Janelle Marie Baker

Janelle Baker's research specializations include ethnography of contamination, environmental and ecological anthropology, ethnobiology and ethnoecology, post-humanism and the anthropocene, anthropology of food, food sovereignty, political ecology, and ethnographic writing. Her research is an ongoing collaboration with Bigstone Cree Nation on sakâwiyiniwak (Northern Bush Cree) experiences with wild food contamination in Alberta’s oil sands region. This research involves community based environmental monitoring for the health of water and moose in Bigstone Cree Nation territory. They are also recording local indicators for climate change and considering Boreal forest food identity. Janelle is also co-PI with Métis anthropologist Zoe Todd on a project that is restor(y)ing land use governance and bull trout population health in a contested area of the Rocky Mountain foothills in Alberta, Canada through podcasts and an upcoming museum exhibit. This work has grown into a Canadian Institute of Health Research funded project (PI Alison Holloway) working with Stoney Nakoda Women to test traditional foods for high selenium content. Dr. Baker is a Co-Editor of Ethnobiology Letters, a diamond open-access online peer-reviewed journal and is the North Americas Representative on the International Society of Ethnobiology Board of Directors. She is the winner of the 2019 Canadian Association for Graduate Studies - ProQuest Distinguished Dissertation Award, Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences category.