Environmental Studies

Paleoecology: The History of Human Impacts on Coastal Ecosystems
Sherri Cooper, Coastal Studies Scholar in Residence
Thursday February 8, 4:00 pm
Druckenmiller Hall, Room 20

Understanding Environmental History One Diatom at a Time

Wilderness and Spirit: A Mountain Called Katahdin
Wednesday, February 14
7:00 pm
ES Common Room, Adams Hall

"Wilderness and Spirit, A Mountain Called Katahdin" captures the spirit of Katahdin and the people who have been drawn to Maine's "Great Mountain". The film explores ways of thinking about the wilderness and how people from many walks of life, past to the present, have found spiritual solace and strength in this mountain called Katahdin. Wilderness and Spirit is a film by Huey.

Biology Seminar:
Jack Putz, Professor of Botony, University of Florida
Thursday, February 15 4:00 p.m.
Druckenmiller Hall, Room 20

Brown Bag Lunch with ES Alumni
Friday, February 16
12:30 pm - 1:30 pm
ES Common Room, Adams Hall

Join ES Alums Cy Moulton ('04 English/ES), Director, Islands Fellow Program, Island Institute, Rockland Maine, and Carly Knight ('05 Anthropology), currently an Island Fellow on Chebeague Island. If you are a senior and would like to stay in Maine for the summer this is a great program to learn about. Cy will be recruiting Island fellows.

Island Institute is a non-profit organization that serves as a voice for the balanced future of the islands and waters of the Gulf of Maine. For more information, please visit the Island Institute web site.

2010 Imperative- Global Warming Teach-in
Tuesday, February 20
12 pm - 3 pm (drop-ins welcome)
ES Common Room

The 2010 Imperative is an opportunity for participants to learn how the building sector is contributing to Global Warming, and to begin working toward a solution. Join us for some, or all of this teach-in.

The 2010 Imperative Teach-in will feature Dr. James Hansen, Director of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, Edward Mazria, American Institute of Architects, and other expert panelists working for a rapid transformation of the architecture and design community to address how the building sector can meet the challenge global climate change. The 2010 Imperative challenge calls for all new buildings and major renovations to immediately reduce their energy consumption by 50% and that all new buildings to be 'carbon neutral' by 2030. The Teach-in, is one of the first steps toward accomplishing this goal.

Wiebke Theodore, Visiting Assistant Professor of Art at Bowdoin will be on hand to lead the discussion.

Fair Trade Discussion
Tuesday, February 20
7:15 pm - 9:00 pm
Lancaster Lounge, Moulton Union

Join rice farmers from Thailand to learn the issues fair trade farmers face including, trade injustice, the organic movement, environmental degradation, genetic engineering and intellectual property rights.

Biology Seminar:
'Sick and Tired?: An evolutionary perspective on immune influences on behaviour'
Shelley Adamo, Associate Professor, Department of Neuroscience, Dalhousie University, Nova Scotia
Thursday, February 22 4:00 p.m.
Druckenmiller Hall, Room 20;

Biology Seminar:
Sara Hotchkiss, Assistant Professor of Botany, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Thursday, March 1 4:00 pm
Druckenmiller Hall, Room 20

Penobscot Indian Environmental Diplomacy
Wednesday, March 28
7:00 pm
Hubbard Hall Conference Room, West

Darren Ranco, Assistant Professor of Native American and Environmental Studies at Dartmouth College, will be giving his talk on Penobscot Indian Environmental Diplomacy; Protecting Territory, Natural Resources and our Indian distinctionSponsored by the Office of the President and the Department of Sociology and Anthropology. Free. Open to the campus community.

A campus sustainability conference right here at Bowdoin!
Saturday, March 31
9 am - 4 pm

There will be five workshops covering different areas of campus sustainability from Transportation, student initiatives, green building, curriculum, and building capacity for sustainability.

If you want to download the brochure or registration form, please visit www.mainecompact.org. There's a link on the right side of the home page for the sustainability documents. Sponsored by the Maine Campus Compact.

