Raycraft, Justin
Assistant Professor
- Phone
- (403) 329-2489
- justin.raycraft@uleth.ca
Office Hours
Tuesdays: 12:00 PM to 1:00 PM
About Me
I direct the Applied Research in Environmental Anthropology
(AREA) Lab. Our group uses mixed ethnographic methods to study
human-environment interactions across space and time. We currently have a
primary field site in the Tarangire ecosystem of northern Tanzania. I welcome
inquiries from prospective students and postdocs interested in carrying out
research under the umbrella of the AREA Lab.
I teach
the following courses at the University of Lethbridge:
ANTH 1000 - The Anthropological Perspective (Fall 2025)
ANTH 2210 - Cultures of East Africa (Fall 2023)
ANTH 2710 - Introduction to Environmental Anthropology (Spring
2025)
ANTH 2850 - Visual Anthropology (Spring 2025)
ANTH 3000 – Anthropological Thought (Fall 2025)
ANTH 3115
– Political Ecology (Spring 2026)
ANTH 4850 – Wildlife and People (Spring 2023)
ANTH 4100 – Anthropology of Pastoralism (Fall 2025)
ANTH 4100 – Anthropology of Climate Change (Spring 2026)
CSPT
5305/7303 – Critical Theory (Fall 2025)
Biography
Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology, University of Lethbridge (Current)
Postdoctoral Fellow, Program on Science, Technology, and Society, Harvard University (2022)
Ph.D. Anthropology, McGill University (2022)
M.A. Anthropology, University of British Columbia (2016)
B.A. Psychology (Major) and Anthropology (Minor), University of British Columbia (2013)
Postdoctoral Fellow, Program on Science, Technology, and Society, Harvard University (2022)
Ph.D. Anthropology, McGill University (2022)
M.A. Anthropology, University of British Columbia (2016)
B.A. Psychology (Major) and Anthropology (Minor), University of British Columbia (2013)
Current Research
I have been carrying out ethnographic research on the human
dimensions of conservation in Tanzania since 2014. My book, Conservation in
Common: Managing Wildlife and Sustaining Community on the Maasai Steppe, is
currently in production with the University of Georgia Press and will be published
in December 2025 (link below). Conservation in Common provides the first
ethnographic account of a conservation area in Tanzania that serves the
interests of its local community, thereby
making the case that protecting wildlife habitat and safeguarding human
well-being are not mutually exclusive activities.
Publications
Raycraft,
Justin. 2024. Off the Verandah, and into the Ocean: Scuba Diving,
Anthropology, and Tourism. In Shores, Surfaces, and Depths: Oceanic
Cultures of Tourism and Leisure. Eds. Felicity Picken and Emma Waterton. Pp.
192-206. Routledge: Abingdon, UK.
Raycraft,
Justin, George Tanner, and Edwin Maingo Ole. 2024. Sharing landscapes with
megaherbivores: Human-elephant interactions northeast of Tarangire National
Park. Environmental Challenges 17(101005):1-11.
Raycraft,
Justin. 2024. Perceived impacts of wildlife on agropastoral food production in
northern Tanzania. Ecology of Food & Nutrition 63(3):204-228.
Raycraft,
Justin. 2024. Human-hyena (Crocuta crocuta) conflict in the Tarangire
ecosystem, Tanzania. Conservation 4(1):99-114.
Raycraft,
Justin. 2023. Wildlife and human safety in the Tarangire ecosystem, Tanzania.
Trees, Forests, and People 13(100418):1-11.
Kisingo,
Alex, Justin Raycraft, Neema M. Lekule. 2023. Attitudes of communities living
near Rau Forest Reserve, Tanzania towards Mount Kilimanjaro black and white
colobus monkeys (Colobus caudatus): A pilot study. African Journal of Ecology
00:1-4.
Raycraft,
Justin. 2022. Community attitudes towards Randilen Wildlife Management Area. In
Tarangire: Human-wildlife coexistence in a fragmented ecosystem. Eds. Christian
Kiffner, Derek Lee, and Monica Bond. Pp. 109-128. Springer: New York, NY.
Kisingo,
Alex, Justin Raycraft, Baltazar Mboya. 2021. Community awareness of critically
endangered pancake tortoises (Malacochersus tornieri) in a village near
Tarangire National Park, Tanzania: A pilot study. African Journal of Ecology
00:1-4.
Raycraft,
Justin. 2021. Islamic discourses of environmental change on the Swahili coast
of southern Tanzania. Human Organization 80(1):49-60.
Raycraft,
Justin. 2020. Seeing from below: Scuba diving and the regressive cyborg.
Anthropology and Humanism 45(2):301-321.
Raycraft,
Justin. 2020. The (un)making of marine park subjects: Environmentality and
everyday resistance in a coastal Tanzanian village. World Development
126(1):1-12.
Raycraft,
Justin. 2019a. "In search of a good life": Perspectives on village
out-migration in a Tanzanian marine park. Journal of Rural Studies 70(1):36-48.
Raycraft,
Justin. 2019b. Conserving poverty: Destructive fishing gear use in a Tanzanian
marine protected area. Conservation and Society 17(3):297-309.
Kamat,
Vinay, Phillipe Le Billon, Rose Mwaipopo, Justin Raycraft. 2019. Natural gas
extraction and community development in Tanzania: Documenting gaps between
rhetoric and reality. The Extractive Industries and Society 6(1):968-976.
Raycraft,
Justin. 2019c. From attention to distraction to attention: Considering an ADD
Anthropology. PAN: Philosophy, Activism, and Nature 14(1):73-79.
Raycraft,
Justin. 2019d. Circumscribing communities: Marine conservation and
territorialization in southeastern Tanzania. Geoforum 100(1):128-143.
Raycraft,
Justin. 2018a. Dilemmas of representation in contemporary environmental
anthropology: Documenting dynamite fishing in southeastern Tanzania.
Ethnobiology Letters 9(2): 289-298.
Raycraft,
Justin. 2018b. Marine protected areas and spatial fetishism: A viewpoint on
destructive fishing in coastal Tanzania. Marine Pollution Bulletin
133(1):478-480.
Research Interests
Human dimensions of conservation; political ecology; environmental anthropology; collaborative and participatory research; human-wildlife coexistence; protected areas; community-based conservation; environmental governance; social institutions; pastoralism; social-ecological systems; rangeland management; fisheries; scuba diving; extractive industries; invasive species; climate change; renewable energy transitions; science and technology; African studies; Tanzania