E. Annamalai, Ph.D. (Interim Chair, 2012), holds a doctorate in Linguistics from the University of Chicago and is Professor Emeritus of the Central Institute of Indian Languages (CIIL), Mysore, India, where he worked for twenty-five years, first as Deputy Director and then as Director. As Deputy Director, he was responsible for work relating to indigenous languages and their use in education, including creation of a writing system for pre-literate languages, production of grammars, dictionaries and educational materials, recording of folklore, designing pedagogical models, training of teachers, orientation to government officials and influencing the policies of state governments about the education of indigenous people. His view on language policy and programs, which evolved over years of work of the above kind, integrates the role of the government, the community and the individual regarding language use and stability of multilingualism. This view is articulated in Reflections on a Language Policy for Multilingualism, published in the journal Language Policy 2:2 (2003). The range of his work is available in the books, Managing Multilingualism in India: Political and Linguistic Dimensions (2001) and Social Dimensions of Modern Tamil (2011: www.crea.in). His research and programmatic work for maintaining multilingualism in India naturally led to his interest in global language diversity and its relation to other diversities in the world. This interest is also reflected in his past work on the panel of the Documentation of Endangered Languages Project of the Rausing Foundation in London. He is also involved in the creation of databases and dictionaries of Indian languages, particularly Tamil, his mother tongue. He is currently a Visiting Professor at the University of Chicago.
Jessica Brown, M.A. (Vice-Chair, 2012; At-Large, 2013) focuses on stewardship of biocultural landscapes, civic engagement in conservation, and governance of protected areas. Her concern with biocultural diversity grows out of this work, recognizing that the landscape is both source and expression of the biocultural diversity of life. Over the past two decades, she has worked with community-based conservation projects in countries of the Caribbean, Mesoamerica, Andean South America, Central and Eastern Europe and the Balkans. Jessica is Executive Director of the New England Biolabs Foundation, an independent, private foundation whose mission is to foster community-based conservation of landscapes and seascapes and the bio-cultural diversity found in these places. Prior to that she was Senior Vice President for International Programs with the Quebec-Labrador Foundation/Atlantic Center for the Environment (QLF), responsible for its capacity-building and peer-to-peer exchange activities in diverse regions, and a founding partner of the US National Park Service’s Conservation Study Institute. She is currently consulting with the UNDP/Global Environmental Facility Small Grants Programme and its Community Management of Protected Areas for Conservation (COMPACT) initiative. A member of IUCN’s World Commission on Protected Areas (WCPA), Jessica chairs its Protected Landscapes Specialist Group, a global working group that advises on policy and management issues related to biocultural landscapes and serves as a platform for qualitative research and dissemination of case-study experience. Recent publications include The Protected Landscape Approach: Linking Nature, Culture and Community, and the launch of a new series on Values of Protected Landscapes and Seascapes, exploring the agro-biodiversity, wild biodiversity, cultural and spiritual values of these areas. She received an M.A. in International Development from Clark University, and a B.A. in Biology and Environmental Studies from Brown University.
Susan Fassberg (Secretary / Treasurer, 2012), brings twenty-plus years of experience in marketing, business development and public relations to the Terralingua Board. Currently she holds the position of Director of Strategic Partnerships at the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley. The GGSC studies the psychology, sociology and neuroscience of well-being, and teaches skills for a thriving, resilient and compassionate society. Previously, Susan held senior positions with Salon.com and AskJeeves.com, and consulted for LAMagazine and numerous TV productions in the US and overseas (NDR, ZDF, and RTL+). “Linking people with ideas with people with ideas…” is Susan’s passion. Fluent in German, French and Spanish, she recently launched Connectingdotz.com, a greeting card company celebrating linguistic diversity, endangered languages, and indigenous wisdom. Susan also serves on the Board of the Rockwood Leadership Institute.
George N. Appell, Ph.D. (At-Large, 2012) is a social anthropologist whose interests lie in encouraging the recording of indigenous cultures before they are destroyed by modernization; understanding the pernicious effects of development; emergent structuralism; social change and the processes of biosocial adaptation; the health consequences of social change; systems of property ownership; religion and oral literature; developing culture-free methods for mapping the socio-cultural systems of non-Western peoples; the ethics of anthropological inquiry; the relationship of anthropological theory to the definition of human rights; cultural ecology; and epistemological issues in social anthropological inquiry. His field research has involved work with the Dogrib people in the Northwest Territories of Canada, the Rungus Momogun of Sabah, Malaysia, and the Bulusu’ of Indonesian Borneo. Among his publication currently in process are the monograph “Understanding Resource Tenure and Property Relations: Theory and Methods” and a Rungus Cultural dictionary (with Laura W. R. Appell). He holds positions as Visiting Senior Research Associate in the Anthropology Department, Brandeis University; President of the Firebird Foundation for Anthropological Research; President of the Borneo Research Council; founder of the Anthropologists’ Fund for Anthropological Research ; General Editor of the Borneo Research Council’s monograph series, proceedings, and occasional papers; Co-director, with Laura W.R. Appell, of the Sabah Oral Literature Project since 1986. He developed a Supplemental Grants Program for the Collection of Oral Literature, and provided a seed grant to Cambridge University to establish the World Oral Literature Project.
Cristina Goettsch Mittermeier (At-large, 2012) is a Mexican-born marine biologist, photojournalist, and writer who has traveled to over 60 countries to photograph and document the close relationship between people and nature. She has edited and co-edited 10 books and has published extensively in the popular and scientific literature on subjects related to conservation priorities for biodiversity and indigenous knowledge, especially in the Amazon region. Cristina serves as President of the International League of Conservation Photographers (ILCP), a prestigious group of photographers that she founded in 2005 (www.ilcp.com). She also serves on the Chairman’s Council at Conservation International (CI), on the Advisory Board of Nature’s Best Magazine, and on the Steering Committee of the Commission on Communication and Education of the IUCN, and is a Board Member of the WILD Foundation.
Christopher P. Dunn, Ph.D. (At-Large, 2013) is a botanist and conservation ecologist who has considerable research experience studying the relationships between people and place and human impacts on the landscape. As director of an arboretum in Hawai‘i, he has developed a keen interest in the intersection of biological and cultural conservation. He serves on the Executive Council of Ka Mauli Hou, a multi‐institutional statewide effort to restore native Hawaiian biota and to reconnect native Hawaiian culture to the land. In addition, he is spearheading the development of a trans‐disciplinary Center for Biocultural Studies at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa that will have broad Pacific reach and impact. Christopher also serves on the Board of the American Public Gardens Association and is active in other botanic garden conservation organizations, including Botanic Gardens Conservation International. He has contributed to IUCN’s strategic vision with a view to greater emphasis on cultural conservation within the conventional conservation community.
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