Faculty Profiles
 | Chris S. DuvallProfessor and Department Chair
| Interests: Biogeography, cultural and political ecology, African studies, historical geography, science studies, food and drugs studies Research: Dr. Duvall examines people-plant interactions from perspectives ranging from biogeography to cultural studies to historical geography, mostly in Africa but also in the U.S. | |
 | Ronda BrulotteAssociate Professor Ph.D., University of Texas, Austin
| Interests: Food systems, tourism geography, critical heritage studies, commodities and materialism, transnational indigeneity, Mexico, Latin America Research: Dr. Brulotte is an interdisciplinary scholar with training in sociocultural anthropology and Latin American studies whose research focuses on craft economies, critical heritage studies, and materiality in Mexico. | |
 | Miriam Gay-AntakiAssistant Professor Associate Director, R.H. Mallory Center for Community Geography Member of the National Academy of Sciences Engineering and Medicine Committee to Advise the U.S. Global Change Research Program Ph.D., University of Arizona | Interests: Human Dimensions of Climate Change, Political Ecology, Decolonial Geography, Feminist Geography, Human Environment Geography, Science and Technology Studies, Mexico Research: My work focuses on human-environment relations in the era of anthropogenic global climate change. I draw from political ecology and decolonial feminist geography to amplify voices that are not regularly part of the debate on climate change - from formal political spaces, such as the UN Conference of the Parties, to scientific spaces such as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change - to make research on the topic more effective for vulnerable and underrepresented communities. | |
 | Xi GongAssistant Professor Affiliate Faculty, Center for the Advancement of Spatial Informatics Research and Education (ASPIRE) Ph.D., Texas State University Spatially Integrated Social Science Lab: xigong.wordpress.com/siss/ | Interests: Geographic Information Science, Big Data Science and Analytics, Spatio-Temporal Data Mining, Health and the Environment, GIS-Based Modelling Research: Dr. Gong’s research focuses on Geospatial Data Science. Specific research interests include developing and implementing novel spatial-temporal data mining algorithms, environmental exposure assessment methods, and visual analytics approaches for big data to better understand the relationships among human health, society, and environment. | |
 | Constantine HadjilambrinosAssociate Professor Ph.D., University of Delaware | Interests: Energy resources, environmental policy, science-technology-and society, relationship between culture and nature | |
 | Andreas HernandezLecturer III of Sustainability Studies Ph.D., Cornell University | Interests: Dr. Hernandez’ research, filmmaking and teaching examines just transitions to sustainability and regeneration. His focus is on social movements and ecovillages in Brazil, and their construction of agroecological systems and emergent politics and worldviews. He also examines how social movement activity can translated and implemented into social policy and may engage with the United Nations System. | |
 | Natasha HowardAssistant Professor of Geography Assistant Professor, Africana Studies Program Ph.D., University of New Mexico | Interests: Black geographies, Black feminist and women of color geographies, critical race studies, geographies of the Southwest, urban geographies, discourses on race, nature and the environment, Latin America and race Research: Dr. Howard's current research focuses on mapping Black geographies in the United States and Latin America. | |
 | Maria LaneProfessor, Graduate Programs Director Director, R.H. Mallory Center for Community Geography Ph.D., University of Texas, Austin | Interests: Historical geography, environmental knowledge, colonialism, American west and southwest, Atlantic basin, history and geography of science, history of cartography, legal geography Research: Dr. Lane is a historical geographer who studies how environmental knowledge is produced through maps, science, stories, and policy. | |
 | Yan LinAssociate Professor Affiliate Faculty, Center for the Advancement of Spatial Informatics Research and Education (ASPIRE), UNM Comprehensive Cancer Center, UNM Center for Native American Environmental Health Equity Ph.D., Texas State University | Interests: Health and Medical Geography, Health Disparities, Environmental Health, GIS, Spatial Data Analysis Research: I am a health and medical geographer and Geographic Information (GI) scientist with a research focus on health disparities and spatial analysis and modeling to gain a better understanding of relationships among human health, society, and the environment. My work is focused on health disparities and environmental spatial epidemiology, especially in the area of understanding and addressing environmental health disparities in Native American communities, cancer prevention and control, identifying social and environmental determinants of health disparities, developing methods for environmental exposure/risk assessment, and developing evidence-based geographic intervention programs to reduce health disparities. | |
