Geography Commons^™

Maximising The Contributions Of Phd Graduates To National Development: The Case Of The Seychelles, Marina Fatima Confait

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) degree is the pinnacle of educational attainment and the most respected of the doctoral programs. The degree certifies the holder as an independent researcher, an expert with extensive knowledge about the chosen field of study, and a professional with a wide range of transferable skills . As such, PhD graduates have the capability to make important contributions to knowledge and drive change in society. Furthermore, PhD graduates represent accumulated human capital, a valuable human resource with potential for making significant contributions to a country’s development. This can materialise through enhancing the knowledge of others, performing …

Reducing Uncertainties In Applying Remotely Sensed Land Use And Land Cover Maps In Land-Atmosphere Interaction: Identifying Change In Space And Time, Yaqian He, Timothy A. Warner, Brenden E. Mcneil, Eungul Lee

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

Land use and land cover (LULC) data are a central component of most land-atmosphere interaction studies, but there are two common and highly problematic scale mismatches between LULC and climate data. First, in the spatial domain, researchers rarely consider the impact of scaling up fine-scale LULC data to match coarse-scale climate datasets. Second, in the temporal domain, climate data typically have sub-daily, daily, monthly, or annual resolution, but LULC datasets often have much coarser (e.g., decadal) resolution. We first explored the effect of three spatial scaling methods on correlations among LULC data and a land surface climatic variable, latent heat …

Temporal Changes In Submarine Groundwater Discharge In A Georgia Salt Marsh, Tanner C. Avery, Jacque L. Kelly

Earth, Environment & Sustainability: Faculty Presentations (1988-2022)

No abstract provided.

Learning To Live With Wolves: Community-Based Conservation In The Blackfoot Valley Of Montana, Seth M. Wilson, Elizabeth H. Bradley, Gregory A. Neudecker

Human–Wildlife Interactions

We built on the existing capacity of a nongovernmental organization called the Blackfoot Challenge to proactively address wolf (Canis lupus)-livestock conflicts in the Blackfoot Valley of Montana. Beginning in 2007, wolves started rapidly recolonizing the valley, raising concerns among livestock producers. We built on an existing program to mitigate conflicts associated with an expanding grizzly bear population and worked within the community to build a similar program to reduce wolf conflicts using an integrative, multi-method approach. Efforts to engage the community included one-on-one meetings, workshops, field tours, and regular group meetings as well as opportunities to participate in …

Small Schools And The Issue Of Scale, Patricia A. Wasley, Michelle Fine

Occasional Paper Series

Wasley and Fine write this essay to respond to the oft-heard claim that small schools are not a systemic reform strategy. They argue, instead, that there is now a broad professional and community consensus for small schools; major policy moves within urban, suburban, and rural communities are being advanced to create and maintain small schools, and substantial social science evidence documents the efficiency and equity potential of small schools .

Mitigating Projected Impacts Of Climate Change And Building Resiliency Through Permaculture: A Community ‘Bee Inspired Gardens’ Movement In The Desert Southwest, Usa, Roslynn Brain, Jeffrey Adams, Jeremy Lynch

Environment and Society Faculty Publications

Permaculture, an integrative design process creating resilient and productive landscapes and communities, can serve as a useful mitigation tool for projected climate change impacts. In the United States, the desert southwest town of Moab, Utah, has employed permaculture design in a community initiative called ‘Bee Inspired Gardens.’ This initiative has harnessed social capital to create resilient landscapes demonstrating pollinator health, water conservation, and perennial food and forage systems. Bee Inspired Gardens have been designed at a University, middle school, charter school, Bureau of Land Management property, hotel, public park, environmental education non-profit, and more. Community members are now harvesting fruit …

Of Rats And Men, Thomas S. Walsh

Capstones

This capstone is a data-driven investigation into New York City's rat problem. By using publicly available government data to map rat activity in NYC, I identified several socio-economic variables that correlate with rat populations at the community district, borough, and city-scale. I used these findings (mainly that rat problems are linked to lower incomes) as the basis of an investigation, which includes interviews with residents, experts, and city officials. Prof. Bobby Corrigan, urban rodentologist and formerly with the NYC Department of Health criticizes the city's efforts for the first time on the record.

https://thomasseiyawalsh.wixsite.com/ratstone

Nature In Deconstruction, Russell Chowdhury

The Transdisciplinary STEAM+ Journal

This 'desconstructive photography' shows how humans interact with nature.

