Made Adityanandana
Aditya is a PhD student in Development Studies in the Department of Global Development, Cornell. Aditya is originally from Bali, Indonesia. Aditya obtained his MA in Development Studies from the International Institute of Social Studies (ISS), Erasmus University Rotterdam. His master's research on an environmental conflict over a tourism development megaproject in the island of Bali has culminated into several publications, including a peer-reviewed article (Journal of Sustainable Tourism, special issue on tourism and degrowth) and a book chapter (Routledge Book Series). His research was supported by the Indonesia Endowment Fund for Education. Prior to his PhD study, Aditya served as an Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Agriculture, Udayana University in Bali, where he taught courses including Development Communication, Human Ecology, and Political Ecology. His research is driven by interests in migration and development, sustainable agriculture and tourism, environmental conflict and movement, and the application of post-growth in the global South. His PhD dissertation project explores the nexus between migration and development, specifically examining what work looks like for the surplus populations amid unequal development and jobless growth in Indonesia. He works with Jenny Goldstein (chair), Sarah Besky, and Marina Welker. He occasionally writes opinions on agricultural issues in Indonesia in mainstream media, such as the Jakarta Post.
Tamar Law
Tamar is a local Ithacan and a PhD student in Development Studies in the Department of Global Development at Cornell. She is interested in soils, capitalist natures, the role of technoscience in climate management, and critical development studies. Tamar’s research stems from longstanding interest in nature-society relations, starting as an undergraduate College Scholar at Cornell University, to receiving a MPhil in Human Environmental Geography from the University of Oxford. Her MPhil thesis examined the growing enrollment of agricultural soil as a climate solution, leading to her doctoral work on the global politics of climate sinks. Drawing from feminist political ecology, post-colonial science studies, and critical agrarian studies, Tamar’s dissertation project focuses on emerging blue carbon governance and low-carbon development in Indonesia. Her work examines the financial and scientific practices of coastal restoration, seeking to understand how mangrove coastlines become global carbon sinks. Tamar’s work is driven by her deep commitment to climate justice, through her work she aims to delineate equitable mitigation pathways, centering how climate management impacts local frontline communities. She was awarded the RANA Prize at Cornell in 2022. At Cornell, Tamar is the graduate co-chair to the Southeast Asia Program, organizes the Critical Soil Studies working group, and plans the Critical Development Seminar series. Tamar works with Jenny Goldstein (chair), Wendy Wolford, and Sarah Besky. Tamar loves to bake pies, accumulate new houseplants, and experiment with clay.
Kendra Kintzi
Kendra Kintzi is a PhD candidate in Development Studies in the Department of Global Development at Cornell. Her work advances scholarship in three key areas: the politics of decarbonization; political ecologies of digital infrastructure; and mobilizations for environmental justice in the (post)colonial world. Her dissertation and first book project examines the material politics of renewable energy development in the Levant, focusing on democratic and community-based forms of energy governance. She centers decolonial feminist approaches to ask how urban communities in Jordan experience and shape processes of environmental and infrastructural change. Questions of resource governance, urbanization, and the political economy of development drive her research, as she examines how mobilization around energy access challenges the distributive politics of the (post)colonial state. Kendra works with Lori Leonard (chair), Jenny Goldstein, Wendy Wolford, and Mostafa Minawi. She is also currently a Global Racial Justice Fellow at Cornell’s Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies. Originally from California, Kendra completed joint bachelors degrees in Development Studies and Comparative Literature at UC Berkeley, and spent several years working to advance inclusive, sustainable development at the grassroots and bilateral levels before coming to Cornell. Beginning in summer 2023, Kendra will be an Atkinson Center for Sustainability postdoctoral associate at Cornell.
Camillo Stubenberg
Camillo is a PhD candidate in Development Studies in the Department of Global Development at Cornell. He is curious about the role of energy-infrastructures co-producing society and environment. For his dissertation research Camillo is conducting ethnographic research about the rushed adoption of solar energy in Lebanon. Hailing form Austria, Camillo earned a B.Sc. in environmental resource management from the University of Applied Life Sciences in Vienna, as well as a B.A. and M.A. degree in International Development from the University of Vienna. His master’s thesis entitled “Hard Standards Shaping Soft Concrete” studied the role of technical standards in an aid funded infrastructure project in northern Albania. After completing his studies in 2012 he worked in on energy, conservation and agriculture related development projects in Sierra Leone. Before coming to Cornell, Camillo worked for Kairos impact research, a non-profit consultancy specialized on rural development and socio-technical innovation in the tri-border region of Austria, Switzerland and Germany. Camillo works with Lori Leonard (chair), Jenny Goldstein, and Sara Pritchard. Camillo has received research grants from the Cornell’s Atkinson Center for sustainability, the Einaudi Center for International Studies as well as the National Science Foundation. For his field research in Lebanon Camillo is affiliated with the German Orient Institute/Max Weber Stiftung in Beirut.
