Janet Chernela, Professor Emeritus
Ph.D., Columbia, 1983

Janet Chernela is Professor Emeritus at Florida International University. She is author of the A Sense of Space: The Wanano Indians of the Brazilian Amazon and numerous other publications on indigenous peoples and local knowledge. Dr. Chernela's work links these topics to larger issues of 1) public policy, sustainable development, and cultural rights as well as 2) indigenous peoples, language, and gender. Recently Dr. Chernela began publication on sustainable development in one Amazonian fishing community (Silves) that instituted an innovative, self-designed and self-regulated program of lake reserves and income-generating ecotourism. Now residing in Maryland, and associated with the University of Maryland, Dr. Chernela continues to work with FIU graduate students and can be reached through e-mail addresses chernela.umd.edu and chernela.fiu.edu.

Anthony P. Maingot, Professor Emeritus
Ph.D., University of Florida, 1967

Dr. Maingot, a native of Trinidad, has taught at Yale University (1966-72), the University of the West Indies, Trinidad (1972-74) and, since 1974, at FIU. He was a member of the Constitutional Reform Commission of Trinidad, 1971-1974. Dr. Maingot is co-author of A Short History of the West Indies, now in its fourth edition; and author of: Small Country Development and International Labor Flows: Experiences in the Caribbean; The United States and the Caribbean; Trends in US-Caribbean Relations. His The US and the Caribbean in the Post-Cold War Era is forthcoming.

Betty Morrow, Professor Emeritus
Ph.D., University of Miami, 1978

Dr. Morrow is a sociological consultant specializing in qualitative social research, gender and family sociology, and the sociology of disasters and extreme events. Her work often focuses on the role of social and economic factors in disaster vulnerability and their effects on the ability of households and communities to respond and recover. She has conducted research projects in the U.S. and Caribbean resulting in a co-edited book (with Elaine Enarson), The Gendered Terrain of Disaster, and numerous articles and reports on the experiences of women and families in disaster mitigation and response. She was part of the team of FIU social researchers who studied the short and long-term effects of Hurricane Andrew on South Florida and the nation (funded by the National Science Foundation). Their earlier work resulted in the book (with Walter Peacock and Hugh Gladwin) Hurricane Andrew: Ethnicity, Gender and the Sociology of Disasters. She currently serves as an Associate Editor for the Natural Hazards Review and is on the editorial committee of Environmental Hazards.

William T. Vickers, Professor Emeritus
Ph.D., University of Florida, 1976

Dr. Vickers has conducted ethnological fieldwork in Ecuador, Peru, and Mexico, focusing primarily on the human ecology of indigenous communities, native land and civil rights, and frontier development. He is particularly interested in studying the interrelationships among people, nature, and culture and how these evolve through time. Issues include the sustainability of hunting around native Amazonian settlements, the dynamics of shifting cultivation, forest resource use and ethnobotany, and the determinants of settlement patterns in Amazonian societies. He has written on frontier expansion and how it affects indigenous societies, including their social and political responses to externally-imposed pressures. Professor Vickers' books include Los Sionas y Secoyas: Su Adaptación al Ambiente Amazónico, Useful Plants of the Siona and Secoya Indians and Adaptive Responses of Native Amazonians. He been a Fulbright Fellow in Ecuador, a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellow at the School of American Research in Santa Fe, and a Doherty Foundation Fellow.