What Congress Can and Should Do About Climate Change
Monday, April 2 7:00 pm,
Smith Auditorium, Sills Hall
Dinner with Mr. Curtis: Hutchinson Room, Thorne Hall

Kevin Curtis, Vice President, National Environmental Trust
Global warming: The rapidly changing political environment in Washington, DC. Or is it?

The National Environmental Trust is a non-profit, non-partisan organization established in 1994 to inform citizens about environmental problems and how they affect our health and quality of life. NET's public education campaigns use modern communication techniques and the latest scientific studies to translate complex environmental issues for citizens. Furthermore, NET works in states across the country to localize the impacts of national problems, as well as to highlight opportunities for Americans to engage in the policymaking process.

Alexandrium in the Gulf of Maine: The Ecology, Detection, and the Management of Harmful Algal Bloom (Red Tides)
Tuesday, April 3
8 am – 5 pm, Druckenmiller Hall

The Kibbe Symposium will bring together experts on the science and management of Harmful Algal Blooms (HABs) from around the world to discuss strategies of how to incorporate new advances in the scientific observation and modeling of HABs into management planning that most effectively responds to these events. For more information, use the following web link: Kibbe 2007

Wondering about the Future of Work in the Environmental Field?
Friday, April 13 11:30 - 12:30 pm
ES Common Room, Adams Hall

Pizza and discussion with Michael Taylor, Vice President, Vita Nuova LLC, a recognized leader in the redevelopment and revitization of environmentally-impacted properties and neigborhoods.

Mr. Taylor regularly serves as project manager, chief facilitator, and key strategist in working with stakeholders to sustainably redevelop projects around the country.

He was a graduate Rockefeller Fellow at Yale University, where he studied Environmental Science, Public Policy and Ethics. He graduated Cum Laude in Urban Planning and Economics from Roanoke College.

For more information on Mr. Taylor's work or Vita Nuova, LLC, please visit the company web site: Vita Nuova

'Bioterror' in Kazakstan- NOVA Documentary Film
Monday, April 16 7 pm,
Smith Auditorium, Sills Hall

NOVA special program on the science of germ warfare that reveals previously unknown details of the secret biological warfare programs conducted by the Soviets and the United States during the Cold War. 'Bioterror' documentalist Kirk Wolfinger together with NY York Times Journalist visit abandoned Soviet germ factories in central Asia and goes to Kazakhstan, where dozens of Soviet scientists worked in the world's largest bioweapons facility

Global Warming and the IPCC- What's all the fuss?
Wednesday, April 18 7:30 pm
Druckenmiller Hall, 4

Join Mark Battle, Physics and Astronomy; John Lichter, Biology; DeWitt John, ES and Government for a discussion of the IPCC 4th Assesment Report.

The IPCC was formed to assess scientific and socio-economic understanding of climate change, its potential impacts, and options for adaptation and mitigation. The 4th assessment report provides a comprehensive and rigorous picture of the global state of knowledge on climate change.

Green certification of Maine’s industrial forests and small woodlots
Thursday, April 19 1 8:30am
Hubbard room 22

Rob Bryan, forest ecologist, Maine Audubon Society and co-chair, Maine Forest Certification Initiative. Students may join the class for these presentations- the class is David Vail's first year seminar "Sustaining Maine's Northern Forest"

Lunch with Stefani Danes, Principal architaect with Perkins Eastman
Thursday, April 19 1 pm,
ES Common room, Adams Hall

Stefani Danes has combined a career in architecture and urban design with teaching and public service. Her work includes urban housing, housing for special populations, urban design, and planning for neighborhood revitilization. Bring your own lunch and come to hear Stefani Danes talk and give a slide presentation.

The Northern Spotted Owl and the Endangered Species Act
Monday, April 23 4 pm
Druckenmiller 20

Paul Phifer, Fish and Wildlife Biologist, US Fish and Wildlife
What is the status of the spotted owl and how might it be recovered given the current assemblage of threats? Is the American public willing to support the necessary recovery actions?

