Bachelor of Arts in Environmental Studies and Bachelor of Science in Environmental Science College of Arts and Sciences University of Hawai`i at Hilo

Current Position

Present Associate Professor and Department Chair, Geography and Environmental Studies, University of Hawai`i at Hilo

2009 Associate Professor, Geography and Environmental Studies, University of Hawai`i at Hilo (Tenured, 2010)

2005 Assistant Professor, Geography and Environmental Studies, University of Hawai`i at Hilo

Education

2001 PhD Geography, University of Hawai`i at Manoa,

Dissertation: Spatial Stories of Researchers and Travelers in a Balti Village, Pakistan: Jangli Geographies of Gender and Transculturation
1996 MA Geography, University of Hawai`i at Manoa,

Thesis: Mountain Heirs: Western Imaginings of Sherpa Children in the Khumbu, Nepal

1987 BA University of California, San Diego

Major: Visual Arts; Minors: Sociology & English Literature

Graduate cum Laude

Grants

2006 University of Hawai`i at Hilo Seed Research Grant, “Pedagogy in Transcultural Spaces of the Pacific” ($9775)

2003 University of Waikato Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences Academic Research Visitor’s Grant, David Butz (NZ $4320)
2002 University of Waikato, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences “Bringing out the beast in us: animal tourism in New Zealand” (with Lynda Johnston and Robyn Longhurst) (NZ $6217)
1999 Arts and Sciences Advisory Council Award, University of Hawai`i at Manoa (US $1000)
1998 National Science Foundation, Doctoral Improvement Grant, “Spaces of Erasure” (with Brian Murton) (US $9919)
1997 Social Science Research Council Pre-Dissertation Fellowship (US $10,000)
1997 Arts and Sciences Advisory Council Award, University of Hawai`i at Manoa (US $1000)

Grants Submitted

August 2011 - NSF Research in Undergraduate Institutions (RUI) Collaborative Research, Geography and Spatial Science and Cultural Anthropology (joint review): Local Food: Cuisine, Subsistence, and Alternative Food Sourcing on Hawai`i Island. K. Besio, PI and L. Costa Co-PI ($224,176.) Result: not funded and will resubmit in August 2012.

Scholarly Activities

Publications
Peer Reviewed Journal Articles
2013, Besio, Kathryn and Sarah Marusek Losing it in Hawai`i: Weight Watchers and the paradoxical nature of weight gain and loss. Gender, Place and Culture

2011 Costa, LeeRay and Kathryn Besio, Eating Hawai`i: Hawai`i Regional Cuisine and the Making of Place, Social and Cultural Geography 12(8): 839-854.

2009 Butz, David and Kathryn Besio “Autoethnography,” Geography Compass (http://www.blackwell-compass.com/subject/geography), Blackwell Publications, 3/5: 1660-1674.
2008, “Success from Failure,” Using Don Mitchell’s Critical Geography in Human Geography 1(2): 118-119.
2008 Besio, K, L Johnston and R Longhurst Sexy Beasts and Devoted Mums: Narrating Nature through Dolphin Tourism. Environment and Planning A 40: 1219-1234.
2007 Depth of Fields: Travel Photography and Spatializing Modernities in Northern Pakistan Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 25, 1: 53-74.
2006 Chutes and Ladders: Gender and Spatiality in a Balti Village, Pakistan. Special issue on Gender & Sexuality, ACME 5: 258-278.
2006 Besio, K and P Moss Introduction to Special Issue on Gender and Sexuality: Sexed, unsexy and gendered spaces of inversions and reversals. ACME 5: 112-126.
2005 Telling Stories to Hear Autoethnography: researching women’s lives in northern Pakistan. Gender, Place & Culture 12: 317-331
2004 Butz, David and K. Besio The Value of Ethnography for Field Research in a Transcultural Setting. The Professional Geographer 56 (3): 350-360.
2004 Besio, Kathryn and D. Butz Commentary: A Limited Endorsement for Autoethnography. The Professional Geographer 56 (3): 432-438.
2003 Stepping in it: Postcoloniality in Northern Pakistan. Area 35 (1): 24-33.
Peer Reviewed Book Chapters

2010 “The politics and ethics of geographic research” invited submission, in the Handbook of Social Geography, Susan Smith, Sallie Marston, Rachel Pain, and John Paul Jones III (Eds.), Sage Publications: 560-573.

