Thomas Mcllwraith is a cultural anthropologist in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, University of Guelph. He conducts research with Indigenous communities and individuals in British Columbia. Together with communities, Mcllwraith works to document territory, understand food and resource harvesting practices, and to help Elders and families prepare life histories. His work also includes an effort to understand the attitudes and biases that underpin consulting anthropology projects such as land use and occupancy studies, particularly in the contexts of unceded territories and Indigenous rights. Recently, he has partnered with the Canadian Camping Association to help address issues related to cultural appropriation at children’s summer camps.

“In this talk I will describe my work as a community-based anthropologist in British Columbia. I will describe some of the recent developments at the University of Guelph around ethical research practices with Indigenous communities and groups. And, I will open a discussion around the implications of community-engaged research and Guelph’s current community-based research directions for Arctic Biodiversity (ArcBio).”

Seminars:

The Centre for Biodiversity Genomics Science Seminar Series is intended to provide a forum for the CBG researchers to present their work and to share new findings and ideas with their colleagues. We also encourage our visiting scientists and collaborators from different U of G departments to participate and present in this seminar series. We believe that this initiative will foster collaboration within CBG and with a wider community of researchers interested in biodiversity genomics. The seminars will be held in the CBG Visualization Theatre (Room 1009) every second Friday, 11:30-12:30 pm, starting January 31, 2020.

If you are a faculty member, postdoctoral fellow, or visiting researcher and are interested in sharing your research in a 30-45 minute presentation at the Biodiversity Seminar Series please contact one of the coordinators on our website.

We accept submissions for talks on an ongoing basis.