Professor, Sociology and Anthropology

Professor/Professeure titulaire

Biography    Research activities: Currently Funded Research    Publications    Teaching activities    Participation activities    Previously Funded Projects    Professional Awards    In the News: Mass Media   

Biographic Note

DR. KATJA NEVES is Professor of Sociology and Anthropology at Concordia University, Montreal, Canada. With Gregory Bateson’s thinking as the basis of her epistemological approach, Professor Neves is passionate in her quest to understand the socio-ecological dynamics by means of which we live within our planet’s more than human world. Her earlier work studied the social, political, historical, and cultural ecologies of human relations with whales and dolphins in the Azores, Portugal, vis-à-vis neoliberal co-optations of marine biodiversity conservation. Theoretically grounded in social studies of science, critical environmental studies, and political ecology, Professor Neves’s more recent research has focused on the reinvention of botanic gardens as significant agents in the governance of biodiversity conservation. Generously financed by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC Canada), this research has resulted in a single authored 2019 book with State University New York Press (SUNY) titled “Postnormal Conservation: Botanic Gardens and the Reordering of Biodiversity Governance”. Professor Neves is currently writing a new book tentatively titled “Cultivating the ‘Anthropocene’: Ecologies, Aesthetics, and Political Economies of Suburban Gardening”. Professor Neves has also started a new multi-media, multi-stakeholder, project that explores the challenges, conundrums, and rewards of teaching and learning in the ‘Anthropocene’. 

SSHRC Insight Grant 2016-2021 Summary Description

Natural resources, biodiversity, and conservation became increasingly important loci of governance throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. Environmental governance continues to grow in importance in light of now ubiquitous concerns about global climate change, biodiversity loss, and shifting geo-political interests pertaining to purportedly untapped natures. In this context the range of actors with stakes in environmental governance is fast expanding with institutions such as the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), botanic gardens, seed banks, arboreta, natural science museums, and zoos being (re)invented as key players in biodiversity conservation. Recent scholarly contributions have focused on accounting for the politics of representation and knowledge that these transformations entail. However, an international SSHRC-funded conference we organized in the Fall of 2014 concluded that comprehensive scholarly scrutiny of these institutions as a new class of environmental governance actors remains incipient. The conference also confirmed the urgent need for scholarly theorization of these emerging agents of biodiversity conservation given the considerable scope of their influence on environmental governance. 

        Lead by Dr. Neves this collaborative research project redresses this gap, with botanic garden biodiversity conservation governance as a starting point. To be sure, botanic gardens have taken pole position in the governance of plant biodiversity conservation on national and transnational levels. The Convention on Biodiversity Conservation (CBD) and the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) have mandated botanic gardens with crucial biodiversity conservation tasks. National governments, including the government of Canada, rely on botanic garden networks to help develop and implement core conservation mandates. With botanic gardens assuming such central positions in environmental governance the following core questions inform the research project here proposed: 1) How do distinct botanic gardens, national governments, and international institutions conceptualize botanic garden biodiversity governance and to what effects? 2) How do different biodiversity discourses inform this governance and how are they spatialized along power relations within and between botanic gardens? 3) How do disparate botanic garden conservation rationalities materialize in the production of natures, educational curriculum and practices, and what knowledge-power dynamics do these processes entail?

        Building on several successful SSHRC-funded projects by the PI (Dr. Katja Neves) and the research project’s team members “Botanic Gardens and the Politics of National and Transnational Environmental Governance” proposes a groundbreaking interdisciplinary approach to newly emerging systems of environmental governance. It submits the first comprehensive study of the national and global arrangements of governance that have coalesced around Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI) and member botanic gardens. The project also distinguishes itself by its innovative methodological approach and extensive student training at university levels that range from the undergraduate to the post-doctoral. Its findings will be of great relevance to established scholars, students, NGOs, governments, and the general public which are all increasingly asked to participate in conservation. In the final instance the project will lay the foundation for an expanded international collaborative program of research that will tackle comparatively natural science museums, zoos, arboreta, and seed banks. 

Refereed Journal Articles and Book Chapters

SINGLE AUTHORED SCHOLARLY BOOKS

• R Neves, Katja (in preparation) Cultivating the Anthropocene: Cars, Lawns, and Gardens in Canada’s Suburban Capital of the Automobile. For submission to Duke University Press.

• R Neves, Katja 2019 Postnormal Conservation: Botanic Gardens and the Reordering of Biodiversity Governance. New York: State University New York Press (SUNY).

EDITED COLLECTIONS

• R Aprahamian, S.; Neves, K.; Rapport, N. eds. 2009 Human Nature/Human Identity: Anthropological Revisionings. Special Issue of the official journal of the Canadian Anthropology Society, Anthropologica.
• R Reuter and Neves, K. eds. 2007 Genes and Society. Special Issue Canadian Review of Sociology and Anthropology Volume 44. Nr.

