SEB 2020 Ballot
Cast your BALLOT here
The Election Closes Friday, July 31, 2020
Candidate for President: Sonia Peter
Candidate for Treasurer: Blair Orr
Candidates for Council Members At-Large: Betsabé D. Castro Escobar, Orou Gaoue, Olwen Grace
Candidate for President
Education
PhD, University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus, Barbados, 1997
Career Activities
Established the nonprofit Biocultural Education and Research Programme, 2017
‘To promote conservation of plant biodiversity through education and research’ – Executive Director
Established commercial entity Heritage Teas Barbados Ltd, 2018 – Founding Director Collaborative academic anticancer study of Caribbean medicinal plants, 2007. Co-supervisor of postgraduate students at the Department of Biochemistry, Faculty of Medical Sciences, University of the West Indies, St Augustine Campus, Trinidad and Tobago. Two graduate students have completed their degrees, one MPhil and one Ph.D. Patent applied for Plant A with activity against prostate cancer.
Ethnobotanical Interests and/or Activities
Plants used during the period of slavery in Barbados and the knowledge transfer, and translation, into modern applications – 60 plants under herbarium preservation and phytochemical assessment.
Underutilised indigenous plants – Food and nutrition security (Research on domestication and reintroduction into food cycle with development of media tools – Farmer’s Kitchen to be aired in August 2020)
Biocultural Collections – documentary Healing Roots, 2020 (Currently being edited); Mobile Herbal Museum and Living Libraries – Being launched in August 2020.
Statement
’To foster and encourage scientific research, education, and related activities on the past, present, and future uses of plants, and the relationship between plants and people, and to make the results of such research available to the scientific community and the general public through meetings and publications.’
The SEB mission statement is now more important than ever. The challenges posed to our daily survival see us fighting levels of social, environmental, and economic impacts. In the context of ‘survival of the fittest’ I pose that it is us in the society that are sensitized to the interplay of the relationships underlying the challenges and we must make our voices louder and contribute to the discourse at all levels for intervention.
The ethos that drew me to the society is the manner with which people were embraced and respected within our bodies of research and the sensitivity embodied in our working regulations. This respect for humanity is sadly lacking across populations and we see this glaringly as we observe, with dismay, the response to injustice and the health scare of COVID 19. Education must be the tool to unlock rigidity and the work of SEB members is exemplary and a model platform.
To this end, I believe that we must bolster our outreach and widen the share of our activity demonstrating how diversity is nature and must be embraced. It must be embraced to strengthen our response to change and generally for harmonious survival. Wherever we can, SEB must support the need for diversity as we engage on scientific and social platforms.
Candidate for Treasurer
Education
PhD University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1988
Career Activities
Professor (2006 to present), Associate Professor (1998 to 2006), Assistant Professor (1992 to 1998) at Michigan Technological University. Assistant Professor (1988 to 1992) at the University of the South. Project Forester, Lutheran World Relief, Luuq, Somalia (1982-1983)
Ethnobotanical Interests and/or Activities
Socio-economic aspects of ethnobotany, agricultural development, statistics.
Statement
If elected treasurer I would like to investigate other financial institutions as a repository for SEB funds. Are there other institutions that would have lower fees and more flexibility? I am also interested in liability insurance. Currently SEB does not have liability insurance. It is inexpensive for an organization of our size and would cover some aspects of our operations that are uninsured and help protect affiliated organizations such as the host sites for our annual meetings.
Candidates for Council
Education
PhD candidate, Department of Integrative Biology, University of California, Berkeley
Career Activities
Ethnobotanical educator and mentor (Fall 2019 & 2020 - IB 117 LF Medical Ethnobotany) for which I was distinguished as one of the 2020 UCB Outstanding Graduate Student Instructors; President of the Caribbean Chapter of the Society of Economic Botany (since 2018); Graduate Student Representative in the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion committee, Department of Integrative Biology (since 2016).
Ethnobotanical Interests and/or Activities
Hypothesis-driven research & theoretical foundations for ethnobotany; evolutionary and ecological responses of plants that are the result interactions with people; what can these responses tell us about the plants themselves (e.g. origin, transport, geography, domestication), the people that engage with them (e.g. cultural value, use, management), and the future (e.g. climate change).
Platform statement
As an interdisciplinary scientist, my work lies at the intersection of ethnobotany, ecology, and evolutionary biology. I value SEB as a professional society because of the possibility of collaborating and exchanging with colleagues from diverse fields and backgrounds and how it truly places trans/inter/multidisciplinarity at the core of their work. As an Afro-Boricua with indigenous roots, I am passionate about working with Caribbean communities in documenting, rescuing, and preserving traditional knowledge of local plants and ecosystems for generations to come. In the near future, with the Caribbean SEB chapter and other initiatives, I hope we can make progress towards this goal by re-establishing a broader Caribbean research network, starting Caribbean Ethnobotany field courses, a Caribbean Ethnobotany database project and journal, and continue to co-create through other engaging platforms in this digital age to keep our botanical traditions alive. As a Council-Member-At-Large, I will make sure that diverse voices in our society are heard and we can actively pose solutions towards the eradication of systemic racist, sexist, and colonial structures still in place in our field and our society.
Education
PhD, University of Hawaii at Manoa, 2008
Career Activities
Assistant Professor, University of Tennessee Knoxville (2017— present); Assistant Professor, University of Hawaii at Manoa (2013-2017); Postdoctoral Fellow, National Institute for Mathematical and Biological Synthesis (2011-2013); Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Miami (2008-2011); Scientific Assistant, SAFORGEN, Bioversity International (2001-2002).
Ethnobotanical Interests and/or Activities
Ecology of plant-human interactions, mathematical modeling, theory in ethnobotany.
Statement
My research is focused on understanding the response of plant-human interactions to global changes. I investigate the impacts of chronic anthropogenic disturbance and ecological interactions on plant population dynamics, the role that local ecological knowledge plays in this process, and how that leads or not to adaptive management strategies. Recently, I have been interested in ethnobotanical teaching, the evolution of ethnobotany as a discipline and the development of theory in ethnobotany. My first participation in the Society for Economic Botany meeting was in 2004 as a graduate student. This was my first participation in an international society meeting, and it had a profound influence on my graduate student career. As a council member, my main interest will be to advocate for a better inclusion of early career ethnobotanists and developing pathway for success in the field. I will also advocate for a more comprehensive discussion about ethnobotanical teaching in a new academic context in American universities and across the world.
Education
PhD, University of Pretoria
Career Activities
Senior Research Leader, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew in the United Kingdom; Marie Curie Fellow at the Natural History Museum, Denmark; I began my research career at the South African National Biodiversity Institute.
Ethnobotanical Interests and/or Activities
I am a botanist studying desert plants and their useful properties. I use evolutionary frameworks to investigate plant relationships and diversity in uses. I am particularly interested in the evolution of succulents—plants with specialized water-storing tissues—in regions where climate change is likely to influence their future value.
Statement
As a member of the Council, I would be honoured to bring my research expertise and experience to contribute to the mission of the Society for Economic Botany. My research spans disciplines and brings varied collaborator groups together. I have previously served on the Council of the Systematics Association and I am in the final year of a 3-year term as a Vice-President of the Linnean Society of London. I particularly advocate for diversity. I contribute to initiatives to bring change in terms of diversity, equity and access in the botanic gardens sector. These include participating in the decolonization agenda for science and leading a gender equity accreditation for Kew. As a Council member of SEB, I will continue to champion diversity, equality and inclusion. In particular, I recognize the importance of increasing international membership to enhance the reach of the society. Promoting the student membership and the participation of student members is another area to which I hope to contribute.