Jake W. Dean | Department of Anthropology

Graduate Student

jakewdean@ucsb.edu

CV_4_2025_Update - Jake W. Dean.pdf

Website:

Personal Website

Specialization:

Sociocultural Anthropology

Education:

M.A. Anthropology, UC Santa Barbara (2025)

M.A. Latin American Studies, The University of Arizona (2023)

B.S. Earth & Space Exploration (Astrobiology & Biogeosciences) - Arizona State University (2021)

B.A. Anthropology - Arizona State University (2021)

Bio:

As an environmental anthropologist, I employ ethnographic methods, the environmental humanities, and critical approaches to infrastructure and tourism to analyze the political ecology of marine conservation, food production, and outdoor recreation in North America. My dissertation research investigates the affective entanglements of ecotourists, fishers, conservationists, and more-than-human beings along the migratory path of Pacific gray whales between coastal Alaska and the lagoons of Baja California Sur, Mexico. I also have ongoing projects investigating the socioecological dynamics of mezcal production in Southern Mexico and the impacts of sport & outdoor recreation on the environment. I currently serve as the Book Reviews Editor for the Journal of Political Ecology and the Graduate Student Representative for the Culture & Agriculture section of the American Anthropology Association. I am also up for election to join the Council on Heritage and the Anthropology of Tourism in 2025.

Research:

Political Ecology of Conservation & Affect

Maritime & Fisheries Anthropology

Posthumanism Pacific Coast of Mexico & the Americas

Critical Tourism Studies

Critical Infrastructure Studies

Publications:

J.W. Dean, “Do whales really want to be watched? Ecotourism marketing, green capitalism, and the subjective narrative of whale-watching in the Pacific lagoons of Baja California Sur,” book chapter accepted in Unsettling Conservation (forthcoming), Colorado University Press.

J.W. Dean, “Fake snow, faking sustainability: Host selection and the Winter Olympics’ growing reliance on artifical snow ahead of Milan-Cortina d’Ampezzo 2026,” The Journal of Olympic Studies, vol. 6, no. 1, pp. 46–65, 2025.

J.W. Dean & J. Parks, “The framing of Indigenous and local ecological knowledge amidst climate change education in the COP27 cyberspace,” Climate & Development, vol. 16, no. 10, pp. 918–929, 2024.

J.W. Dean, A.M. Rice, L.M. Choi, “Small-Scale Food Production in the Pandemic: Perspectives from Mexico & Guatemala,” in Journal of Latin American Geography, vol. 22, no. 2, pp. 215–226, 2023.

Dean, J. W. (2023). Cesando la Sal: A Social Ecology of Conservation-as-Development and Pacific Gray Whale Ecotourism in El Vizcaíno Biosphere Reserve, México [Master’s Thesis, The University of Arizona]. http://hdl.handle.net/10150/668385

P. Whelley et al., “The Importance of Field Studies for Closing Key Knowledge Gaps in Planetary Science,” Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, vol. 53, no. 4, White Paper #165 of the NASA Planetary Science and Astrobiology Decadal Survey 2023-2032, Mar 2021.

Courses:

Associate Instructor - ANTH 109: Human Universals (Summer 2024, Summer 2025)