JOURNAL ARTICLES, BOOK CHAPTERS, ENCYCLOPEDIA ARTICLES 

• R Neves, Katja 2019 Governing Biodiversity Conservation at the Intersection of ‘Scientific’ and ‘Traditional’ Local Knowledge: A Critical Approach. IN: Environmental knowledge at the boundary between science and politics. Cambridge University Press. Tuinstra, Willemijn with Esther Turnhout & Willem Halffman guest authors.
• R Esther Turnhout and Neves, Katja 2019 Theorizing the Intersection of Scientific, Traditional, and Local Knowledge in Science Policy Frameworks. IN: Environmental knowledge at the boundary between science and politics. Cambridge University Press. Tuinstra, Willemijn with Esther Turnhout & Willem Halffman guest authors.
• R Neves, Katja 2017 Confronting the Invisibility of Resistance to Nature Neoliberalization Dynamics: Re-theorizing the politics of abeyance, everyday practice, and performative agency in environmental conservation organizations. Geoforum.  Volume 98, Pp. 254-263. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2017.08.007
• Neves, Katja 2016 The Art of Seeing: Grasping More-Than-Human Plant Worlds beyond Objectified ‘Nature' Blog-post for Scholarly Journal Environment and Society http://www.envirosociety.org/2016/07/the-art-of-seeing-grasping-more-than-human-plant-worlds-beyond-objectified-nature/
• R Ingham. James and Neves, Katja 2015 Whales, tourism and manifold capitalist fixes: New relationships with the driving force of capitalism. IN: Kevin Markwell Editor. Birds, Beasts and Tourists: Human-Animal Relations in Tourism.
• R Neves, Katja 2015 Horta: notes on an invaluable legacy.  Dodman ed. Special Issue of Mundo Acoreano. http://www.mundoacoriano.com/index.php?mode=noticias&action=show&id=752
• R Castree, Noel et al. (incl Neves, Katja) 2014 Changing the Intellectual Climate. Nature and Climate Change. Vol. 4, Nr. 9 Pp. pp763 - 768. 
• R Turnhout, Esther Neves, Katja, Buizer Marleen 2014 Measurementality in biodiversity governance: the connection of scientific and neoliberal discourses in the Intergovernmental science-policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). Environment and Planning D. Vol 46. Nr 3, Pp. 581-597. 
• R Neves, Katja 2014  A Grande Saga Wollemi: Entre a Preservação de Genoma e a Conservação Consumista. Memorias Special Journal Issue on Environmental Anthropology. Casanova, Catarina ed. Pp. 48-61.
• Neves, Katja 2014 Blog-post for Scholarly Journal Environment and Society Reproducing Empire, Subverting Hegemony? Botanic Gardens and Biodiversity Conservation. http://www.envirosociety.org/2014/12/reproducing-empire-subverting-hegemony-botanic-gardens-in-biodiversity-conservation/
• R Turnhout, Esther Neves, Katja, and Waterton, Claire 2013 Rethinking biodiversity: from goods and services to ‘living with’. Conservation Letters. Vol. 6 Pp. 154-161.
• R Neves, Katja 2013 The Politics UNESCO’s Shift Towards Intangible Heritage Sites and their Strategic Relevance for the Azores, Porthcurno, Newfoundland Partnership Barreios, Henrique eds Journal of the University of the Azores. Pp. 147-153.
• R Neves, K. 2012 The New Roles of Botanical Gardens in Biodiversity Conservation. Encyclopedia of Global Climate Change. Paul Robbins. ed. Sage Publications Online Encyclopedia.
• R Neves, Katja 2012 The Articulation of Azorean Insularity in the Early 1990s as a Strategic Source of Power within the European Union’s Agricultural Policy. Journal Boletim do Nucleo Cultural da Horta Special Issue. Pp. 87-110.
• R Neves, K. and Igoe, J. 2012 Accumulation by Dispossession and Uneven Development: A Cross Comparative Analysis. Invited Article for Special Issue of Journal of Economic and Social Geography. Busher and Arsel Eds. Pp. 164-179.
• R Fletcher, Rob and Neves, Katja 2012 Contradictions in Tourism: The Promises and Pitfalls of Ecotourism as a Manifold Capitalist Fix Environment and Society: Advances in Research. Vol 3, Sep. Pp. 60-77.
• R Büsher, B., Brockington, D., Neves, K., Igoe, J., Sullivan, Sian. 2011 Neoliberal Biodiversity Conservation: Towards a Synthesized Critique. Capitalism Nature Socialism. September 2011 Pp. 4-30.
• R Neves, Katja 2011 The Production of Modernity in Classic American Whaling. Reading Sociology. Pp. 66-71. Lorne Tepperman ed. Oxford; Oxford University Press.
• R Neves, K. 2011 A Dual Coiled Phenomenon: Atlantic Telegraphic Cable Companies and the Dynamics of Cosmopolitanism in Horta - Azores. Special Issue On Azores and the Socio-History of Cable Communications by Centro de Estudos Sociedade Acoreana, Horta. Pp. 134-156.
• R Neves, Katja 2010 Critical Business Uncritical Conservation: The Invisibility of Dissent in the World of Marine Ecotourism. Current Conservation. January Issue. Pp. 18-21.
• R Neves, K. 2010 Cashing in on Cetourism: A Critical Engagement with Dominant E-NGO Discourses on Whaling, Cetacean Conservation, and Whale Watching. Special Issue Antipode on Capitalism and Conservation. Vol. 42, Nr 3, Pp. 719-741.
• R Igoe, J. Neves, K., Brockington, D. 2010 A Spectacular Eco-Tour around the Historic Bloc: Theorising the Convergence of Biodiversity Conservation and Capitalist Expansion. Special Issue Antipode on Capitalism and Conservation. Vol. 42, Nr 3, Pp. 486-512.
• R Neves, K. 2009 Urban Botanical Gardens and the Aesthetics of Ecological Learning: A Theoretical Discussion and Preliminary Insights from Montreal’s Botanic Garden. IN: Aprahamian, S.; Neves-Graca, K.; Rapport, N. eds. Pp. 145-157. Human Nature/Human Identity: Anthropological Revisionings. Special Issue Anthropologica 51 Pp. 145-157.
• R Neves-Graca, K. 2008 Animals and Global Warming (4000 words). SAGE Reference project: Encyclopedia of Global Warming and Climate Change. Maria Siano Ed. Sage Publications
• R Neves-Graca, K. 2008 Portugal and Global Warming (500 words). SAGE Reference project: Encyclopedia of Global Warming and Climate Change. Maria Siano Ed. Sage Publications.
• R Neves-Graca, K. 2008 Special Whaling Issue Journal of Maritime Studies. Expert commentary on Professor Van Ginkel’s article ‘Gentle Giants, Barbaric Beasts and Whale Warriors. Contentious Traditions, Eco-Political Discourse and Identity Politics’.
• R Neves-Graca K. 2007 Elementary Methodological Tools for a Recursive Approach to Human-Environmental Relations. Chapter VIII, IN: Keck and Wassmann eds. Research Methods. Series: Person, Space, and Memory in the Contemporary Pacific: The Experience of New Worlds. New York, Oxford: Berghan Books. 
• R Reuter, S. and Neves-Graca, K. eds. 2007 Introduction. Genes and Society. Special Issue Canadian Review of Sociology and Anthropology Volume 44. Nr. 1.
• R Neves-Graca, K 2007 Animals (5000 words). Encyclopedia of Environment & Society. Paul Robbyns. ed. Sage Publications
• R Neves-Graca K. 2007 Hunting (1000 words). Encyclopedia of Environment & Society. Paul Robbins. ed. Sage Publications
• R Neves-Graca, K. 2006 Politics of Environmentalism and Ecological Knowledge at the Intersection of Local and Global Processes. Journal of Ecological Anthropology. Volume 10: 19-32.
• R Neves-Graca 2006 Dynamic Intersections of Relational Ontologies and Objectified Identities: The Whalers’ Ritual in Lajes do Pico. Pp. 67-90 Chapter II IN: Klaus-Peter Koepping, Bernhard Leistler, Michael Rudolph (eds). Rituals and Identity: Performative Practices as Effective Transformations of Social Reality? Series: Intercultural Studies on Ritual, Play and Theatre. Volume 8. Lit. Verlag (Press): Muenster, Hamburg, Berlin, Vienna, London.
• R Neves-Graca, K. 2005 Chasing Whales with Bateson and Daniel. Ecological Humanities Corner of the Australian Humanities Review Journal. Issue 35, June 2005. Online publication. 
• R Neves-Graca, K. 2004 Revisiting the Tragedy of the Commons: Whale Watching in the Azores and its Ecological Dilemmas. Human Organisation. Vol 63, Nr 3: 289-300.
• R Neves-Graca, K. 2003 Investigating Ecology: Cognition in Human-Environmental Relationships. IN: Meusburger, P. und Schwan, T., eds. Humanökologie: Ansätze zur Überwindung der Natur-Kultur-Dichotomie. (Human Ecology: Towards Overcoming the Nature-Culture Dichotomy). Steiner Verlag, Stuttgart, Erdkundliches Wissen Bd. 135: 287-307.

