Lauren D. Pharr

Lauren Pharr on Being a Black Field Biologist

– Birdnote, May 31, 2023

For her PhD, Lauren Pharr took on a challenge: studying Red-cockaded Woodpeckers, which make their nests high in pine trees. But as a Black woman working as a field biologist in the rural South, Lauren says she faces higher levels of risk than her white colleagues. Lauren co-founded an organization called Field Inclusive that raises awareness about how to promote the safety of people from marginalized backgrounds in the field.

Ph.D. Student Discovered Her Passion at Wingate

Wingate Magazine, Spring ’23 Issue

Pharr, like her Ph.D. subject, the red-cockaded woodpecker, is something of an endangered species: There just aren’t many Black birders out there. But she’s trying to change the perception of birding, and wildlife research itself, as an activity only for middle-age white men.

An Interview with an Icon

A South Carolina native, Joseph Drew Lanham, a Black Man, naturalist, writer, and poet, continues to change this narrative. This new MacArthur Fellow is an ornithologist and bird watcher who chooses to focus intensely on birds as beings, relating their plight to poetry and the human social condition. This is a reflection on Lanham’s influence, significance, and perspectives on ecology and society.