2007 In the “Lady’s Seat”: Western Women Travelers in Northern Pakistan in Women, Religion, Space Karen Morin and Jeanne Kay Guelke (Eds.), Syracuse University Press, NY: 81-101.
Book Reviews

2003 Cang-Sen Ooi Cultural Tourism and Tourism Cultures: The Business of Mediating Experiences in Copenhagen and Singapore in The Journal of Asian Studies (May 62(2): 568-9.

2002 Martin Khor Rethinking Globalization in Progress in Development Studies, 2 (3): 247-8.
Invited Encyclopedia Entries

2007 “Women, Gender and Tourism: South Asia” in Encyclopedia of Women and Islamic Cultures Volume VI, Supplement and Index, Suad Joseph (Ed.) Brill Publications, Leiden: 258-260.

2009, “Autoethnography” in International Encyclopedia of Human Geography, Rob Kitchin and Nigel Thrift, Eds., Elsevier Press.
Papers in Progress
Too Many Mangos and Local Food on Hawaiʻi Island for submission to special issue on Hawaiʻiʻs Foodscapes Food, Culture and Society.
Presentations at Conferences and Other Scholarly Venues
2012 Too Many Mangos and Local Food on Hawai`i Island. Foodways: Diasporic Diners, Transnational Tables and Culinary Connections Conference, Centre for Diaspora and Transnational Studies, University of Toronto, Canada, October 4-7, 2012.
2011 “Grow ‘em, Catch ‘em Eat ‘em: Decolonizing foods in east Hawai`i,” Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting Seattle, WA, April 15, 2011.
2011 What does your garden grow? Everyday practices of food and identity in Hilo, Hawai`i. University of Auckland, Auckland, NZ, April 1, 2011
2011 Local Eaters, Eating Locally: Local foods and Hawai`i Regional Cuisine, University of Waikato Staff-Student Seminar Series, Hamilton, NZ, March 28, 2011
2010 “Grow ‘em, Catch ‘em, Eat ‘em: Hilo’s Foodscape” Tropical Conservation Biology Seminar Series, University of Hawai`i at Hilo, October 20, 2010.
2010 “Eating Hawai`i: Local Foods and Hawai`i Regional Cuisine” at University of Hawai’i at Manoa, Geography Department Colloquium Series, September 23, 2010.
2010 Hawai`i Regional Cuisine and the Making of Place, Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting, Washington, DC, April 16, 2010.
2008 Eating Hawai`i: Agritourism and Hawai`i Regional Cuisine in the Big Island Foodscape. American Anthropological Association Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA Nov. 19-23, 2008.
2008 Alter(ed)Native Nationalisms: Spaces of Resistance and Accommodation on a Hawai`i University Campus, Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting, April 18, 2008, Boston, MA
2008 Panel Participant, Teaching Critical Geography: Using Don Mitchell’s Critical Geography. Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting, April 19, 2008, Boston, MA.
2007 Being haole: ‘race,’ education and US empire in Hawai`i, Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting, April 17, San Francisco, CA.

2007 Stereotypical Geographies/Iconoclastic Ethnographies, Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting, April 20, San Francisco, CA.

2006 Autoethnography and Blurring Conceptual Boundaries within Feminist Geographic Research, International Geographic Union Commission on Gender and Geography Pre-Congress Symposium, Hamilton, NZ, June 28, 2006.

2006 The Emotional Geographies of ‘Doing Ethnography’ 3: Representations, Association of American Geographers, Chicago, March 9, 2006.