Courses Design and Teaching, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec

- Contemporary Cultural Theory SOCI 403 (2015; 2016; 2018)

- The Governance of 'Nature' and the nature of Governance: Botanic Gardens, Natural Science Museums, and Zoos. SOCI/ANTH 398 (2018)

- Nature, Conservation, Development, and Capitalism SOCI 637 2012; 2013

- Contemporary Issues in Economy, Society, and Biodiversity SOCI/ANTH 277 (2014; 2015; 2017;  2019)

- Contemporary Socio-Environmental Issues SOCI/ANTH 319 (2011-2012; 2013; 2014; 2015; 2017; 2019)

- Qualitative Research Methods, SOCI 613 (Graduate Level), 2010; 2012

- Qualitative Research Methods, SOCI 415, 2004-2010; 2012-2013

- Undergraduate Honors Seminar, SOCI 409, 2007-2009

- Self and Subjectivity: Human-Environment, SOCI 652, 2007

- Environmental Sociology, SOCI 398, 2005-2007

- Graduate Colloquium, SOCI 660, 2005-2006

- Introduction to Society, SOCI 203, 2004-2005

Course Design and Teaching, Institute fuer Ethnology, Ruprecht-Karls University of Heidelberg, Germany

Maritime Anthropology, 2004

- Theory, Practice, Knowledge and Power, 2004

- Anthropology and Literature, 2003-2004

- Conducting Preliminary Research in Anthropology, 2003-2004

- Anthropological Approaches to Contemporary Issues, 2003

- Reflecting Anthropology: History of Anthropology through the Lives of Anthropologists, 2004