Persuasive Kinship: Human–Plant Relations In Southwest Amazonia, Fabiana Maizza

Tipití: Journal of the Society for the Anthropology of Lowland South America

Based on my ethnographic research with the Jarawara people, an indigenous society in the Southwest Amazonia, the article explores the idea of thinking kinship as persuasion. Among the Jarawara, children can have more than one father, which is well known in Americanist literature, but there would exist as well an original practice what we could call "multi-maternity". I also observe that the Jarawara can have diverse parental relations - some of their children are human, while others are plants. This occurs in a system of raising (nayana) in which children and plants are raised by a father and/or a mother …

Canela Shamanism: Shamans’ Accounts, “Journeying,” And Delimitation Of Shamanic Terms, William H. Crocker

Tipití: Journal of the Society for the Anthropology of Lowland South America

In this article I recount the stories of various shamans I have worked with throughout many decades of fieldwork among the Ramkokamekra-Canela (Eastern Timbira) of central Maranhão state, Brazil. Along with their narratives, I provide ethnographic context in order to address the following questions: (1) Who is a shaman? (2) What is shamanism? Is shamanism better understood (3) as a process or a method that is carried out to achieve certain ends, or is it better understood (4) as a particular set of beliefs associated with particular cultures? Additionally, (5) are altered or shamanic states of consciousness found in Canela …

The Behavioural Response Of Migrating Humpback Whales To A Full Seismic Airgun Array, Rebecca A. Dunlop, Michael J. Noad, Robert D. Mccauley, Eric Kniest, Robert Slade, David Paton, Douglas H. Cato

Anthropogenics and Population Decline Collection

Despite concerns on the effects of noise from seismic survey airguns on marine organisms, there remains uncertainty as to the biological significance of any response. This study quantifies and interprets the response of migrating humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) to a 3130 in³ (51.3l) commercial airgun array. We compare the behavioural responses to active trials (array operational; n = 34 whale groups), with responses to control trials (source vessel towing the array while silent; n = 33) and baseline studies of normal behaviour in the absence of the vessel (n = 85). No abnormal behaviours were recorded …

Progress For Whom, Toward What? Progressive Politics And New York City’S Mandatory Inclusionary Housing, Samuel Stein

Publications and Research

In both its historical Progressive Era roots and its contemporary manifestations, U.S. urban progressivism has evinced a contradictory tendency toward promoting the interests of capital and property while ostensibly protecting labor and tenants, thus producing policies that undermine its central claims. This article interrogates past and present appeals to urban progressive politics, particularly around housing and planning, and offers an in-depth case study of one of the most highly touted examples of the new urban progressivism: New York City’s recently adopted Mandatory Inclusionary Housing program. This case serves to identify the ways in which progressive rhetoric can disguise neoliberal policies. …

Devolution Of Power And Woreda Or District Development In Benshangul Gumuz Regional State: The Case Of Metkel Zone (North West Ethiopia), Aldo Morka Atnafu

International Journal of African Development

Decentralized governance offers opportunities for achieving development through good governance and community participation at the grass root level (Ayenew, 2007). Ethiopia has adopted two phases of decentralization, namely decentralizing of power from the federal government to the regional level and from the regional to the woreda level (Gebre-Egziabher & Berhanu, 2007). Thus, this study has aimed at assessing the effect of the woreda level decentralization on the development of the Metekel zone. In particular, it examines the nature of political, administrative and fiscal decentralization in woredas. The study was conducted in two selected woreda, Bulen and Mandura. Data were collected …

Assessing Preservation Priorities Of Caves And Karst Areas Using The Frequency Of Endemic Cave-Dwelling Species, Eugen Nitzu, Marius Vlaicu, Andrei Giurginca, Ioana N. Meleg, Ionut Popa, Augustin Nae, Ştefan Baba

