Research
Professors in the geography department participate in a variety of research activities. These activities cross national and international boundaries and frequently provide opportunities for student collaboration. Students interested in conducting undergraduate research projects are encouraged to contact a potential faculty sponsor early in their academic careers. Summer research is especially encouraged and can be supported by the School of Arts & Sciences' generous summer fellowship program.
Geography professors at Richmond perform research in numerous areas including:
- Biocultural diversity
- Boundaries and borderlands
- Carbon offsetting in universities and colleges
- Climate change science and policy
- Community forest management
- Connectivity of natural resources
- Ecotourism
- Energy infrastructure and dam-building
- Indigenous peoples land and resource rights
- International peace parks
- Landscape ecology
- Multiethnic regional autonomy movements
- Political and economic integration
- Tropical conservation and development
- U.S National Parks
There is a special emphasis on the Western hemisphere and a strong interest and expertise in Central and South America, as well as the Mid-Atlantic and Pacific Northwest of the United States. Students are invited to begin undergraduate research projects early in their academic careers. Recent students have studied:
- Agro-industrial development in Africa
- Alternative economic strategies of indigenous peoples
- Amazon fisheries
- Climate change mitigation in East Africa, Central America and the Caribbean
- Dam-building and indigenous rights
- Ecotourism in the Caribbean
- Environmental education
- Forest carbon offsets in Costa Rica and Panama
- Gender and the environment
- Indigenous land use
- Participatory mapping
- Race and ethnicity in Nicaragua
- Remote sensing of illegal logging in Amazonia
- Sustainable hunting practices in Peru
The first step to finding the right research opportunity for you is to find a professor whom you enjoy working with and whose work appeals to you. He or she will be able to help you find appropriate opportunities in your field of interest.
