Experts Guide

Dixon studies people-plant interactions, past and present. As an ethnobotanist and medical anthropologist, her research interests include human-plant coevolution, landscape reconstruction and the economic and medicinal uses of plants.

Wells is an environmental anthropologist with an interdisciplinary background in the social and natural sciences. His research emphasizes environmental pollution, brownfields challenges, land use legacies, sustainable and equitable development, water/wastewater management and science-policy interactions.

Lende is an expert in biocultural medical anthropology, and his research has focused on substance use and abuse, neuroanthropology, behavioral health, stress, journalism and social media, cybersecurity, public and applied anthropology and interventions in behavioral health.

Himmelgreen is an expert in biological and medical anthropology whose research focuses on food insecurity and hunger, maternal and child health, nutritional assessment, child growth and development, obesity and chronic disease, hypertension and HIV/AIDS prevention.

Mahoney is a cultural and linguistic anthropologist interested in issues of indigeneity, heritage and economic development in East Africa and the United States. He has studied art vendors on the Kenyan coast, farmers experimenting with new agricultural techniques in Eastern Kenya, refugees in Tampa and indigenous peoples in New Hampshire, seeking to frame research participants as knowledgeable sources of crucial information.

O'Leary is an anthropologist and scholar of the human dimensions of water. She leads CRESCENDO (Communicating Research Expansively through Sonification and Community-Engaged Neuroaesthetic Data-literacy Opportunities), an innovative interdisciplinary project that reimagines how environmental data is communicated. CRESCENDO translates complex data from critical issues like harmful algal blooms and red tide into immersive experiences that bridge the gap between scientific research and public understanding.

Castaneda is an immigration expert whose research focuses on critical border studies, legal anthropology, medical anthropology, migration, migrant health, citizenship and the US/Mexico border.

Singh is an expert in anthropology and global health and a cultural studies scholar with expertise in fertility, reproduction and religion in India.

Jayaram's research focus includes migration/mobility, anthropology of Education, the Caribbean and the Americas and political economy. He has conducted fieldwork on Haitian educational and labor migrants to Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic and human rights for Haitian migrants.

Taylor's research is broadly focused on the emergence and maintenance of institutionalized social inequality in the ancient world. Specific areas of focus include linking topics in archaeology to applied anthropology, and she has performed work in areas including North America, Central America and South America, including the far North Coast of Peru.

Pluckhahn's research focuses on Eastern U.S. prehistory, Mesoamerican prehistory, cultural resource management, settlement pattern studies, household archaeology, environmental anthropology, ceramic analysis and GIS applications for anthropology.