From the warm sands of the Gulf of Mexico to the frigid shores of the Bering Sea, Laura has lived and learned in a diversity of landscapes and cultures. As a geographer, ethnobotanist, and wilderness educator, Laura has sought to understand how humans have come to make sense of the world around them, be it through storytelling, backcountry field experiences, plant medicine, folk arts or spiritual rituals. Laura’s graduate work in Geography with a focus in the Circumpolar North and ethnobotany, explored the intimate relationships between arctic women and wild berries. While at Sterling, Laura has instructed field courses in the high mountains of the Sierra Nevada, arctic Labrador, Alaska and Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. When not in the field, she has taught classes in Cultural Ecology, Storytelling, Ecology, Research Design and Writing. In these courses students have explored and questioned what they know about the world- how did it come to be, what forces hold it in place, how can they live in accordance with such forces, and how can they authentically articulate their evolving understandings of the world around them.

Profile

Award	Institution
M.A. Geography	Prescott College
B.A. Environmental Studies and Adventure Education	Prescott College

Presentations
“Ethnobotany and Circumpolar Food Sovereignty”- Kuskokwin Campus, University of Alaska, 2013
“A Berried Geography: Fruit from the Circumpolar North” – Vermont Folk Life Symposium, 2013
“Food from the Land: Berries of the North” – Center for Circumpolar Studies, Hardwick, VT, 2012
“Northern Ephemeral Mapping” – The Northeast Association of Experiential Education, Amherst, MA, 2011
"A Storied Landscape: Ethnobotany of the Circumpolar North” – Kuskokwim Campus , University of Alaska, 2011
“Toponyms, Songlines and Story Mapping of Northern Cultures” – Snow Walker Rendezvous, Fairlee, VT, 2010
“The Pre-history of Nordic Skiing” – Snow Walker Rendezvous, Fairlee, VT, 2010
“Gender and Leadership in Outdoor Education”- Northeastern Camp Consortium, 2010
“Traditional Ecological Knowledge and the Alaskan Beluga Whaling Committee” – Northern Studies Lecture Series, 2009
“ The History of Alaska’s Kayaks”- University of Alaska’s Outdoor Adventuring Slideshow Series, 2009
“The Klondike Gold Rush and Early White-water Rafting”- University of Alaska’s Outdoor Adventure Slideshow Series, 2009
“The Changing Geography of the North American Arctic”- Prescott College Geographic Society, 2007
“The Influence of Climate Change in the North American Arctic” – Mobile Sierra Club, 2006

Publications
A Berried Geography: Circumpolar Understandings of Empetrum nigrum, Rubus chamaemorus, and Vaccinium vitis-idaea - JSTOR

Three Books You Recommend?

The Power of Myth by Joseph Campbell – Stories and Storytelling

Kiki: Ten Thousand Years in a Lifetime: A New Guinea Autobiography by Albert Maori Kiki – Cultural Ecology

Research is Ceremony: Indigenous Research Methods by Shawn Wilson- Senior Year Research Project

 

 

Laura's Recent Blog Posts

Melding the Majors: Global Field Studies in Labrador

Posted February 26, 2016 by Laura Beebe read more

Nesting Bird Surveys in the Yukon Delta National Wildlife Refuge

Posted January 22, 2016 by Laura Beebe read more

More Than Just a Board

Posted January 18, 2016 by Laura Beebe read more