William Fisher
Associate Professor
Office:
Washington Hall 123
Phone:
757-221-1068
Email:
[[whfish]]
Areas of Specialization:
Social organization, indigenous Amazon, political economy and history of Amazonia, ethnoecology; Brazil
Background
My interests center on the way changes in environment, social relations and minds occurs and how these are understood and described by social actors in ways that feed back into a matrix of biophysical and meaningful causality. Within this broad framework, I have published research on gender relations, ritual, and social movements. My book, Rain Forest Exchanges, on the extractive industries and the indigenous Xikrin-Kayapo of the Brazilian Amazon has been used in university courses on indigenous peoples, economic anthropology, and development. Currently, I am engaged in a project to study the spread of industrial agriculture on the Amazonian frontier, with an emphasis on soybean production for the world market.
Education
PhD Cornell 1991
