Michelle Y. Merrill, Ph.D.
Anthropology Instructor at Cabrillo College
PhD in Biological Anthropology, Duke University
BA in Anthropology, UC Santa Cruz
My goal with this blog is to write about things that interest me as a thinker and scholar (and yes, that sounds pretentious, but I think I’ve earned it at this point). So look over my biography (below) and see if the things that interest me are also interesting to you. If so, welcome! If not… well… diversity is the soul of resilience, so to each her own.
I’ve taught and lectured on evolutionary biology, social networks, anthropology, sustainability and communication for groups ranging from junior high school students to advanced university and professional audiences. I’ve studied animal behavior, evolutionary biology, tropical ecology, and social networks. I’m fascinated with applied complexity science, resilience thinking, and the future of technology and society.
I currently teach Anthropology courses (including “Surviving the Future: The (Re)Emergence of Sustainable Cultures”). I am the faculty advisor for the Cabrillo student Sustainability Council, an active member of the Cabrillo College Climate Initiative Task Force and Sustainability Alliance, and am happy to support students in activities and independent studies related to campus sustainability. See www.CabrilloGreenSteps.org to learn more. I am currently researching and writing a book on culture change, eco-literacy and sustainability.
My graduate research centered on the evolution of cooperation, social learning, culture and the origins of technology through the study of non-human primates. I studied Bonobos at the Language Research Center and in a rainforest in Congo (Zaire) and orangutans in the Sumatran rainforests.
Observational Learning in Sumatran Orangutans
My Ph.D. dissertation (Duke University, 2004) was on orangutan sociality and the question of orangutan cultures.
In 2005-2006, I was involved in the replication project for the Digital Bridge Academy. In this work, I learned more about experiential and team-based education and the experience of at-risk students in community colleges. I continue to work occasionally as an eco-literacy consultant with Emergent Systems.
Finally, I am a nerd. Dyed-in-the-wool, knows a D20 from a Dyson Sphere, nerd. Huge fan of Joss Whedon (can recite many Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Firefly episodes chapter and verse) and Babylon 5, still buy comic books, play MMORPGs, was in a Rocky Horror Picture Show cast for years, love to browse NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day, attend CONTACT conferences, and wish I had more time to read speculative fiction novels. Actually, also writing a speculative fiction novel, or more like two now (yeah, baby, livin’ the dream).
So, my goal is to share that with y’all, at least once a week through 2011. Let’s talk…
-Michelle
Oh yeah, all text on this site is under a Creative Commons 
Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, with love.