Dr. Phifer will use the draft spotted owl recovery plan as a case study to discuss the listing and delisting (i.e., recovery) processes of the Endangered Species Act, which involve the interplay of science and social risk tolerance. He will also discuss the wicked problem presented by the Barred Owl threat.

The Role of Forests in Achieving Carbon Neutrality
Tuesday, April 24 7:00 pm,
ES Common Room, Adams Hall

Alec Giffen, Director of the Maine Forest Service, will outline the potential role of forests and forest products in addressing global warming. He will also discuss research and policy initiatives currently under way in Maine. Alec has over 30 years of experience in natural resource planning and program administration. This experience is roughly equally split between government service and experience in the private sector. Alec has also served as an arbitrator on environmental disputes, and assisted in crafting public policy that balances economic development and conservation interests. Alec is a licensed professional forester and a registered Maine guide. He has a Master of Science degree from the University of California, with emphasis in ecology; and a Bachelor of Science degree in Forest Science from the University of Maine.

Forest conservation: public, private and non-profit initiatives
Thursday, April 26 1 8:30am
Hubbard room 22

Tim Glidden, Director, Land for Maine's Future. Students may join the class for these presentations- the class is David Vail’s first year seminar "Sustaining Maine's Northern Forest"

Islands of Desire~ Islands of Fear
Tuesday, May 1 4:00 pm,
Searles Hall, Room 315

John R. Gillis, Professor Emeritus of History, Rutgers University, author of Islands of the Mind: How the Human Imagination Created the Atlantic World

For centuries islands have been imagined as both paradise and hell. As objects of desire and landscapes of dread, they have been important agents in history. Today, islands of desire are vital to the tourist industry, while prison islands function in a global landscape of intimidation. John Gillis will explore the changing meaning of islands from the fifteenth century to the present.

John Gillis lives in Berkeley, California and spends his summers on Great Gott Island off the coast of Maine. As a social and cultural historian of both Europe and America, he has worked on a variety of topics, including age relations, memory, family cultures, and commemoration. Recently he has turned his attention to historical cultural geography, writing Islands of the Mind, a study of western islomania. He is now researching the history of coasts and how their meaning has been transformed by global change in recent centuries.

Chrysalis, Maria Sibylla Merian and the Secrets of Metamorphosis
Wed. May 2 7:00 pm,
Cram Alumni Barn

Kim Todd will speak about her book, Chrysalis, Maria Sibylla Merian and the Secrets of Metamorphosis, which tells the unknown story of a seventeenth-century naturalist and artist whose pioneering field studies of insects in South America helped lay the groundwork for modern-day ecology. Merian's biography is interwoven with the tale of how notions about metamorphosis developed through time.

Merian, trained as an artist in Frankfurt, Germany, found herself drawn to the mysteries of insect metamorphosis at an early age. By 50, she had written two books detailing the life histories of hundreds of European species. Wanting to investigate the South American specimens in collector's cabinets alive and in their natural habitats, she decided to travel to Surinam in 1699 with only her daughter for company. Her careful observations of iridescent blue morpho butterflies and giant cockroaches offered views into the tropical insect world that no one else had seen. But her accomplishments were mostly dismissed and then forgotten in the nineteenth century when scientists feared they would be discredited if they built on the work of "amateurs," particularly women.

Todd is a widely published science writer whose work has appeared in Sierra Magazine, Orion, Legal Affairs, and Grist Magazine. Todd's first book, Tinkering with Eden: A Natural History of Exotics in America (New York: W.W. Norton & Co. 2001), a study of the biological and social effects of invasive species, won the PEN/Jerard Fund Award and the Sigurd Olson Nature Writing Award. A graduate of Yale University and the University of Montana, Todd has degrees in environmental studies and creative writing. Please follow the link provided for more information:
Kim Todd

Energy from Maine's forest region: biofuels, wind and hydro
Thursday, May 4 1 8:30am
Hubbard room 22

Pete Didisheim, Advocacy Director, Natural Resources Council of Maine.Students may join the class for these presentations- the class is David Vail's first year seminar "Sustaining Maine's Northern Forest"