- Anthropology of Museums, 2002-2003

- Culture, Identity, and Tradition: Reappraisal, 2002-2003

- Writing Ethnography, 2002

- Research Methods, 2002

- Advanced Theoretical Anthropology, 2001-2002

- Environmental Anthropology, 2001-2002

Guest Talks, Conference Organization, and Regular Conference Papers

Conference/Panel Organization 

• 2018 Panel Organizer Pondering New Social Roles, Diversity, and Inclusion at Botanical Gardens. Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI) 10th Education Congress. Warsaw, Poland September 13th. 
• 2017 Panel Organizer (with Peter Stoett as co-organizer) The Role of Botanic Gardens as Networking Agents. Side Event COP-13 Conference of the Parties of the Convention on Biological Diversity Cancun Mexico http://cop13.mx/en/cop-13/ 
• Co-organizer of 7 Panels Association of American Geographers- AAG 2015 with Neera Tsing Affective Ecologies, Living Economies and Alternate Ways of Valuing Nature. May Chicago.
• Principal Organizer International Conference, Leaders in Conservation: Botanic Gardens and Biodiversity in the 21st Century, Concordia University 2014 http://leadersinconservation.wordpress.com 
• Conference Program Committee 2012 Canadian Sociological Association Annual Meetings (at University of Waterloo, Ontario).
• Conference Program Committee 2011 Canadian Sociological Association Annual Meetings' (at Waterloo, Ontario).
• Session Organizer End of Sales? Reclaiming Conservation as a Human-Nature Affair. For Conference Nature Inc International Conference at the Institute of Social Studies Busher, Arsel, Spoor, Dressler, And Brockington Organizers. Then Hague Netherlands June 30th 2011.
• Session Co-Organizer with Esther Turnhout Regimes of Transparency: Knowledge, Standards, Politics and Commodification. For Conference Nature Inc International Conference at the Institute of Social Studies Busher, Arsel, Spoor, Dressler, And Brockington Organizers. Then Hague Netherlands June 30th 2011.
• Session Co-organizer with Marc Watson (Concordia University), Hunting in the Shadows, Subsisting at the Margins? CASCA, Montreal, June 2nd, 2010.
• Session Co-organizer (with Bram Busher International Institute of Social Studies, The Hague, and Jim Igoe Dartmouth University). Appropriation for Appreciation: Exploring the changing nature of neoliberal conservation for Nature-Society interactions”, for the conference, A Brief Environmental History of Neoliberalism, May 6-8, 2010 at Lund University, Sweden.
• Member of the Canadian Sociological Association Annual Meetings' Conference Program Committee 2010 (at Concordia Montreal).
• American Anthropology Association (AAA) Double Panel — Main Organizer (with Jim Igoe, Dartmouth College), Philadelphia, 2009‘Chronicle of a Death Foretold: Neoliberal Conservation at the end of Neoliberalism?’
• Canadian Sociological Association (CSA), Invited Panel Genes and Society, Vancouer, 2008.
• Modern Dialogues: The Paradoxes and Violence of Modernity, Concordia University, Montreal — Co-organizer (with Meir Amor), 2008
• Canadian Anthropology Society (CASCA) Annual Meeting, Concordia University, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Montreal — Member of Executive Committee,, 2006
• American Anthropology Association (AAA), Bateson and Aesthetics Conference — Co-organizer (with Michael Nijarhwan), Berkeley University, California, 2004 Presidential Session Bateson’s Centennial

Conference Presentations and Guest Talks

• 2018 “Beyond the Greenhouse”: Situating the Reinvention of Botanic Gardens as Socially Purposed Institutions of Plant Conservation. Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI) 10th Education Congress. Warsaw, Poland September 13th.
• 2017 Guest presenter for social sciences module of the 2017 QCBS Biodiversity (November 13-22) at Mont-St-Hilaire Quebec. 
• 2017 Keynote Gehman Memorial Lecture. Post-Normal Conservation: Environmental Governance, Botanic Gardens and the Anthropocene. The University of Western Ontario, London Ontario. 
• 2017 Guest Talk Post-Normal Conservation: Re-Ordering of Biodiversity Governance.  For special event titled Re-Inventing Food Systems Through Agri-Environmental Governance. Jeremy Forney Organizer. Université de Neuchâtel, Institut d’ethnologie. Neuchâtel Switzerland. September 13th. 
• 2017 American Public Gardens Association. Presentation titled: Identifying Needs and Potential Partners: Lessons Learned from Botanic Gardens. For panel titled The Role of Public Gardens in Revitalizing Communities. Organized by Don Rakow.  Hamilton Ontario 19th-23rd of June.
• 2017 Guest talk Weeds, Weeding, and the Politics of Mars-topia. Graduate Student Association Sociology and Anthropology (SAGSA) Concordia. Conference To Boldly Go: Reflections on New World Possibilities. Concordia University, Montreal, March 25th.
• 2016 Guest Talk Rights to Nature in the Anthroposcene: Re-orderings and re-appropriations. Special Geoforum Conference: Rights to Nature: Tracing Alternative Political Ecologies Against the Neoliberal Environmental Agenda. Cambridge University UK 23-24 June.
• 2016 Mainstreaming Biodiversity: Conservation as Socio-Ecological Engagement. For panel titled Management and Sustainable Valorisation of Plant Diversity in Tropical Regions, Needs and Existing Programs. Organized by Stéphanie Ardila-Chauvet and Jean-Pierre Profizi. Tenth Meeting of the Subsidiary Body on Scientific, Technical and Technological Advice (SBSTTA 20). Subsidiary Body on Implementation SBI1. Organized by Convention on Biodiversity Conservation Montreal. Montreal  26th April.

• 2015 Guest talk Biodiversity Conservation: Human Non-Human Intersection. Keynote Guest Presenter. Quebec Centre for Biodiversity Science; Biodiversity Science Intensive course (http://qcbs.ca/training/intensive-cours/biodiversity-science-school/) October 28 Gault Nature Reserve Quebec. 
• 2015 Session Convener Leaders in Conservation: Botanic Gardens and Biodiversity Conservation in the 21st Century. Botanic Gardens Conservation International. Biannual Education Congress May St Louis. 
• 2015 Post-Normal Environmentality, Affect, and Eco-Citizenship. ��������American Geographers Association Annual Meetings Chicago May. Paper Presented at Affective Ecologies, Living Economies and Alternate Ways of Valuing Nature. Sing and Neves Organizers 7 panels. April Chicago.
• 2015 Presenter Author Meets Critique for 2 books at ��������American Geographers Association Annual Meetings Chicago. Collard Organizer. April Chicago.
• 2015 Guest Talk New Dynamics of Biodiversity Conservation in a Neoliberal World. Paper presented at Closing the Loop Symposium McGill University, March 13th, Montreal.
• 2014  Plant Biodiversity Conservation as Human Mental-Health Intervention? More than Human Communication, Affect, and Civic Environmentalism at the Bristol Zoo Gardens  December at the American Anthropological Association AAA in Washington DC US. Session Plants & Health: Producing Anthropologies at the Human-Environment-Health Nexus Liz Olson Organizer. December 5th
• 2014 Leaders in Conservation: Botanic Gardens and Biodiversity Conservation in the 21st Century. Paper Presented at: Leaders in Conservation: Botanic Gardens and Biodiversity in the 21st Century, Concordia University 2014 http://leadersinconservation.wordpress.com Concordia University Montreal October 24th
• 2014 The Emergence of Botanic Gardens as Key Actors in Environmental Governance. Guest Presentation for Peter Stoett POLI SCI 394 Lecture Fev (also recorded for future online course) Fev 11th 
• 2014 Botanic Gardens, Community, Health, and Well Being. Concordia University: Guest Lecture for Online Course by Prof. Rosemarie Shade. Loyc 398E/Loyc 398J Sustainability and Community July 29th 

