Megan Tarrant

PhD topic title: The role of environmental knowledge in rights-based approaches to conservation.

PhD supervisor(s): Professor Lindsay Stringer and Professor Neil Carter.

Biography and Research

My background is in environmental anthropology, with a focus on conservation and international development. I completed my BA Hons in Archaeology and Anthropology at UCL in 2014 and subsequently spent three years working with indigenous communities in Peru and Papua New Guinea on community-led rainforest conservation projects with a UK NGO. I returned to UCL to study an MSc in Anthropology, Environment and Development in 2017.

My PhD research focuses on rights-based approaches to conservation, and the role of environmental knowledge in environmental justice. Having worked in “community-led” conservation, I am interested in the ways in which people experience conservation, how conservation organisations understand the communities with whom they work and how this affects conservation outcomes. Rights-based approaches have the potential to ensure that biodiversity conservation and the protection of rights are mutually reinforcing. Through my research I want to explore what this means, in reality, for communities involved in such approaches.

Funder

• The Leverhulme Trust