Anthropology Researcher is Funded to Study Geospatial Technologies in Pursuit of Justice

A digital model of the Cerro de Pasco mining operation in Pasco region of Peru. Communities living around the mine have been subject to massive lead exposure through contaminated soil, water and air. A consortium is working to highlight the abuses of the mine's owner by synthesizing spatial and scientific data into a single register. (Image by SITU.nyc)

Jennifer Burrell of Anthropology and two collaborators will conduct one of the first empirical studies on how geospatial technologies are being used around the world in criminal and human rights judicial investigations, thanks to a new National Science Foundation (NSF) grant.

Burrell, working with co-PIs Kamari Maxine Clarke of UCLA and Sara Kendall of Kent University Law School in the United Kingdom, will receive $299,999 over three years from the NSF’s Cultural Anthropology and Law and Science programs for the project “Geospatial Technologies, Justice and Evidentiary Procedure.” The highly competitive award provides support for multi-sited research on three continents.