 | Yolanda C. LinAssistant Professor Ph.D., Cornell University
| Interests: Natural hazards and disasters, risk and resilience, spatial analysis, earthquake engineering, data visualization, uncertainty, systems thinking Research: Dr. Lin’s research projects include developing novel methods for conducting scenario-based risk assessments for single and multi-hazard risks, and creating new tools to facilitate effective risk communication to stakeholders. | |
 | Caitlin LippittLecturer III, and Undergraduate Program Director Ph.D., UC Santa Barbara and San Diego State University | Interests: Biogeography, invasive species, remote sensing of vegetation, fire ecology, the role of disturbance in plant communities. | |
 | Chris LippittAssociate Professor Associate Dean for Research, College of Arts & Sciences Director, Center for the Advancement of Spatial Informatics Research and Education (ASPIRE) ( aspire.unm.edu) Ph.D., UC Santa Barbara and San Diego State University | Interests: Remote sensing, geographic information science, time-sensitive geographic information Research: Dr. Lippitt’s research is focused on the design and automation of remote sensing and related information systems to improve human perception and decision making, including applications to infrastructure, vegetation ecosystems, wildlife sampling, and hazard response. | |
 | Melinda MorganProfessor and W.K. Kellogg Chair in Sustainable Environmental & Food Systems J.D., University of Idaho | Interests: Environmental governance, social-ecological systems, new materialism, legal geography Research: Dr. Morgan’s research focuses on environmental governance. I’m particularly interested in understanding the next generation of tools and approaches to biodiversity loss, climate change and other environmental challenges and how those new ideas interface with existing legal and regulatory requirements. Research interests: emerging environmental governance regimes, legal geographies, new materialisms. | |
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 | Jessica RowlandLecturer II of Sustainability Studies MS, University of Arizona | Interests: Jessica Rowland teaches interdisciplinary courses on sustainability, food systems, and climate change, and promotes personal and collective behavior change for a more sustainable future. Along with her students, Jessica facilitates the annual UNM Sustainability Expo and the on-campus Lobo Growers’ Market, and collaborates with a diverse set of campus and community partners to grow the local and regional food system. She has served as a Board member of La Montañita Food Co-op, and as a local food systems consultant for the Thornburg Foundation. Jessica has also worked professionally on environmental quality monitoring and land restoration in the Southwest as an environmental geochemist, and on earth science and climate policy in Washington, D.C. as a government affairs intern. | |
 | Asa StoneResearch Assistant Professor Affiliate, UNM Resilience Institute Ph.D., Washington State University | Interests: intersection of climate and social justice, human resilience to climate change, intersections of beer, social identity, and cultural heritage | |
| Benjamin P. WarnerAssistant Professor Ph.D., Arizona State University | Interests: Water governance and institutions, Latin American development, vulnerability, risk, and adaptation to environmental change, political economy, development studies, mixed methods Research: Dr. Warner's research is grounded in critical development studies and focuses on water governance and climate change. | |
| Marygold Walsh-DilleyAssociate Professor | Interests: Political ecology, food and agricultural systems, rural development, modernity/coloniality, agrarian change, climate change, vulnerability and resilience, qualitative methods, Andes | |
| Liping YangAssistant Professor of Geography
| Interests: Geographic information science (GIScience), geospatial artificial intelligence (GeoAI), visual (image and text) big data analytics, geovisualization, indoor navigation Research: Dr. Liping Yang, as the name of her GeoAIR Lab (Geospatial Artificial Intelligence Research and Visualization Lab) implies, conducts research on developing novel and creative methods and applications of geospatial artificial intelligence, such as intelligent city infrastructure management, including (natural) disaster and emergency management and visualization of (geospatial) big data for efficient and effective insight generation. |
Emeritus Faculty
| Scott Freundschuh | Ph.D., State University at Buffalo |
| Olen Paul Matthews | Ph.D., University of Washington; J.D., University of Idaho |
| Stanley A. Morain | Ph.D., University of Kansas |
