Specialty

Building bridges between the humanities and the natural sciences in a wide variety of research projects in order to further understanding of long-term human ecodynamics and climate change.

Research Interests

The human ecology of Arctic and Subarctic regions; the environmental, social, and human history of countries bordering the North Atlantic; studies of sustainability and adaptability in Norway, Iceland and Canada; changing seasonality in the Arctic; the historical climatology of northern Europe and reconstruction of sea ice incidence; human and social dynamics in the context of climatic and environmental changes; syntheses of proxy climate records; North Atlantic fisheries history; the Viking period; the medieval literature of Iceland; and the analysis of primary historical texts in several languages.

Bio

Astrid Ogilvie is a climate and environmental historian and human ecologist. Her overarching career goal is to build bridges between the humanities and the natural sciences in order to foster interdisciplinary cross-fertilization. Her wide-ranging research interests include the human ecology of Arctic and Subarctic regions; the environmental, social, and human history of countries bordering the North Atlantic, in particular Norway, Iceland, Greenland, and Labrador/Newfoundland; studies of sustainability and adaptability in Norway, Iceland and Canada; changing seasonality in the Arctic; the historical climatology of northern Europe and especially Iceland; the reconstruction of variations in the incidence of sea ice off the coasts of Iceland, Newfoundland/Labrador, the Greenland Sea and the Barents Sea; the impact of climate on societies (human dimensions); human and social dynamics in the context of climatic and environmental changes; syntheses of proxy climate records; North Atlantic fisheries history; the Viking period; the medieval literature of Iceland; and the analysis of primary historical texts in English, Icelandic, Norwegian, Swedish and Danish.

Although her career has primarily involved research, she developed and taught a course in the Department of Anthropology entitled “North Atlantic Peoples and Cultures.” Her service activities have included being on the board of ARCUS for two terms. She is the author of some 100 scientific papers and two edited books, and is currently writing a book on documentary records of climate change.