RW Moriarty Science Seminars

October 4, 2021 by Kathleen

Moriarty Science Seminar: Beasts of the Southern Wild: the African Aurochs in Art, Ritual, and DNA.

R.W. Moriarty Science Seminar Presents: Beasts of the Southern Wild: the African Aurochs in Art, Ritual, and DNA.

Speaker: Shayla Monroe

Aurochsen, the swift and powerful wild predecessors of domesticated cattle, have captivated human beings since our earliest encounters. In the 2012 film Beasts of the Southern Wild, a young girl named Wink fixates on the mythical return of the aurochs, convinced that they are harbingers of the extreme climate change and the flooding that threatens her coastal Louisiana home. Dramatic shifts in weather patterns and ecology also served as the backdrop of interactions between early human populations and the African aurochs, Bos primigenius africanus. Rock art, archaeological remains, and aDNA analysis all tell an interlocking story of the African aurochs as a prevailing preoccupation in the lives and rituals of human communities at the dawn of social complexity in the Sahara and the Nile Valley, a time of intense environmental change. The genetic legacy of the aurochs in domesticated cattle on the African continent reveals an enduring entanglement between the genus Bos and the genus Homo that is unique in the long history of human-animal interactions.

Join the Zoom on Monday October, 11 at 12:00 p.m. EST

April 27, 2021 by Kathleen

Moriarty Science Seminar: Promoting Indigenous Participation in Environmental Governance

R.W. Moriarty Science Seminar Presents: Promoting Indigenous Participation in Environmental Governance

Speaker: Ryan E. Emanuel

Indigenous peoples often face barriers to participation in decision-making about their contemporary and ancestral territories. In the United States, the extent to which Indigenous voices are heard, let alone incorporated into decision-making, depends heavily on whether or not Native nations are recognized by the federal government. In eastern North Carolina, several non-federally recognized Native American tribes continue to occupy their ancestral territories near rivers, floodplains, pocosins (a regionally unique non-riparian wetland), and in interstitial uplands. Historically, these tribes were rarely involved in environmental affairs. The situation changed in 2017, when plans to construct the Atlantic Coast Pipeline prompted eastern North Carolina tribes to demand formal involvement in environmental decision-making. Their actions, along with responses by governments and corporations, expose barriers to participation in environmental governance faced by Indigenous peoples throughout the United States, but especially barriers faced by non-federally recognized tribes. The pipeline was cancelled in 2020, but lessons remain. I tell the story of the pipeline and its lessons through my lens as an environmental scientist who belongs to one of the affected tribes (Lumbee). I discuss Lumbee connections to land and water, how these connections are (or are not) reflected in environmental decision-making, and lessons for the future.

April 27, 2021 by Kathleen

Moriarty Science Seminar: Northward Migration of Umbrella Magnolia via Horticultural Escape

R.W. Moriarty Science Seminar Presents: Northward Migration of Umbrella Magnolia via Horticultural Escape

Speaker: Jesse Bellemare

Due to climate change, many species will need to shift their distributions northward in coming decades; however, slow rates of natural dispersal might be insufficient to keep pace with the high rate of change, resulting in species declines or extinctions. To avoid this outcome, some biologists have proposed human intervention via “assisted migration” to move species northward into regions where they have not lived in the past, but where they are expected to survive in the future. Significant concerns about the potential for invasive behavior have delayed implementation of this controversial strategy, but native plant horticulture might already be resulting in “accidental” assisted migration for some plant species. This talk will review the case of Umbrella Magnolia (M. tripetala), an understory tree species native to southern Pennsylvania and areas southward that has historically been planted north of its native range in the Northeast U.S. With recent climate change, this tree has begun to escape from horticulture and naturalize north of its native range, effectively shifting its range northward in the directions forecast by climate models. The species provides a striking example of human-assisted migration and raises challenging questions about our definitions of “native” in a world of increasing species range shifts due to climate change.

March 9, 2021 by Kathleen

Moriarty Science Seminar: Who Belongs When No One or Everyone Does? Stewarding Novel Ecosystems in the Anthropocene

R.W. Moriarty Science Seminar Presents: Who Belongs When No One or Everyone Does? Stewarding Novel Ecosystems in the Anthropocene

Speaker: Nicole Heller

Conserving biodiversity is a scientifically and socially challenging enterprise. This is perhaps especially the case in the early twenty-first century when global environmental changes associated with the Anthropocene are impacting local ecosystems everywhere. Many ecosystems are characterized as novel; meaning they have unique assemblages of species and altered processes due to human land-use and behavior. Dr. Nicole Heller’s research explores the challenges inherent in setting conservation goals and finding effective stewardship practices in a world of novel ecosystems and ongoing global environmental and social change. Here Heller explores this research question in the context of stewarding ant communities in the Hawaiian Islands. The island biota evolved without ants, but over the last few hundred years an assemblage of approximately 60 ant species derived from around the world have become established, and the number of new species continues to rise annually. The ants have major ecological, economic, and social impacts. Determining “what is ‘natural’” and “who belongs” is not easily addressed using standard categories of native versus non-native that often drive conservation decision-making. In this talk, Heller will discuss this general topic area and present some preliminary research findings about this novel ant community and the struggles of people to manage their distribution and impacts.

March 2, 2021 by Kathleen

Moriarty Science Seminar: Molecular Paleobiology of Early Life on Earth

R.W. Moriarty Science Seminar Presents: Molecular Paleobiology of Early Life on Earth

Speaker: Betül Kaçar

Only one record of life exists, but what does that tell us about life’s existence elsewhere? Will we recognize “life” when we see it? Are there characteristic chemical properties that would be common to all forms of life, or can they differ substantially? What are the significant historical innovations of life that shaped the life we observe today?

In this lecture we will travel back in time and take a journey across the history of life on Earth from a molecular perspective. Betül Kaçar will discuss the emergence of essential metabolisms, their evolution across billions of years of planetary evolution, and how molecular innovations were impacted by significant changes in the environment, including the Great Oxidation Event.

February 10, 2021 by Kathleen

Moriarty Science Seminar: Repatriation Initiated by Whom?

R.W. Moriarty Science Seminar Presents: Repatriation Initiated by Whom?

Speaker: Joe Stahlman

In this talk, Joe will discuss a recent experience where a non-Native community initiated and supported a repatriation into their municipality. Native America usually does not observe this type of engagement from our neighbors. Although a positive step forward in reconciling the past, this endeavor encountered many missteps and educational moments along the way. This talk will focus on that experience and how we can collectively reconcile the past by working with non-Native partners and encouraging community engagement.

Dr. Joe Stahlman is the Director of Seneca Nation’s Seneca-Iroquois National Museum-Onöhsagwë:de’ Culture Center and Seneca Nation’s Tribal Historic Preservation Office. Joe is a scholar and researcher of Tuscarora descent. He has over 20 years of research experience working with First Peoples. His research focuses on culture and history, as well as ongoing socio-economic and health and wellness related endeavors with Native communities. He takes an active role in addressing the space Native peoples occupy in North American archaeology and cultural resource management. He regularly talks on the need to promote equity among all peoples in North American society through a number of reconciliatory processes which are inclusive for all and empowers people to express agency through creative and intellectual endeavors.