to household compositions and livelihood strategies.

04/07/2010 - I have been awarded a National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship to continue my research on Haiti through the PhD. See the University of Florida announcement of other 2010 NSF GRF winners here.

03/28/2010 - I will be presenting a paper entitled, Ecological Development in Haiti: Trends of the Early 21st Century, at the annual Society for Applied Anthropology meeting in Merida, Mexico. Schedule [pdf]

03/24/2010 - I will be moderating a round table entitled, The Role of Anthropology in Post-earthquake Haiti, at the annual Society for Applied Anthropology meeting in Merida, Mexico. UPDATE: This round-table is now available as a podcast here.

02/09/2010 - I will be speaking about my research in Haiti and the earthquake at the Civic Media Center on Tuesday, February 9^th. Details.

01/19/2010 - My research referenced at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute and the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies conference, in Panama.

01/14/2010 - Interviewed by ABC News about missing film student in Haiti, after the earthquake. See their film Bound by Haiti here.

2009 (summer) - I (in collaboration with another graduate student) worked on assembling the largest glossary of Haitian Creole words in the world. We then traveling to Haiti with Dr. Benjamin Hebblethwaite to promote his Scrabble as a Tool for Haitian Creole Literacy Project (read about it here, and about the same project in earlier years here). This project is an applied extension of Hebblethwaite scholarly research on that very topic. Finally we expanded on the Haitian Vodou (Voodoo) terms in this glossary for inclusion in Dr. Hebblethwaite s upcoming book (in press) entitled Vodou Songs and Texts in Haitian Creole and English, from Temple University Press, Philadelphia.