The Living Forest: A Proposal for Indigenous-Led Conservation and Climate Change Mitigation

In honor of Indigenous Peoples’ Day 2025, the Department of Anthropology is hosting an invited talk with Tulio Viteri, the Director of International Relations for the Indigenous Kichwa community of Sarayaku in the Ecuadorian Amazon. Mr. Viteri will give a presentation on the Living Forest Proposal, a grassroots initiative for Indigenous-led conservation and climate change mitigation.

Tabitha Dentice

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First Name:
Tabitha
Last Name:
Dentice

I graduated with my B.A. in Anthropology with minors in Biological & Medical Anthropology and Italian from UGA in 2025, and through the Double Dawgs program will complete my M.A. in Anthropology here as well. My master’s research is based in the ancient Greek colony of Himera in Sicily. With the guidance of Dr. Laurie Reitsema, I will examine the colony’s weaning practices via stable isotope analysis of dentinal collagen from permanent teeth that form during infancy, focusing on survivorship and mortality.

Cassie Hausdorf

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First Name:
Cassie
Last Name:
Hausdorf

As an entering Ph.D. student in anthropology at UGA, I will be working under Dr. Danielle Riebe to broadly study past human-animal relationships in the Great Hungarian Plain. I received my B.A. at the University of Central Florida, where I studied in the Zavodny Isotope Geochemistry and ZooArchaeology Group Lab. My past research has utilized zooarchaeological methods throughout Cape Canaveral to analyze Native American inhabitation sites, along with identifying faunal bone and teeth from Croatia and processing faunal bones from Hungary for isotopic analysis.

Aiyana Thomas

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First Name:
Aiyana
Last Name:
Thomas

Aiyana Thomas is a Ph.D. student researching human-environment interactions in coastal regions, primarily the Gulf and Atlantic coasts of the U.S., through zooarchaeological and isotopic analyses. Under the guidance of Dr. Victor Thompson, Aiyana plans to evaluate how archaeological investigations paired with historic and present-day data can expand the current understanding of environmental change in coastal landscapes throughout history.

PhD Candidate Receives National Science Foundation Grant for Research on Understanding the Interface of Diplomacy, Politics, and Conservation

Three people—an elderly man, a young boy, and another adult man—stand in conversation on a dry, open landscape scattered with low shrubs. They wear traditional light-colored clothing and hold wooden walking sticks. In the background, multiple large wind turbines rise across the horizon under a partly cloudy sky, suggesting a juxtaposition of local community life and renewable energy development. A few goats can be seen grazing in the distance.

Asif Ali Sandeelo, a fifth-year PhD candidate in the Integrative Conservation (ICON) and Anthropology program at UGA, has received a Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grant (DDRIG) from the National Science Foundation (NSF) for his project titled “A Political Bird: Elite Falconry, Wildlife Laws and Marginalized Communities of Sindh, Pakistan”.

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