Skimming Alan Weisman’s The World Without Us, I found it it to be a fascinating yet problematic book. Its premise is incredibly intriguing; it asks, what would the world look like if humans suddenly disappeared? And Weisman’s answer? The world would, more or less, be better off without us. This is a depressing sounding conclusion, and it […]
Environmental Literature Lab
Audrey Stuart, Liza Tugangui, Blake Slattengren Background With the massive amounts of environmental literature being published that analyze the condition of the world today, there is a lot said about global conditions and local, more situated conditions. Many of the ideas portrayed in this literature situated environmental issues in the terms of the common expression, […]
GIS Reflections
After using GIS for the past two labs, I finally think I can call myself proficient at ArcGIS. Not good, but good enough to get by. ArcGIS has proved itself to be a super useful program, but also not super intuitive. It has a lot of techie features that would be almost impossible to figure […]
Environmental Justice GIS Lab
by Audrey Stuart, Liza Tugangui, Blake Slattengren Background This lab used arcGIS mapping features to examine issues of environmental injustice within the city of Portland. GIS is an easy way to look at trends across city blocks to understand how various factors may be related to environmental health. The ultimate goal of our analysis was […]
Finding Scale
Gearing up for the concentration draft deadline, I have been thinking a lot about scale. A concentration is supposed to be larger than a situated project, but smaller than a broad environmental theme. Finding the perfect balance and focus has been difficult. I have narrowed down to the broad theme of agtech, but just agtech […]
Spatial Data Lab
by Audrey Stuart, Liza Tugangui, Blake Slattengren Spatial Data Lab
Inferential Statistics Lab Report
Lab Team: Audrey Stuart, Liza Tugangui, Blake Slattengren Background In this lab, we focused on the use of inferential statistics to find patterns between different sets of international data found on the UNEP Environmental Data Explorer. Inferential statistics is a way of comparing and testing different sets of sample data from different variables to see […]
Wisdom Sits In Places
After recently finishing Keith Basso’s ‘Wisdom Sits in Places’ for Intro to Cultural Anthropology, I have been reconsidering place as it applies to Environmental Studies. We discussed at the beginning of the semester about how place provides a method for situating otherwise sprawling research. It provided context for complex environmental issues. While this is certainly […]
Concentration Brainstorm
Figuring out what I want to focus on for my next three years of study in ENVS has been a longer, more difficult process than I had imagined. There are just so many interesting topics under the general field of Environmental Studies that it has been an adventure just to know where to start. Sorting through […]
RVNA Microclimate Lab Report
Lab Team: Liza Tugangui, Audrey Stuart, Blake Slattengren Background A basic concept in Environmental Studies describes that the biotic and abiotic aspects in an environment are incredibly dependent on each other. In this lab, we wanted to focus on the aspects of a microclimate in Riverview Natural Area. According to Lawrence Mendonca of Stony Brook […]