Analyzing the past has earned Jonathan Dombrosky, a senior anthropology major and Honors College student, the Society of Ethnobiology’s 2012 Undergraduate Ethnobiologist Award, which came with a one-year membership to the society and travel funds to attend the organization’s annual conference at the Denver Botanic Gardens in April.
The international nonprofit organization is dedicated to the interdisciplinary study of the relationships of plants and animals with human cultures worldwide. Dombrosky’s research focuses on subsistence patterns in the Northern Rio Grande region of New Mexico from about 1300 to 1600 A.D. His research will help answer questions about what types of animals humans hunted in that time period, how people procured and processed animals, and how these practices have changed over time. His mentor and advisor is Steve Wolverton, professor of geography.
After graduation, Dombrosky plans to earn a doctoral degree in environmental science and apply paleozoology to conservation biology. He says he also hopes to become a professor and inspire other students as his professors have inspired him.