• 2014 Re-grafting the Modern Constitution:  Politics of Science and Socio-Nature in the World of Botanic Garden Biodiversity Conservation. Technology and Science II. Session organized by Marion Blute. Canadian Sociological Association. St. Catherine’s May 30th
• 2014 A Difference that Makes a Difference? Infrastructure/Environment and the Politics of Re-Inventing the Botanic Garden as Global Biodiversity Conservation Leader. Infrastructure and Environment. Session Organized by Kregg Heatherington. Canadian Anthropological Society (CASCA), Toronto, May 2nd, 2014.
• 2014 The Emergence of Botanic Gardens as Key Actors in Environmental Governance. Videorecorded guest lecture for Dr Peter Stoett online course. POLI 394 Globalization and Development, Feb 11. At Concordia University, Montreal.
• 2014 Partnering-up for Sustainable Futures: Eco-citizenry and the Governance of Urban Biodiversity Conservation. Partnerships for the Living City Conference. Loyola Sustainability Research Centre. Concordia University Montreal, March 7th. 
• 2013 Invited Keynote Speaker Bristol Zoo Gardens Biodiversity Conservation Series Eco-citizenry at Botanic Gardens: Engaging Wider Publics to Practice and ‘Produce’ Biodiversity in Urban Environments. July 17th Bristol, UK
• 2013 Bio Politics of Nature Conservation at Botanic Gardens and the Contemporary Politics of Austerity. At conference Grabbing Green Conference. University of Toronto, Canada. May 19. 
• 2013 Invited Speaker Cultivating Nature Nurturing Eco-citizenry. At PlanNetwork Conference.  April 11-12. (http://plantnetwork.org/meetings/conferences/urban-public-gardens-challenges-and-opportunities/) University of Cambridge, UK.
• 2012 Bodies do Matter: Fantasy, Desire, and ‘Pseudocatharsis’ in Environmental Governance. With Rob Fletcher. Association of American Geographers. Session Grabbing ‘Green’: Markets, Environmental Governance and the Materialization of Natural Capital II - Theories of Neoliberal Governance and Political Ecology Specialty Group. February 26th.
• 2012 Keynote Guest Speaker,  World Submarine Cable Communications as International Cultural Network. Its Potential as Intangible World Heritage. Os Cabos Submarinos como Rede de Comunicacoes Internacionais. Horta Faial Azores. Congress on the International Legacy of the Submarine Telegraphic Communications Era.
• 2011 The commoditization of Nature-Society Unity in the Age of Commercial Environmentalism. James Carrier Session Organizer. Session Tittle: Neoliberalism as Virtualism. At Nature Inc International Conference at the Institute of Social Studies Busher, Arsel, Spoor, Dressler, And Brockington Organizers. Then Hague Netherlands June 2nd.
• 2011 with Esther Turnhout (Wageningen University) Performing transparency and opacity and the building of institutions: the case of the Intergovernmental Science Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) at Session Regimes of Transparency: Knowledge, Standards, Politics and Commodification.Turnhout and Neves Session organizers. At Nature Inc International Conference at the Institute of Social Studies Busher, Arsel, Spoor, Dressler, And Brockington Organizers. Then Hague Netherlands June 30th 2011.
• 2011 Patrimonio Mundial Material/Imaterial: Introducao ao Debate. Horta Faial Azores. Keynote Guest Speaker, Special Session about UNESCO and Horta’s Candidature to World Heritage Site February 28th.
• 2011 Património Mundial Material/Imaterial: Introdução ao Debate. Keynote address at the 2011 Colloquium on Horta’s UNESCO World Heritage Site candidature. Organized by The Azorean Department of oceanography and Horta’s High school Alumni Association March 18th.
• 2010 From Hell to Paradise: The Phenomenal Transfiguration of a Lava Covered Island in the Age of Environmentalism. Paper presented in November at the American Anthropological Association AAA in New Orleans US. Session Natural Circuits: the Political Ecology of Environmental Commodities Molly Doane (University of Illinois at Chicago) and Paige West (Barnard College/Columbia University), Organizers.
• 2010 The Great Botanical Transformation Beyond the Erudite Greenhouse into the Garden. Guest presenter in Leiden Netherlands 23rd Sept. at the International Symposium Living with Biodiversity: People, Knowledge, Politics. Organizers: Esther Turnhout, Associate Professor, Forest and Nature Conservation Policy Group, Wageningen University, the Netherlands Johannes Vogel, Program Leader UK Biodiversity, Natural History Museum, London, United Kingdom, Claire Waterton, Senior Lecturer, Department of Sociology, Lancaster University, United Kingdom
• 2010 Keynote presentation  O Cosmopolitismo e a Horta dos Cabos Submarinos. National Symposium on Horta’s Cable Communications Legacy. Faial, Azores Portugal August 4th.
• 2010 Tackling the environmental politics of conservationist responses to subsistence cetacean hunting in Lajes do Pico, Azores. Paper Presented at the Session Hunting in the Shadows, Subsisting at the Margins? Session organized by Katja Neves and Marc Watson (Concordia University), Canadian Anthropological Society, Montreal, June 2nd, 2010.
• 2010 Poachers and Pirates in the Court of Conservation Spectacle: A Thrilling Tale of the Paradoxical and Ambiguous Limits of International Law on the High Seas. Paper presented at the panel The Society of the Spectacle Reloaded: Movement, Medium, and Message in the 21st Century Canadian Anthropology Society (CASCA) June 3rd Montreal. Session Organizer Craig Proulx.
• 2010 Session Chair at the Canadian Sociological Association’s Annual Meeting (Montreal). Session Organizer Alan Simmons (York University) Session title Nationalism. June 1st
