Geography of Fishes

Posted on By Amy Freitag
Science

The discipline of geography is one that most people likely dismiss as mapmaking.  Gone is the stodgy cartographer and here is the GIS tech wizard. But outside of very particular applications, do most people really give geography a second thought?  I hope to show through a famous fishery example that the world should give geography more attention – the Peruvian anchovy fishery.

First a bit of context.  Geography is a diverse discipline, spanning applications from environment to physics to cultural anthropology.  At the core of the discipline is the importance of place – something very simple yet very often forgotten.

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Monday Morning Blogaerobics – Aquatic Owls and Cephaloid Overlords

Posted on By Andrew Thaler
Uncategorized

Southern Fried happenings from the weekend of April 24, 2010. On Friday, a Great Horned Owl was driven into the water by a flock of gulls at the Duke Marine Lab. I posted a few picture of it on my twitter feed – The Owl and The Owl Rescuer. XKCD rocked the marine science world … Read More “Monday Morning Blogaerobics – Aquatic Owls and Cephaloid Overlords” »

Epistemological Idioms

Posted on By Amy Freitag
Science

My research is embedded in political ecology. Though no one can agree on an exact definition, suffice it to say that it’s an outgrowth of geography that focuses on human-environment interactions with specific emphasis on the role of power. It’s a field that is deeply academic and there’s nothing like a week of political ecology discussions to send your head spinning. Also, as the field is new, we like to create terms to help define a disciplinary jargon. In addition, the field’s methodology relies on discourse analysis and units of analysis defined by epistemic communities. Therefore at the recent annual meeting of the Annual Association of Geographers, I spent more time than I was willing thinking about word usage and incorporating some new ones into my syntax.

My favorite quote:

“given it’s mainly men climbing, I’d be interested in starting a rumor that it decreases virility but I thought it would be unethical to start a rumor” on feeling the need to help the Australian aboriginal group, the Anangu people, in keeping climbers off their sacred rock formation (Uluru/Ayer’s Rock)

But read on for my collection of a few gems from my colleagues…

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