Miles Richardson Research Lab

The Department of Geography and Anthropology received funds from the College of Humanities and Social Sciences in 2003 to outfit a laboratory dedicated to cultural, historical, ethnographic, linguistic, and landscape oriented research.

The vision for this lab was to create a place where geography and anthropology students engaged in research that was humanistic or social scientific, collaborate, and have access to equipment dedicated to their projects. The lab complements several other labs across campus dedicated to coastal research, archaeology, forensics, and GIS.

Faculty developed a list of equipment that would enable students to do three things: (1) record, preserve, and edit video interviews and images, (2) take still photos and edit the results, and (3) record, preserve, and edit audio interviews. The department created one Mac workstation for audio and video work and secured a video camera, tripod, and a compact digital audio recorder. Supplemental equipment included software and a foot pedal for working on audio transcriptions. To enable the transfer of old slide transparencies and other photographic still image activities, the department also acquired flatbed scanner to function with the photo workstation. A digital camera completed the photography gear.

Since its inception, the equipment has traveled with students to several continents and proved useful in conducting research on a variety of projects.