• 2010 Paper presented at the Canadian Sociological Association’s Annual Meeting (Montreal). Session Organizer Marion Blute (University of Toronto) titled The Sociology of Science. Paper title: The Sociology of Science and the Science of Nature Conservation: A Critical Engagement with Marx’s Notion of Agricultural Metabolic Rift vis-a-vis Marine Conservation.  June 1st
• 2010 Paper Present at Session title Appropriation for Appreciation: Exploring the changing nature of neoliberal conservation for Nature-Society interactions”, for the conference, A Brief Environmental History of Neoliberalism, May 6-8, 2010 at Lund University, Sweden. Paper Tittle: There may  be ‘plenty of room at the bottom’ for neoliberal expansion, but only at the expense of ecological connection: The environmental paradoxes of contemporary neoliberalism. 
• 2010 Guest Lecturer at the Toronto Botanical Gardens. Paper title The Role of Urban Botanical Gardens in Teaching and Disseminating Ecological Knowledge.
• 2010 Guest Lecture at Manchester University Development and Environment Institute Graduate Seminar. Paper titled Paradoxical Relations in Human-Cetacean Neoliberal Conservation. February 2010.
• 2010 Guest Speaker at Manchester University. Paper titled Producing Modernity through Classic American Whaling.  February 2010.
• 2010 Guest Speaker at Lancaster University. Paper titled A Whale of a Dilemma: Analyzing the Contemporary Intersection of Capitalism and Nature Conservation. 
• 2009 Paper Presented at the Double Panel Main Organizer (co-organizer Jim Igoe Dartmouth College). Philadelphia. ‘Chronicle of a Death Foretold’: Neoliberal Conservation at the end of Neoliberalism?. Paper Title: Exaggerated News of a Timely Demise: IUCN’s Conservation Categories and the Possibility for Neoliberal Rebirth.
• 2009 Discussant at International web seminar on Dr Dan Brockington’s presentation titled: Celebrity and the Environment. 19th November.  Organized by The Transboundary Protected Areas Research Initiative (TPARI), hosted by the University of Johannesburg, South Africa and the International Institute for Social Studies (ISS), Erasmus University Rotterdam, the Netherlands.
• 2009 Paper Presented at the American Association of Religion. Montreal, November. Session Organizer Jens Kreinacht. Reframing Naven: Bateson’s Ethnography and its Impact on Ritual Theory. Paper Tittle: The Sacredness of Human-Cetacean Unities: Towards a non-Mechanical non-Transcendental Ethnographic Approach. 
• 2009 Keynote paper Presented at the Subsistence Relationships Workshop. Bruce Erickson Organizer, Nippsing University North Bay. Paper Tittle: Hunting in the Shadows, Subsisting at the Margins? Reductionist Understandings of Hunting and Subsistence. Co-authored with Mark Watson (Concordia University).
• 2009 Guest Speaker. Oxford University - UK. Christ Church College. May 25th. Workshop Titled Communicating Environmental Change in the 21 Century: celebrities voices and public engagement. Paper titled: Whaling in the Court of Celebrity Spectacle.
• 2009 Keynote Speaker. 24t-25h February. York University, Center for German Studies. CCGES Transatlantic Forum York University. Paper titled: The Aesthetics and Ethics of Human Non-Human Relations.
• 2008 AAA (American Anthropology Association). November 21st, paper global warming titled: Environmental Entanglements and Ethnographic Conundrums: Towards a Holistic Anthropological Approach to Global Warming
• 2008 Invited Judge Rappaport Prize for the Best Dissertation in the context of Environmental Anthropology.
• 2008 Manchester UK, Invited Paper on Conservation and Capitalism. Paper Titled: Cashing in on Cetourism: A Critical Engagement with Dominant E-NGO Discourses on Whaling, Cetacean Conservation, and Whale Watching.
• 2008 Washington Workshop Disobedient Knowledges. Paper titled The Intersection of Conservation in Marine Protected Areas and Late Capitalist Investment. Held May 2008.
• 2008 Taking the Heat with Iconized Natures. Paper presented at Modern Dialogues: The Paradoxes and Violence of Modernity.  Held March 26th 2008 at Concordia University.
• 2008 Keynote speaker on the Complexity of Global Warming and its Mis-representation in popular Mass Media. At the Champlain University, Quebec.
• 2008 Guest Lecture for Professor Homa Hodfa March 13th Concordia University.
• 2008 Guest Lecture for Professor Jim Igoe. February 18th Denver University at Colorado.
• 2007 The Social and Cultural Politics of Organic Foods: the Case of Montreal-Quebec. Paper presented at the American Anthropological Association. December, Washington, DC USA.
• 2007 Deus ex Machina: Popularized Determinism and Complexity in Systems Biology vis a vis Global Warming. Paper presented at the International Conference ‘Nature Matters’. October, Toronto, Ontario.
• 2007 Reflecting the gene: the social sciences and systems biology in a post-genomic era. Paper presented at the Annual Meetings of the Society for Social Studies of Science. October, Montreal, Quebec.
• 2007 Maps and Territories: the Ethics and Aesthetics of Rebuilding New Orleans. May at the CASCA (Canadian Anthropology Society) meetings in Toronto, Ontario.
• 2007 Expectations and Disappointments in Whale Watching Trips: Living up to Moby Dick and Disney World Cetaceans. Paper presented at the April 11th, at the Association of Social Anthropology, London Metropolitan University UK in the session:  Great expectations? Anticipation, imagination and expectation in the tourism. Session organizers: Dimitrios Theodossopoulos Jonathan Skinner.
• 2007 The Aesthetics of Representation in Human-Cetacean Interactions: From Hunting to Eco-Tourism. Paper presented at "Green Travel: Texts, Traditions, Tensions, Oxford's 2007 Interdisciplinary Colloquium", St John's College 23rd-24th March 2007.
