William Balée (born 1954) is a professor of
anthropology
Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, society, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including archaic humans. Social anthropology studies patterns of behav ...
at
Tulane University
The Tulane University of Louisiana (commonly referred to as Tulane University) is a private research university in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. Founded as the Medical College of Louisiana in 1834 by a cohort of medical doctors, it b ...
in
New Orleans
New Orleans (commonly known as NOLA or The Big Easy among other nicknames) is a Consolidated city-county, consolidated city-parish located along the Mississippi River in the U.S. state of Louisiana. With a population of 383,997 at the 2020 ...
,
Louisiana
Louisiana ( ; ; ) is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It borders Texas to the west, Arkansas to the north, and Mississippi to the east. Of the 50 U.S. states, it ranks 31st in area and 25 ...
.
About
Balée was born in
Fort Lauderdale
Fort Lauderdale ( ) is a coastal city located in the U.S. state of Florida, north of Miami along the Atlantic Ocean. It is the county seat of and most populous city in Broward County with a population of 182,760 at the 2020 census, making it ...
, Florida and educated at the
University of Florida
The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida, United States. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida and a preem ...
,
Gainesville, where he received a B.A. in Anthropology before moving on to
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...
in
New York City
New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...
where he earned a Ph.D. in Anthropology (1984).
Career
Balée was appointed research fellow in 1984 by the
New York Botanical Garden
The New York Botanical Garden (NYBG) is a botanical garden at Bronx Park in the Bronx, New York City. Established in 1891, it is located on a site that contains a landscape with over one million living plants; the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, ...
, collecting plants for an
ethnobotany
Ethnobotany is an interdisciplinary field at the interface of natural and social sciences that studies the relationships between humans and plants. It focuses on traditional knowledge of how plants are used, managed, and perceived in human socie ...
project sponsored by a
Noble Grant. Later he took up a research position with the
Museu Goeldi in
Belém
Belém (; Portuguese for Bethlehem; initially called Nossa Senhora de Belém do Grão-Pará, in English Our Lady of Bethlehem of Great Pará), often called Belém of Pará, is the capital and largest city of the state of Pará in the north of B ...
, Brazil.
His primary ethnographic work was with the
Ka'apor indigenous culture of
Maranhão
Maranhão () is a States of Brazil, state in Brazil. Located in the country's Northeast Region, Brazil, Northeast Region, it has a population of about 7 million and an area of and it is divided into 217 municipalities. Clockwise from north, it ...
,
Brazil
Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...
(Balée 1994). During his time in Brazil, however, he also carried out fieldwork with the
Tembé, the
Assurini of the
Xingu River
The Xingu River ( ; ; ) is a river in north Brazil. It is a southeast tributary of the Amazon River and one of the largest clearwater rivers in the Amazon basin, accounting for about 5% of its water.
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Description and history
The fir ...
, the
Araweté of the
Ipishuna, which is also a tributary of the Xingu, and the
Guajá.
However, he is most renowned as a proponent and foremost expert of
historical ecology (Balée 1998). Balée has proposed four interdependent postulates, which set historical ecology apart from other more traditional research programs. Basically summarized, these postulates are: (1) Humans have affected nearly all environments on Earth; (2) Humans do not have an innate propensity to decrease biotic and landscape diversity or to increase it; (3) Various types of societies impact their landscapes in dissimilar ways; (4) Human interactions with landscapes can be comprehended holistically.
Current Work
Currently he is working on issues of applied historical ecology.
Dr. Balée has won the Mary W. Klinger Book Award from the
Society for Economic Botany for two of his books, in 1996 (Footprints of the Forest) and 2014 (Cultural Forests of the Amazon). He was appointed Officer of the
Order of the Golden Ark, a Dutch conservation merit order, by Prince Bernhard in 1993. In 2016 he received the President’s Award for Excellence in Graduate and Professional Teaching from Tulane University. He is a 2019 Guggenheim Fellow.
Balée is the 2023 recipient of the Distinguished Ethnobiologist Award from the Society of Ethnobiology.
See also
*
Carl O. Sauer (geographer)
References
Sources
*Balée, William. 2013. ''Cultural Forests of the Amazon: A Historical Ecology of People and their Landscapes.'' Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press.
*Balée, William 2012 ''Inside Cultures: A New Introduction to Cultural Anthropology.'' Walnut Creek, CA: Left Coast Press.
*Balee William. 2016. Inside Cultures. Second Edition. New York and London: Routledge.
*Balée, William (editor) 1998 ''Advances in Historical Ecology.'' Historical Ecology Series, New York: Columbia University Press.
*Balée, William 1994 ''Footprints of the Forest: Ka’apor Ethnobotany—the Historical Ecology of Plant Utilization by an Amazonian People.'' New York: Columbia University Press.
*Balée, William (editor) 1989 ''Nomenclatural patterns in Ka'apor ethnobotany'' (Journal of Ethnobiology).
{{DEFAULTSORT:Balee, William
21st-century American anthropologists
Tulane University faculty
Ethnobiologists
Living people
1954 births
Environmental studies scholars