📢 Check out the UH Geography & Environment Department’s Fall 2026 Guest Lecture Series schedule! We look forward to a great semester of talks and discussions. 🌎 geography.manoa.hawaii.edu/public-lectu...

Last week, Geography & Environment faculty and graduate students gathered for new student orientation and a pau hana to kick off the semester! 🌺 We’re excited to welcome our new graduate students and look forward to a great semester ahead!

🏃 This weekend, the Geography & Environment Department Run Club participated in the 2026 Honolulu Rainbow EKIDEN relay race! 🌈 Congratulations to everyone who ran or served as an alternate and represented the department!

Congratulations to UH Mānoa Geography and Environment Assistant Professor Dr. Aurora Kagawa-Viviani, who has been selected as a recipient of the 2026 College of Social Sciences Award for Excellence in Social Impact! Congratulations, Aurora, on this well-deserved recognition!

🗺️ UH Geography Assoc. Prof. Yuqin Jiang was a team leader in the I-GUIDE Summer School 2026: Spatial AI & Convergence Science, hosted by the University of Illinois. Her team developed a machine learning framework to study how urban environmental factors can influence human mobility patterns in NYC 🏙️

UH GEO MA student Kathleen Julca led her team Qochas Resilientes to win the MIT Climate & Energy Prize Student Innovator Award from MIT D-Lab The project supports climate resilience through community-led water management solutions based on traditional q’ocha designs 🌱💧 🔗 Read more: buff.ly/HHABFf7

🐘 New Publication 👏 UH GEO MA student Xiaoyun Neo has published an article in Forest and Society. Read “Elephant Economics and Agrarian Transitions: Conditions for Benefiting From Elephant Tourism Market in an Upland Karen (Paganyaw) Village” here 👉 scholarhub.unhas.ac.id/fs/vol10/iss...

📣 This week in our Spring Seminar Series: Meagan Harden (UH GEO alum, Political Geographer & Public Historian) 📅 Thursday, April 16 | 🕛 12–1 PM 📍 Saunders Hall 443 | Zoom registration 🔗 on request 'The Geoduck’s Garden — public storytelling in the Maritime Washington National Heritage Area'

🥇 UH GEO grad student Xiaoyun Neo won 1st place in AAG's Animal Geographies student research competition for “Following the Elephant: Multispecies Livelihoods & Rural Livelihood Change in Upland Northern Thailand,” 🌏🐘 Congratulations! 👏 🎉

📣 Join us TODAY | Spring Seminar Series Prof. Jason K. Blackburn will talk about linking pathogen genetics and remote sensing to improve disease risk mapping, illustrated through anthrax 🦠 🕛 12–1 PM 📍 Saunders Hall 443 | Zoom (registration 🔗 on request)

🌱 New Publication 👏 UH GEO MA student Sophia Somerscales has published in the International Journal of Remote Sensing! Read “Crop presence and growth-stage mapping in a tropical smallholder setting in Hawai‘i with PlanetScope time series” here 👉 buff.ly/Dbbxyc2

🏆 Another AAG student success story: UH GEO MA student Xiaoyun Neo received the Recreation, Tourism, & Sport Specialty Group Student Paper Award 🎉 Her award-winning paper is titled “Elephant Economics: Conditions for Benefiting from Elephant Tourism Market in an Upland Karen (Paganyaw) Village” 🐘

📣 Join us this week! 'Advancing Medical Geography: linking pathogen genetics with GeoAI and remote sensing' Prof. Jason K. Blackburn (Geography (Dept. Chair) / Emerging Pathogens Institute, UF) 📅 Thursday, April 9 | 🕛 12–1 PM 📍 Saunders Hall 443 | Zoom (registration 🔗 on request)

🏆 More AAG highlights: UH GEO MA student Fernando Lopez Oggier @flopezoggier.bsky.social received the Political Geography Student Travel Award to present “Queer Borderscapes: The Geographies of Border Internalization for Queer Latin American Migrants in Barcelona” at the AAG '26 Meeting in SF ✈️🌍️

⏰ Today at noon! Russell Fielding presents: Breadfruit: Three Global Journeys of a Bountiful Tree 📍 Saunders Hall 443 | 🕛 12–1 PM Zoom🔗 available on request Tracing breadfruit’s path from Oceania to the Caribbean—and its role in sustainability today.

📢 This week: Russell Fielding, visiting author & CCU faculty 📅 Thursday, 4/2 | 🕛 12 PM | 📍 Saunders 443 (Zoom🔗 on req) Topic: Breadfruit: Three Global Journeys of a Bountiful Tree Tracing breadfruit from Indigenous Pacific cultivation through colonial plantations to today’s “superfood” revival.