• 2006 To Be an Anthropologist... Or is it Being an Anthropologist? Shared Experiences, Communicative Silences, and Embodied Imagination. Paper presentation in November 2006 at the Concordia Centre for Cosmopolitan Studies Inaugural Conference Dimensions of Being: Time, Imagination and Experience.
• 2006 Emotional Immanence: Moby Dick and the Theorization of Emotions as Emergent Processes. Paper presentation in October at the Symposium on Love, Hate, and Rationality: Towards a Sociology of Emotions, organized by Dr Meir Amor and Dr Ayel Glick at the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Concordia University.
• 2006 Clash of the Titans: Stem Cell Chimeras Between Dream and Monstrosity. Paper presented in June at The Canadian Sociology and Anthropology Society (CSAA), in June. Session organized by Dr. Shelley Reuter. 
• 2006 Organizer of the Bateson Symposium in May 2006 at the CASCA (Canadian Anthropology Society) meetings in Montreal, Quebec.
• 2006 The aesthetics of ecological learning at Montreal’s Botanical Gardens. Paper presentation at the Bateson Symposium in May 2006 at the CASCA (Canadian Anthropology Society) meetings in Montreal, Quebec.
• 2006 Session organizer at the CASCA (Canadian Anthropology Society) meetings in May Montreal, Quebec. Session title: Anthropos Meets Biothecos: Revisiting the “Human” in the Anthropology of Biotechnology.
• 2006 Chimeras, Super-humans, and Cyborgs: Transcendence through Subjugation? Paper presentation in May at CASCA’s (Canadian Anthropology Society) annual meetings in Montreal, Quebec. Session title: Anthropos Meets Biothecos: Revisiting the “Human” in the Anthropology of Biotechnology.
• 2006 They say 'you are what you eat': but what does eating say about thinking? Paper Presentation in May at The Anthropology of Food session organized by Dr Christine Jourdan at the CASCA (Canadian Anthropology Society) meetings in Montreal, Quebec.
• 2005 Bonn, Relational Ecological Ontologies versus Objectified Identity. Paper presentation in October at the Session New Ontologies: Exploring the Anthropo-Sphere. Organized by Werner Krauss and Dennis Bray at the The 6th Open Meeting of the Human Dimensions of Global Environmental Change Research Community - HIDP. University of Bonn (Germany).
• 2005 Ecological Aesthetics of Azorean Whalers: Ritual, Faith, and Sacred Unity. Invited Paper Presentation in October at the University of Copenhagen (Denmark). International-Multidisciplinary Bateson Symposium 2005: Bateson and the Epistemology of the Sacred - The Science-Religion Pattern.
• 2005 In-human Humanisms: from 'Hopeful Monster Theories' to the Creation of Hopeful Monsters. Paper presentation in May. London, Ontario. The Canadian Sociology and Anthropology Association (CSAA).
• 2005 Aesthetics of Whale Hunting: Azorean Whalers, Greogory Bateson, and Immanent Holism. Toronto, Canada. Graduate Colloquium Celebration of Bateson’s Centennial, in March. Department of Anthropology, York University.
• 2005 Asking Questions in 'Post-Worlds'?: Conversations with our Graduate Students. Opening Talk. Montreal, Canada. The Sociology and Anthropology Graduate Student Association (SAGSA) of Concordia University.
• 2004 Politics of Environmentalism and Ecological Knowledge at the Intersections of 'Local' and 'Global' Processes. Anthropocommons, November.  San Francisco, CA (USA), American Anthropology Association (AAA).
• 2004 Exploring Human-Environmental Relations Through Gregory Bateson’s Holistic Ecological Epistemology London-Ontario (Canada), paper presented in May Canadian Anthropology Society (CASCA).
• 2004 Ritual and the Construction of Whaler Identity in the Azores. Heidelberg (Germany), Paper presented in June at the International Workshop: 'Ritual and Identity': Performative Practices as Effective Transformations of Social Reality?
• 2003 Antipodes Sharing 'Common Grounds'? Thinking about Common Property Dilemmas in the Pacific through a Case Study from the Mid-Atlantic Archipelago of the Azores. Paper presented in February, Vancouver (Canada), Social Anthropology Association for Oceania.
• 2003 Investigating Ecology: Cognition in Human-Environmental Relationships. Heidelberg, (Germany), Paper presented in June at the International Colloquium on Research Methods - University of Heidelberg.
• 2003 Co-authored with Doehren, Godela. Intersections Amongst Life Histories, Narratives, and Visualised Metaphors of HIV Infection: Reflexivity in Expressions of Body-Mind Unity.  Paper presented in June, Halifax (Canada), Canadian Sociology and Anthropology Association (CSAA).
• 2003 Reflections on Common Property Dilemmas in the Azores: A Theoretical Quest, Fieldwork Experience and Ethnographic Writing. Toronto (Canada), York University, Invited Speaker at the graduate colloquium, in February.
• 2002 Researching The Social Effects of Global Warning in Oceania. Heidelberg (Germany), Oceania AG - University of Heidelberg. Paper presentation, March.
• 1999 Preliminary Results from Fieldwork in Lajes do Pico, Azores. Guelph (Canada) - Association of Anthropology Students of the University of Guelph. 
• 1997 The Theory of Practice and Anthropology. Saint Catherine's, May, annual meetings of the Canadian Anthropology Society (CASCA), Session Chair.
• 1996 Azorean Identity: Articulations of a Primordialised Concept. Paper presented in May, at the annual meetings of the Canadian Anthropology Society (CASCA), Montreal, Quebec.
• 1995 Negotiating Agricultural Policy with the European Union: A Case Study from the Azores. Vancouver (Canada), Canadian Anthropology Society (CASCA).

