Dr James Andrew Whitaker

Honorary Research Fellow

Researcher profile

Email

jaw30@st-andrews.ac.uk

 

Research areas

James Andrew Whitaker (Ph.D. Anthropology, Tulane University) is an Honorary Research Fellow in Social Anthropology at the University of St Andrews and a Post-Doctoral Researcher at the CNRS (USR 3456, LEEISA) in Cayenne, French Guiana. He has conducted fieldwork with Indigenous communities (primarily Makushi and Akawaio) in Guyana and archival research in the UK, US, and Guyana. His work centres around ethnohistory, historical ecology, and ontologies in Amazonia.

He is currently in the process of expanding his ethnographic work to West Africa (primarily Liberia) and will be conducting new fieldwork there during the summer of 2022.

He is working on a book and two edited volumes.

Selected publications

• Armas y brujería: Robo, intercambio y kanaima entre los Makushi

  Whitaker, J. A., 2025, Sorcery in Amazonia: A Comparative Exploration of Magical Assault. Ibero - Amerikanisches Institut

  Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter

• Indigenous Alliance Making: Histories of Agency in Colonial Lowland South America

  Whitaker, J. A. (Editor) & Harris, M. (Editor), 2025, Tucson: University of Arizona Press.

  Research output: Book/Report › Book

• Makushi Alliances in Guyana

  Whitaker, J. A., 2025, Indigenous Alliance Making: Histories of Agency in Colonial Lowland South America. Whitaker, J. A. & Harris, M. (eds.). Tucson: University of Arizona Press

  Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter

• Open access

  On Amazonian magical darts

  Whitaker, J. A. & Daly, L., 10 Dec 2025, In: Folklore. 136, 4, p. 759-781 23 p.

  Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

• Open access

  Sorcery in Amazonia: a comparative exploration of magical assault

  Whitaker, J. A. (Editor), Lewy, M. (Editor) & Janik, T. (Editor), 11 Feb 2025, Berlin: Ibero - Amerikanisches Institut. 244 p. (Biblioteca antropológica Americana; vol. 1)

  Research output: Book/Report › Book

• Open access

  Spoiled by COVID-19: geontology, pathogenesis, and resistance among the Akawaio

  Whitaker, J. A. & Cooper, D. G., 30 Dec 2025, In: Journal of the Anthropological Society of Oxford. 17, p. 23-44 22 p.

  Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

• The Shamanism of Eco-Tourism: History and Ontology among the Makushi in Guyana

  Whitaker, J. A., 6 Feb 2025, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Cambridge Latin American Studies)

  Research output: Book/Report › Book

• Plant agency in the Guianas: attraction, assault, and animacy

  Whitaker, J. A., Tamboli, V., Daly, L. & Lewy, M., 1 Dec 2024, In: Journal of Ethnobiology. 44, 4, p. 247-359

  Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

• Open access

  Shamanic alliance in the touristic borderzone: strategic hospitality at Surama Eco-Lodge in Guyana

  Whitaker, J. A., 19 Mar 2024, In: The Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology . 29, 1, p. 38-49 12 p.

  Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

• Open access

  Climatic and ecological change in the Americas: a perspective from historical ecology

  Whitaker, J. A. (Editor), Armstrong, C. G. (Editor) & Odonne, G. (Editor), 17 Aug 2023, Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge Taylor & Francis Group. 248 p. (New frontiers in historical ecology)

  Research output: Book/Report › Book

 

See more publications