International Journal of Speleology

Endemic and rare species as bioindicators of habitat vulnerability were used to develop protection and management plans for biotope prioritization (mainly islands habitats, lava tubes or groundwaters). Due to their narrow distribution, the endemic species (species confined to a restricted geographic area) are more susceptible to ecological disequilibrium and habitat loss than the widespread ones. Consequently, endemics become endangered in the context of ecological disturbance caused by anthropogenic pressure, making them suitable candidates to assess environmental preservation needs. Taking into consideration that most of the stygobitic and troglobitic species are endemic and confined to specific karst areas, based on their …

Globalization Tumult And Civilizational Greatness, Pradip N. Khandwalla

Markets, Globalization & Development Review

In the kind of tumultuous, strife-torn, and stressful world we are living in, we need to ask the questions: “Is our civilization moving in the right direction? What makes a civilization great?” Greed for power and greed for money, unless offset by a shared conception of civilizational excellence, often degenerate into widespread corruption, fraud, and violence. In developing countries like India, the challenge is to design a civilization that uses the creativity and enterprise of the market economy, the freedom of choice of democracy, and the altruism of the developmental state – to reverse degeneration and foster social, economic, and …

Collective Narcissism, Anti-Globalism, Brexit, Trump, And The Chinese Juggernaut, Russell Belk

Markets, Globalization & Development Review

Brexit and the election of Trump both relied on a particular type of nationalistic appeal to collective narcissism — an exaggerated emotional belief that the nation’s greatness is being undermined by other nations and other people. This tendency is catered to by appeals to make the nation great again by shutting borders and embracing isolationism while scapegoating refugees and immigrants. The rise of jingoistic leaders like Trump, Putin, and Erdogan can be explained by such appeals. But China, which has long suffered feelings of national humiliation is reacting in quite different ways that embrace globalism, even while rejecting multiculturalism. This …

Globalization: Mere Hiccup, Major Convulsion Or Mega Transformation?, Nikhilesh Dholakia, Deniz Atik

Markets, Globalization & Development Review

No abstract provided.

Global Production Networks, Foreign Direct Investment, And Supplier Linkages In The Integrated Peripheries Of The Automotive Industry, Petr Pavlínek

Geography and Geology Faculty Publications

This article examines the regional development effects of foreign direct investment (FDI) in the integrated peripheries of the automotive industry by analyzing supplier linkages between foreign subsidiaries and domestic firms. It develops the spatial concept of integrated peripheries in core-based macroregional production networks. Conceptually, it draws on the dynamic notion of uneven development in contemporary capitalism, namely, on David Harvey’s spatiotemporal fix and on the global production networks concept of strategic coupling to investigate the mode of articulation of integrated peripheries into macroregional production networks. Empirically, it analyzes the quantity and quality of supplier linkages in the automotive industry of …

Canada In A Climate Disrupted World, Simon Dalby, Daniel Scott, Clay Dasilva, Alex Suen

Geography and Environmental Studies Faculty Publications

Climate change has already begun impacting economies and societies across the globe, and its impacts are expected to increase into the future. Adaptation to climate change is and will continue to be one of the greatest policy challenges facing the Canadian government. However, im- portant and much-needed work on understanding the future of climate change has not yet been completed. Gaps remain in the body of academic, government, and other policy-relevant publications. Specifically, there is a relative paucity of research done on the indirect impacts of climate change on Canada. These external impacts outside of Canada’s borders may have second-order …

Enhancing Ontario’S Rural Infrastructure Preparedness: Inter-Community Service Sharing In A Changing Climate — Interim Report 1: Key Informant Interview Results, Bryce Gunson, Brenda Murphy

Social and Environmental Justice Faculty Publications

The purpose of this study is to develop a climate change (CC) prepared inter-community service sharing strategy (ICSS) targeted to rural Ontario communities that capitalizes on infrastructure assessments that are undertaken through the asset management process (AMP). AMP is defined by the Ontario government as “…. the process of making the best possible decisions regarding the building, operating, maintaining, renewing, replacing and disposing of infrastructure assets. It helps prioritize infrastructure needs and ensures that investments are made in the right place and at the right time to minimize future repair and rehabilitation costs.” The objective of AMPs are to maximize …