Previously Funded Projects

External Competitive Funding

2016-2021 Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Insight Grant $ 203,417 (PI)

2014 Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Connections Grant $ 17 260 (PI)

The Emergence of Botanic Gardens as Leaders in the Governance of Biodiversity Conservation

2014 Quebec Centre for Biodiversity Science $ 3 000 (PI)

The Emergence of Botanic Gardens as Leaders in the Governance of Biodiversity Conservation

2012-2015 Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) standard research grant $ 66 976.00  (PI - Sole applicant)

Cultivating Biodiversity: the politics of knowledge, education, and practice at botanical gardens in the age of nature conservation

2012-2014 Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Insight Development Grant $ 50 894.00 (PI - Sole applicant)

From Backstage to Forefront: A pilot study on the re-invention of botanical gardens as stewards of Canadian biodiversity conservation and designers of tomorrow’s Eco-citizenry: the politics of knowledge, education, and practice at botanical gardens in the age of nature conservation

2007-2010 Fonds Quebecois de Recherche sur la Societe et la Culture (FQRSC), $32,624.00 (PI - Sole applicant)

Programme Établissement de Nouveaux Professeurs-chercheurs (Quebec Research Fund for the Study of Society and Culture - program for the support of new research-faculty)

Est-il possible d'assurer la résilience des collectivités malgré ́puisement des ressources et les conditions de marché défavorables? La restructuration économique dans une perspective écologique.

Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), Post Doctoral Fellowship, $35,000/year, 2004-2006 (PI - Sole applicant)

Declined by candidate upon receiving tenure-stream position at Concordia University, Montreal

Junta Nacional de Investigacao Cientifica e Tecnologica (JNICT), Portugal, PhD Scholarship, $160,000, 1995-2000 (PI - Sole applicant)

Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), PhD Scholarship, $12,000/year, 1996-2000 (PI - Sole applicant)

Declined by candidate upon receiving JNICT scholarship

Ontario Graduate Scholarship, PhD Scholarship, $10,000/year, 1996 (PI - Sole applicant)

Declined by candidate upon receiving JNICT scholarship

York University, Special Admissions Scholarship, $3,000, 1995

Junta Nacional de Investigacao Cientifica e Tecnologica (JNICT), Portugal, MA Scholarship, $48,000 plus enrolment fees, 1994-1995 (PI - Sole applicant)

The University of Western Ontario, Special University Scholarship, $8,000, 1993-1995

Concordia University Competitive Funding

2015 Individual Seed Grant Office of the Vice-President, Research and Graduate Studies $ 7 000 (PI - Sole applicant)

Transforming the Global Order of Biodiversity Governance: Botanic Gardens and the Politics of Transnational Governance 

2014 Office of the Provost and Vice-President Academic Affairs Special Conference Support $ 4 000 (PI)

The Emergence of Botanic Gardens as Leaders in Biodiversity Conservation.

2014 Office of the Provost and Vice-President Academic Affairs Special Conference Support $ 2 000 Sabbatical Research Grant (PI - Sole applicant)

2013 Aid to Research Related Events, Exhibition, Publication and Dissemination Activities (ARRE) Program $ 5 000 (PI)

The Emergence of Botanic Gardens as Leaders in Biodiversity Conservation. Principal Applicant (co-applicants: Peter Stoett; Jill Didur; Dayanadan Selvadurai)

2010 Office of the Provost and Vice-President Academic Affairs Special Conference Support $ 10 000 Sabbatical Research Grant (PI - Sole applicant)

2004 Office of the Provost and Vice-President Academic Affairs Special Conference Support $ 15 000 Star-up Fund (PI - Sole applicant)

Professional Awards

Outstanding Service Award 2013 by the Canadian Sociological Association for my services as Treasurer of the Association from 2009 to 2013.

In the News

Video Interview with Neuchatel University (Switzerland) about the role of Botanic Gardens as socio-cultural agents of environmental governance. https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=AIXDIvZbcso

Interview for Concordia News with Brent Frederick Botanic gardens lead the way in biodiversity conservation and eco-citizenry Concordia to host the Leaders in Conservation: Botanic Gardens and Biodiversity in the 21st Century conference. http://www.concordia.ca/cunews/main/stories/2014/10/15/botanic-gardens-leadthewayinbiodiversityconservationandecocitize.html October 2014

Interview for Devoir — Economie Section (main french language newspaper in Quebec). Interview titled: Faire the la Ville un Jardin. April 29th 2013 http://www.ledevoir.com/economie/actualites-economiques/376869/faire-de-la-ville-un-jardin

Does Horta’s Patrimony Constitute Heritage of Universal Value? Expert interview for Azorean Television Network, broadcast through Portugal’s International TV network. March 18th 2011. 

Featured in ‘Petroleum Economies in the Age of Environmental Concern’ 2011. Documentary by Professor Conny Davidsen (University of  Calgary) details of this project available at http://people.ucalgary.ca/~literacy/project.htm

The Guardian Newspaper UK, article by Naomi Klein, June 19th 2010. Refers to my work on the notion of Sacred in environmental thinking based on an interview she did with me in the spring of 2010. http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2010/jun/19/naomi-klein-gulf-oil-spill

Radio interview on the Cosmopolitan Dimensions of Horta Faial’s Cable Communications Legacy (August 6th 2010, Azores-Portugal radio broadcast).