Coupling Citizen Science With Political Ecology and Ethnography to Produce Environmental Knowledge

• In Event: Communicating Science: From Knowledge to Implementation

Abstract

Citizen science as a method of data collection underscores an opportunity for science-minded volunteers to participate in the production of scientific knowledge. In the case of the University of Southern California’s 2015-16 “Urban Tides Community Science Initiative,” researchers and oceanographers are using citizen scientists’ photographs of king tides and coastal flooding to project the impact of sea level rise on California’s coastal communities by 2050. The initiative asks us to consider how citizen science intersects with political ecology and ethnography as methods. This paper argues that coupling these approaches to data collection creates a practical framework for producing and sharing environmental knowledge.

Author

• Brie Iatarola, U of California - San Diego