2006 Discussant, The Emotional Geographies of ‘Doing Ethnography’ 4: Autoethnographies, Association of American Geographers, Chicago, March 9, 2006.
2005 “In the “Lady’s Seat: Cosmopolitan Women Travelers in Pakistan”, On Voyage: New Directions in Tourism Theory, sponsored by Berkeley Tourism Studies Working Group, University of California, Berkeley, October 8, 2005.
2005 “Chutes and Ladders: Gender and Spatiality in a Balti Village,” Association for American Geographers Meeting, Denver CO, April 8, 2005.
2005 “Constructing Knowledge, Destabilizing Authority and Commending Bodies” Association for American Geographers Meeting, Denver CO, April 8, 2005.
2004 “Depth of Fields: Islamization, travel photography and women’s places in a Balti village, Pakistan” Association of American Geographers Meeting, Philadelphia, PA, March 19, 2004.
2003 “Why look at animals when you can swim with dolphins?” Besio, K., Johnston, L. & Longhurst. R. Taking Tourism to the Limits Conference, University of Waikato, NZ December 9, 2003.
2002 “Stitched together geographies: writing postcolonial stories,” invited participant to the Geography and Postcolonialism Workshop, December 9, 2002, The National University of Singapore.
2002 “Txtng a Poco Msg: Researching Gender and Social Science Methodologies,” Law, History and Post-Colonial Theory Symposium, University of Waikato, NZ December 6, 2002.
2002 “Separation anxiety: colonial geographies and wedding stories in northern Pakistan,” Staff-Student Seminar Series, Geography Department, University of Waikato, May 6 2002.
2002 “I think we may need a divorce”: Spatial Stories of Weddings and Postcolonial Geographies,” Association of American Geographers Meeting, Los Angeles, CA, March 21, 2002.
2001 “Depths of Fields: Tourism, Islamization, Photography and Women in Askole,” (presented by David Butz) at the colloquium “Other 'Risk Societies”: Himalayan Peoples in Transition,” sponsored by the Cold Regions Research Centre, Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Ontario, December 7, 2001.
2001 “Stepping in it: Post-colonial geographies in Pakistan,” Feminist Interdepartmental Research Series, University of Waikato, May 30, 2001.
2001 “A Transcultural Geography of Baltistan, Northern Pakistan: Stories of Girls, Weddings, Goats and other Mysteries,” University of Hawaiÿi at Manoa, April 19, 2001.
2000 “Locating Bodies in the Map: Colonial and Post-Colonial Geographies in Pakistan,” Cultural Studies Program, Colloquium Series, University of Hawaiÿi at Manoa, December 6, 2000.
2000 “The Geographer and the Geographized: Post-Colonial Theory and Qualitative Methods,” (Butz, David and K. Besio) Association of American Geographers Meeting, Pittsburgh, PA, April 5, 2000.
1999 “Placing Each Other in Baltistan: A Geography of Knowing,” Annual Conference on South Asia, Madison, WI, October 16, 1999.
1999 “Power Play: Himalayan Children and Geographies of Authority,” Association of American Geographers Meeting, Honolulu, HI March 27, 1999
1999 “Look at me!” Children’s Geographies of Power in a Balti Village,” Center for South Asian Studies Sixteenth Annual Symposium, University of Hawaiÿi at Manoa, April 16, 1999.
1999 “Travelers, Transients, Women and Children in a Karakoram Mountain Village: A Study of Fields,” Center for South Asian Studies, University of Hawaiÿi at Manoa, February 26, 1999.
1998 “Camera Shudders: Women, Girls, Trekkers and Photographic Space in a Karakoram Mountain Village," Association of American Geographers Meeting, Boston, MA, March 29, 1998.
1997 “Spaces of Erasure: Age and gender in transcultural interactions in a Karakoram mountain community,” Colloquium Series, Department of Geography, University of Hawai`i at Manoa April 24, 1997.
1997 “Marketing Mountain Heirs: Adventure Travel and Appropriation of Place in Nepal,” Association of American Geographers Meeting, Fort Worth, TX, April 3, 1997.
1996 “Keep the Home Fires Burning: Colonial and Postcolonial Representations of Reproductive Labor in the Himalayas,” Annual Conference on South Asia, Madison, Wisconsin, October 19, 1996.
1996 “AnOther Space on the Margin: Children and Tourists in Nepal,” Association for Asian Studies Meeting, Honolulu, Hawai`i, April 12, 1996.
1996 “Travels in Childhood and Colonizing Space in the Khumbu, Nepal,” School of Hawaiian, Asian and Pacific Studies Student Conference, University of Hawai`i at Manoa, March 12, 1996.
1995 “Tropes on the Pleasure Periphery: Representations of Sherpa Children’s Work in the Khumbu Tourist Industry,” Western Regional Conference, Association for Asian Studies, Lewiston, Idaho, September 27, 1995.
Academic Panels Organized
2010 The Decolonization of Diet: Examining Health and Food Practices with Jessica Hayes-Conroy, Association of American Geographers, Seattle, WA April 15, 2011
2005 More Sex! More Gender! (with Robyn Longhurst, University of Waikato) Association of American Geographers, Denver, CO April 8, 2005
2002 AC/DC: Alternating and (Re)Directing Currents in Geographic Presentation, Association of American Geographers, Los Angeles, CA, March 21, 2002.
2002 Posting Up: Positioning Research Methods in a Postcolonial Context (with David Butz, Brock University), Association of American Geographers Meeting, Los Angeles, CA, March 22, 2002.
2000 Feminist Geographic Inquiry and Qualitative Research Methods (with Maureen Hayes-Mitchell, Colgate University) Association of American Geographers Meeting, Pittsburgh, PA, April 6, 2000.
1999 Critical Geographies of Children and Youth (with Tom Herman, San Diego State) Association of American Geographers Meeting, Honolulu, HI, April 12, 1999.
1999 Knowing the “other,” Annual Conference on South Asia, Madison, WI, October 16, 1999.
1996 Contemporary Tourist Destinations: Conflicting Imagery of Spaces and Places in Asia and the Pacific, Association for Asian Studies, Honolulu, HI, April 12, 1996.
Invited Reviewer for Scholarly Journals

