Professor, Anthropology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Program in the Environment, Program in Computing for the Arts and Sciences, School for Environment and Sustainability; Associate Chair, Anthropology
he/him
ajmarsha@umich.edu
Office Information:
Office: 204-B West Hall
Lab: 420 West Hall
1085 S. University Ave, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1107
phone: 734.763.4735
hours: Tuesdays, 2:30 pm - 4 pm, and by appointment via email
Biological;
Anthropology;
Department Administration
Education/Degree:
2004, Ph.D. Anthropology, Harvard University; 2000 M.A. Anthropology, Harvard University; 1996 B.A. Anthropology, summa cum laude, Harvard University
About
I received my undergraduate and graduate degrees from the Biological Wing of the Department of Anthropology at Harvard University. After finishing my undergraduate work in 1996, I spent a year living in Indonesian Borneo managing Cheryl Knott's long- term orangutan research project and working for National Geographic. I returned to Harvard in 1997 to do my PhD with Mark Leighton and Richard Wrangham. While in graduate school I did fieldwork on apes in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo before returning to Kalimantan to study gibbons and leaf monkeys. During my fieldwork I became interested in botany and plant ecology, and upon completion of my PhD in 2004 I did a two-year post doc at The Arnold Arboretum in the Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology at Harvard. From 2006 to 2014 I served on the faculty at the University of California, Davis in Anthropology, Ecology, and Animal Behavior and from 2012-2014 I served as Chair of Conservation Ecology. I joined the faculty at Michigan in 2014. My main research site (since 2000) is Gunung Palung National Park, West Kalimantan, Indonesia. I am also involved in mammal and forest conservation initiatives at several other sites in Indonesia.
Research Areas(s)
- primate evolutionary ecology, population biology, and behavior
- community ecology
- tropical forest ecology
- conservation biology
Award(s)
- University of Michigan Distinguished Faculty Achievement Award
- UC Davis Chancellor’s Fellow
- UC Davis Hellman Fellow
- Fulbright Scholar (Indonesia)
