I'm generally interested in the sense that people make of place through daily practices, and particularly through relationships and interactions with the wider ecological community. One of the easiest and most enjoyable paths into this is investigating the ethnobotany and cultural biogeography of food plants — since people are often happy to talk about food, and, if nothing else, this leads to new interesting things to eat and drink! As mundane as this may sound, I think it can also lead productively to insights about the persistance of — and people’s ways of understanding — cultural and biological diversity.

I like working in Hawai‘i, the Pacific, Mexico and western north America — largely because of the food, the people, and the land!

Geog 101L: Introduction to the Natural Environment Lab classes (UHM 2008-2010)
Geog x99 (coord.): Field Mapping practicum Continuing Arboretum Tree Survey (09-10)
Geog 365: Geography of the Pacific (UHM Summer 2010)
Geog 368: Geography of Hawai‘i (UHM Fall 2012)
Geog 425: Geography of Film (UHM Summer 2011, Spring 2013))
Guest lectures: Botany 105 (UHM 2003, 2005), Botany 444 (UHM 2004, 2007, 2009)
      Geography 102 (UHM 2010), Biology 123 & Biology 440 (UHM 2012)
Workshop: Installing Open-Source GIS software (UHM Spring 2010)
Workshop: Ethnobotanical filmmaking (UHM 2005, 2007; SEB Chiangmai 2006)
Workshop: NV & Woods Skills Training (various places for EF!, RAG/RAN etc. 1988-1993)

Bot 105: Introduction to Ethnobotany – Honors
Bot 444: Ethnoecology and Conservation - Intensive
Bot 446: Hawaiian Ethnobotany
Biol 440: Psychoactive Plants
Geog/Biol 410: Human Role in Environmental Change
Geog 426: Environment, Resources & Society

The cross-Pacific Nao de China plant exchange workgroup
The Ethnobiological Media Archive
Culinary Practices in Shared Kitchens: a proposal for a collaborative film project
Green Chopsticks: a site examining the impact of disposable chopsticks
Grass Radicals: the barebones layout for a site connecting food, plants and language,
     under the grass radical (艹) used in many Chinese plant names