Tabitha K. Kabora
Associate Lecturer in Environment
Profile
Biography
I am an environmental modeller with a background in environmental sciences and archaeology. I completed a PhD in Archaeology from the University of York and I hold an MSc in Biology of Conservation and BSc in Environmental Conservation both from the University of Nairobi.
My interdisciplinary research explores human and environment interactions within the Holocene and Anthropocene with a focus on biodiversity, sustainability and large-scale landscape modifications. My research interests include:
- understanding the effects of human activities on biodiversity and how we can enhance the future utility of land use practices for biodiversity and conservation management
- using agent-based models to explore the socio-environmental factors that influenced the development and resilience of historical agricultural systems in East Africa as well as models to
- understanding landscape changes and responses to Holocene sea-level rise in the North Sea using computer simulations and agent based models
Research projects also included as a Co-Investigator in an AHRC-NERC funded project (Activating the Archive: African environmental histories and knowledges materialised in museum collections) which involved interdisciplinary perspectives on the use of a range of museum artifacts (i.e. objects, archival photographs and ethnographic evidence) to understand past environments, with a focus on the colonial period.
My research has led to collaborations with researchers across the world from the UK, Tanzania, Kenya, the Netherlands and Ethiopia.
Teaching
Undergraduate
I am an Associate Lecturer in the Department of Environment and Geography at the University of York and teach across undergraduate and postgraduate courses on topics related to sustainability, human-environment interactions and modelling socio-ecological systems.
I have previously led on the 2nd year Undergraduate Ecosystem Management and Conservation module as module convenor, and have also taught on Masters-level seminars on climate change and climate modelling and on modelling socioecological systems for the postgraduate Sustainability I and Sustainability II modules.
Publications
Selected publications
- Kabora, T.K., Stump, D., Thomas, C.D. & Beale, C.M. 2024. Assessing inconsistencies in historical land-use reconstructions for Africa at 1800. Reg Environ Change 24, 55 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10113-024-02224-5.
- Murgatroyd, P., Ch’ng, E., Kabora, T.K. & Butler, M. 2022. Simulating a drowned landscape: A four-dimensional approach to solving problems of behaviour and scale', in Gaffney, V. & Fitch, S. (ed), Europe's Lost Frontiers: Volume 1 Context and Methodology. Oxford, Archaeopress Publishing Ltd, pp. 190-207, https://www.archaeopress.com/Archaeopress/Products/9781803272689.
- Kabora T.K., Campbell K. 2022. Archival Photography, UAV Surveys and Structure-from-Motion Techniques for Local Heritage Management. In: Ch'ng E., Chapman H., Gaffney V., Wilson A.S. (eds) Visual Heritage: Digital Approaches in Heritage Science. Springer Series on Cultural Computing. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-77028-0_17
- Kabora, T. K., Stump, D., & Wainwright, J. 2021. Digging deep: Exploring the role of social cohesion and farmer decision-making in the resilience of historical socio-ecological systems. Resilience & Archaeology, 36 (1), 133-152. https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.79044.
- Kabora, T. K., Stump, D. & Wainwright, J. 2020. How did that get there? Understanding sediment transport and accumulation rates in agricultural landscapes using the ESTTraP agent-based model. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, 29, 102115. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jasrep.2019.102115.
- Marchant, R., et al. 2018. Drivers and trajectories of land cover change in East Africa: Human and environmental interactions from 6000 years ago to present. Earth- Science Reviews, 178, 322-378. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.earscirev.2017.12.010.
