Shane A. Scaggs
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I am a PhD candidate and NSF Graduate Research Fellow in the Department of Anthropology at the Ohio State University where I work in the Human Complexity Lab. My research focuses on the social and ecological dynamics of human subsistence activities (e.g., cultivation, foraging, exchange). I am conducting my dissertation research in southern Belize, where I have previously conducted fieldwork with my advisor, Sean Downey.
I have a master of science in Applied Anthropology from Oregon State University where I worked with Drew Gerkey, and conducted fieldwork with the Division of Subsistence, a branch of the Alaska Department of Fish & Game. In my thesis at Oregon State, I used network modeling to characterize the relationship between subsistence harvest diversity and resource sharing in a network of rural Alaskan households.
Harrison Fried
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I am a graduate research fellow in the School of Environment and Natural Resources at The Ohio State University and I am interested in how people manage ecological processes. My master’s research, which is advised by Dr. Ramiro Berardo and Dr. Matthew Hamilton, focuses on a social-ecological network depicting climate change adaptation in Ohio. The guiding question of my research is to determine under what conditions environmental stakeholders manage for ecological interdependencies. My research interests in local environmental protection are heavily shaped by my undergraduate thesis experience, in which I studied how human-induced environmental stressors impact fish in Lake Erie.
Chelsea E. Hunter
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Chelsea joined Ohio State’s Anthropology PhD program in 2019. Prior to joining OSU, Chelsea earned her B.A. from Portland State University in 2013. While at PSU, she conducted research on fair trade cocoa farming and social, ecological, and environmental sustainability in Ghana, West Africa. Hunter went on to earn an MA in Applied Anthropology from San Diego State University in 2017. While there, she worked on an interdisciplinary research project on coral reef resilience in Moorea, French Polynesia. While at SDSU, she was named an Inamori Fellow – a university wide award granted to ten graduate students. Hunter graduated as the Anthropology Department’s “Outstanding Graduate Student”. Between completing her MA and starting her PhD, Chelsea completed a post-master’s scholarship on resilience and adaptive capacity following the 2015 Nepal Earthquakes. Her dissertation research examines the intersection of co-management and Indigenous sovereignty on land-and-sea conservation projects in the South Pacific. Her research has been funded by the Elizabeth A. Salt Anthropology Travel Award, the OSU Office of International Affairs, and the National Science Foundation.
Drew Gerkey
I am an ecological anthropologist. My research focuses on the emergence and stability of cooperation and collective action. I have conducted research primarily with communities of salmon fishers and reindeer herders on the Kamchatka Peninsula in Northeast Siberia. Recently, I initiated several research projects across the Pacific in Alaska.
My research combines qualitative and quantitative ethnographic methods to examine subsistence activities, market expansion, natural resource use, social networks, institutions, social movements, and sustainability.
Prior to joining Oregon State, I was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Maryland’s National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center (SESYNC) and the University of Washington Department of Anthropology.
Jordan Inskeep
I am a master’s student in the School of Environment and Natural Resources at the Ohio State University. My research is focused on collaboration and learning in environmental policy networks. Particularly, I am interested in the development of theory grounded tools which help policymakers and community stakeholders develop more collaborative and community engaged decision making processes. I am currently working in the Socio-Environmental Networks and Sustainability (SENS) Lab with Dr. Matt Hamilton where we are studying policy learning and diffusion in wildfire risk mitigation networks. I have broad interest in complex governance, social learning, text analysis and natural language processing, and network analysis.
Nicolás Gómez Andújar
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I am a recent graduate from Oregon State University, Marine Resource Management master’s program. My research interests span adaptive governance of marine socio-ecological systems in the Caribbean, with a focus on network approaches to understand the livelihoods and socio-ecological depencies of artisanal fisherfolk. I serve as co-founder and coordinator of Asociación Pesquera de Culebra, a non-profit fishing collective in my home island municipality of Culebra Puerto Rico, where I facilitate self-organization of fishers, and conduct actionable community-based research on topics such as climate change adaption, drivers of cooperation, and food sovereignty.
Shuai Cao
I am a Ph.D. student at John Glenn College of Public Affairs, Ohio State University. My research orientations include policy process, public management, and network analysis in the context of energy and environment. I’m now working on policy benchmarking and learning networks among U.S. states.