The Department of Anthropology is pleased to announce it’s newest PhD., Dr. Ryan Klataske.

We are proud to see Ryan come to the completion of his graduate school career here at MSU after the successful defense of his dissertation on December 8th. The department faculty and staff wish Ryan and his family all the best as he moves forward with his professional career.

Dr. Klataske’s dissertation entitled Wildlife Management and Conservation on Private Land in Namibia: An Ethnographic Account documents the use of common property as a tool for wildlife management and conservation on private ranchland in Namibia. Based on 13 months of ethnographic research, it examines how and why groups of white ranchers have used common property as a tool for managing common-pool wildlife across boundaries of private land. These arrangements and the territories they govern are called freehold or commercial conservancies. His work suggests that common property offered not only a tool for conservation, but also a strategy for survival in post-apartheid southern Africa. By working together, these ranchers attempted to construct a new niche for themselves based on the conservation and sustainable use of African wildlife. Since the early 1990s, freehold conservancy members have transformed their relationship to wildlife and each other, contributing to the conservation of wildlife and habitat on private land. Yet, despite their accomplishments, many ranchers see their efforts as failing or falling short. Their disillusionment stems from the politics of land, fear of a potentially predatory state, and an insecure sense of belonging.