Patrick W. Staib, Ph.D.
Associate Professor, Social SciencesAffiliated Faculty, Sustainability Studies
970-870-4448 | pstaib@coloradomtn.edu
Education
- Doctorate and Master’s degrees in Anthropology and Latin American Studies, University of New Mexico
- Dissertation: Coffee and Countryside: Small Farmers and Sustainable Development in Las Segovias de Nicaragua.
- BA in Spanish and Religion from Dickinson College.
I am a cultural anthropologist focused on organic agriculture and sustainable development in Mesoamerica, Nicaragua and the US Southwest. I work with small-scale, organic coffee farmers in the highlands of northern Nicaragua. I have also coordinated and managed a farmer-owned, small-scale, vegetable cooperative based in the South Valley of Albuquerque.
The courses I teach in sustainability and anthropology consider how groups adapt to environmental and social change, both in contemporary settings and ancient contexts. I rely on traditional ecological knowledge, the ethnography of place, and resilience theory as the theoretical basis for inquiry into sustainability education and practice.
My father is from the Black Forest region of Germany and my mother is from Nicaragua. They imparted much of their agrarian and traditional lifestyle on me as a child. I grew up in suburban Philadelphia and lived in Albuquerque and Flagstaff before moving to Steamboat with my wife Kelly and two boys Sebastian and Diego.