Previous Appointments

2001-4 Lecturer, University of Waikato, Hamilton, NZ

Courses Taught: Gender, Place and Culture, Tourism Environments, Contemporary Cultural Geographies, Tourism in Society, Geographies of Tourism Planning and Development, Social Construction of Tourism and Tourists, Introduction to Tourism Studies and Critical Urban Geographies

Graduate Supervision

2 MA students, 5 Honours Students

2000 Instructor, Outreach College, University of Hawai`i at Manoa

Geography of World Regions

1994-2000 Teaching Assistant, University of Hawai`i at Manoa,

Geography and the Natural Environment; Geography & Contemporary Societies; Geography of World Regions; Geography of Hawai`i

1999 Reader and Examiner, Manoa Writing Project, University of Hawai`i at Manoa May and August

1995 Instructor, College of Continuing Education, University of Hawai`i at Manoa

Geography and the Natural Environment Lab

1995 Instructor, Summer Session, University of Hawai`i at Manoa

Geography and the Natural Environment Lab

1993 Student Research Assistant, Dept. of South Asian Studies, University of Hawai`i at Manoa

University Service

2012 MA Committee member for Tom Belfield and Krista Jaspers, Department of Geography, UH Manoa

2012 PhD Committee member for Jenn Bernstein, UH Manoa

2012 Chair, Geography and Environmental Studies

2012 Academic Policy Committee Chair, College of Arts and Sciences

2010 Social Sciences Division Personnel Committee

2010 Search Committee Chair, UHH Dept. of Geography and Environmental Studies

2009-10 University of Hawai`i at Hilo, Director, Women’s Studies

2008-09 University of Hawai`i at Hilo Student Assembly, Faculty Advisor

2008-09 University of Hawai`i at Hilo Shared Governance Review Taskforce

2008-10 Keaholoa/LSAMP Mentor, University of Hawai`i at Hilo

2008- 10 Food Service Advisory Council, University of Hawai`i at Hilo

2007- 09 Graduate Council, University of Hawai`i at Hilo

2005-2010 Steering Committee, Women’s Studies, University of Hawai`i at Hilo

2006 - 2007 Health and Safety Committee, University of Hawai`i at Hilo

2006 (spring) Acting Chair, Geography Department, University of Hawai`i at Hilo

2004 Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences Planning Group, University of Waikato

2002 Cultural Studies Working Group, University of Waikato

Professional Development

Uluakea Faculty, Teaching from a Hawaiian World View, Kipuka Native Hawaiian Student Center, University of Hawai`i, 2007-present

Uluakea Workshop, Teaching from a Hawaiian World View, 2007, Kipuka Native Hawaiian Student Center, University of Hawai`i at Hilo, May 17-23, 2007

MacPac Group, 2007-2008 – Online and course development, using Podcasts and other online resources.

University of Waikato, Teaching and Learning Development Unit Workshops

2002 Supervision & Lecturers at Work

2001 Using Technology, Leading Discussions, Designing Assessment Tasks Principles of Assessment

Professional Memberships

Association of American Geographers (since 1996)

Community Service

2011 – Regional Geography: South Asia, E.B. DeSilva Elementary School

2009 – What do geographers do? E.B. DeSilva Elementary School,

2008 – Rice is Nice, Guest Lecture, Smithsonian Foodways Exhibit, HCC, HI, December 11, 2008

2008 – More than Madrassas: Pakistan and Ecotourism UHH and HCC International Education Week, November 17, 2008

2008 – Panelist, Hands-on and Creative Teaching, UHH New Faculty Orientation, August 21, 2008

2007 – UHH Hunger Banquet, Guest Speaker

2007 – YWCA Preschool, Guest Speaker on geography

2007 – Volunteer, University of Hawai`i at Hilo, Women’s Center

2003-2004 Trustee, Hamilton Multicultural Services Trust, Hamilton, NZ

1998-99 Guest Speaker, Hawai`i Geographic Alliance, “Village Children in Northern Pakistan,” 45 classrooms in the Hawai`i State School System

1999 Appearance on EARTH, Tele-School produced by Department of Education, State of Hawai`i, 2 January.

1999 Website Development, Hawai`i Geographic Alliance, “Village Children in Northern Pakistan.”