🌿 UH GEO Lecture Series Join us next Thursday (4/2) at noon for a talk by visiting author & Coastal Carolina University faculty Russell Fielding! Breadfruit: Three Global Journeys of a Bountiful Tree 📅 Thursday, April 2 | 12:00–1:00 PM 📍 Saunders Hall 443 (please request 🔗 to register for Zoom)

🏆 More great news for UH GEO PhD student Carter Beale! He’s also the 2026 AAG Hazards, Risks, & Disasters Specialty Group Gilbert F. White Thesis Award winner for his thesis work on collaborative, nature-based flood management in Hawaiʻi 🌊👏

🎉 Congrats to UH GEO PhD student Carter Beale! He’s been awarded the 2026 Kem Lowry Scholarship (UHM CSS & DURP) 🏅 His research shows that solving environmental challenges goes beyond technical fixes—highlighting the importance of trust and inclusive governance across diverse communities 🌱

📣 New Publication 📝 UH GEO faculty Aurora Kagawa-Viviani and grad student Bryceson Tugade co-authored an article in the Journal of Geography in Higher Education. The study, with UW Bothell and Mālama Maui Nui, discusses collaborative strategies to mitigate contamination exposure in communities. 🔗 👇️

📰 In the news Inkstick: How Trump’s DHS Is Fighting to Pull Local Cops to Its Side UH GEO Prof Reece Jones says Border Patrol practices are appearing in major U.S. cities, where agents can “stop and interrogate pedestrians and vehicles at a lower standard than all other police.” 👉 buff.ly/5KLTCPm

TODAY at noon: Prof. Jason Edward Lewis talks about Reflections on the Challenges of Indigenous AI. Prof. Jason Edward Lewis is a digital media theorist, poet, and software designer exploring computation as a creative and cultural material. 🕛 12–1 PM 📍 Saunders Hall 443 🔗 Zoom on request

📰 In the news UH GEO Prof Reece Jones featured in The Christian Science Monitor. He notes that the current strategy of expanding immigration enforcement both at the U.S. border and interior at the same time seems “unprecedented.” Read more: buff.ly/8foX0rg

Join us TOMORROW (3/12) for a special talk by visiting faculty member and Concordia University Professor of Computation Arts Jason Edward Lewis: Abundant Intelligences Year 03: Reflections on the Challenges of Indigenous AI 📅 Thursday, March 12 🕛 12–1 PM 📍 Saunders Hall 443 💻Zoom 🔗 on request

🏛️🌎️ UH GEO MA student Xiaoyun Neo helped organize the EWC's 25th International Graduate Student Conference, featuring 140 grad presenters from 20+ countries across 30 panels. Xiaoyun also moderated a panel on "Indigenous and Decolonial Education Futures". 👏 Read her interview: buff.ly/LHdeEoo

🔥 UH GEO MA student Fernando Lopez Oggier @flopezoggier.bsky.social has published a new article in Territory, Politics, Governance Congrats, Fernando! 👏 🔗 Read "Itinerant deathworlds: Spanish border externalisation and the necroborder": buff.ly/PqwaZaY 📩 Or reach out for a PDF copy #Geography

📣 Today | Spring Seminar Series Seth Quintus (Assoc. Prof., Anthropology, UH Mānoa) 🕛 12–1 PM 📍 Saunders Hall 443 | 🔗 Zoom (on request) Economic Gravities in Pre-Industrial Hawaiʻi — economic relationships, place-based management, and political change. Join us at noon!

📃 UH GEO Prof. Marina Karides has published new work in Geohumanities, drawing on research conducted in Lesvos, GR🗺️ Read '"Sappho the Eresia:" Place-Making Through Graffiti and Sculpture in Skala Eresos' here 👉 buff.ly/FGIYidj

📣 Spring Seminar Series Seth Quintus (Assoc. Prof., Anthropology, UH Mānoa) 📅 Thursday, February 26 | 🕛 12–1 PM 📍 Saunders Hall 443 | 🔗 Zoom (on request) Economic Gravities in Pre-Industrial Hawaiʻi — economic relationships, place-based management, and political change.

⏰ Today at noon! Leteisha Te Awhe-Downey presents: “Demystifying the Māori diaspora – Conversations with whānau (family)” 📍 Saunders Hall 443 | 🕛 12–1 PM Zoom🔗 available on request We hope to see you there.