Jen Liu
Jen is a PhD candidate in Information Science at Cornell University. Her work investigates the ecological, social, and political implications of computing technologies and infrastructures. She uses ethnographic and design methods to understand these challenges and build alternatives for livable and equitable futures. Jen’s recent research is on the impact of climate change on Internet infrastructures in southeast Louisiana. She works with Steve Jackson (chair), Jenny Goldstein, and Phoebe Sengers. Her research has been supported by the National Science Foundation. Prior to coming to Cornell she completed her masters in Interaction Design from Carnegie Mellon University and BFA in Fiber Arts from the Maryland Institute College of Art.
Michael Cary
Michael is a Ph.D. Candidate in Development Studies in Cornell’s Department of Global Development. He is also pursuing a minor in Latin American and Caribbean Studies. He is broadly interested in political ecology, critical agrarian studies, and state formation with a regional focus on South America. His dissertation research focuses on monoculture expansion, water governance, and land politics in southern Paraguay, where industrial-scale irrigated rice cultivation is rapidly transforming the region’s wetlands and the livelihoods of those that inhabit them. Prior to coming to Cornell, Michael received a B.A. in Sociology and American Studies from the University of Virginia and an M.A. in Latin American and Caribbean Studies from New York University, where he wrote his thesis on the politics of food sovereignty in Bolivia. He also lived for four years in Argentina, where he organized educational exchange programs. Michael works with Wendy Wolford (chair), Jenny Goldstein, Fouad Maaki, and Tom Perrault (Syracuse University). When not buried in the library he enjoys nature photography, basketball, cooking, and gardening.
Whitman Barrett
Whitman is a PhD student in the field of Soil and Crop Sciences in the School of Integrative Plant Sciences at Cornell. He is interested in the ways in which social, political, and economic factors shape agricultural practices, and especially soil conservation practices. Whitman is a Tata-Cornell Institute scholar and is conducting dissertation research related to the reuse of human feces and urine as soil amendments in South India. His research and collaborations with other researchers seek to further a holistic understand of soil and soil fertility as resulting from the interaction of natural and social processes. He works with Johannes Lehman (chair), Jenny Goldstein, Rebecca Nelson, and Prabhu Pingali. Prior to coming to Cornell, Whitman served for three years as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Togo, where he worked on projects related to agricultural education, cover cropping, and agroforestry. He earned his B.A. in history from Oberlin College and his Master of Urban and Regional Planning degree from the University of Minnesota—Twin Cities.
Emily Baker
Emily is a PhD candidate in Development Studies in the Department of Global Development at Cornell. Emily is originally from Montana, where she earned her B.A. in literature and philosophy from the University of Montana. She holds M.S. degrees in International Agricultural Development (2015) and Community Development (2015) from the University of California, Davis. She has been studying climate change adaptation, conservation, and agriculture in East Africa since 2014. Her dissertation research explores the ways protracted conflict and climate change intersect with gendered knowledge, farm management practices, and agrobiodiversity in agroforestry systems in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo and western Uganda. Emily is particularly interested in participatory approaches that center local knowledge and priorities to inform policy and community decision-making for biodiversity conservation, food security, and adaptation strategies. Her recent projects include: Chapter Scientist for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Sixth Assessment Report (2022), a review of climate change adaptation in mixed agricultural systems, and a review of the social and environmental impacts of local 'food hubs' in collaboration with the Cornell Small Farms program. She works with Rachel Bezner Kerr (chair), Jenny Goldstein, and Alison Power. Emily’s field research has been supported by the Sustainable Biodiversity Fund and an Atkinson Center for Sustainability Graduate Research Grant.
Nicole Venker
Nicole is a PhD student in the Department of Natural Resources. Her dissertation research engages critical geography methodologies to study the politics of access to land, “wilderness,” and wild food in North America. Through this work, she is interested in better understanding relations that shape opportunities for and inequities in access to land and wildlife resources. This project explores access as it relates to the experiences of migrant communities, specifically from Myanmar, as well as the shifting dynamics of access in an increasingly digitized world. In addition to her dissertation work, she is working on a collaborative project using critical GIS methods to understand the spatial dimensions of armed conflict in Myanmar. She works with Katie Fiorella (chair), Jenny Goldstein, Bruce Lauber, and Peter McIntryre. Nicole holds an MS in Natural Resources from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a BS in Environmental Science & Sustainability from Cornell University. She has previously worked in environmental consulting and higher education in Myanmar. She also freelances as a Burmese language interpreter/translator and is active in diasporic organizing. In her free time, she enjoys fishing and painting.