I was born and raised in Tampa, Florida, and currently live in South Carolina with my wife, Diane, and our two children. My research, teaching, and other travel have taken me to six continents, fifty countries (more or less, depending on how you count) and all fifty US states, plus all five inhabited US Territories.

​

After my undergraduate training in computer science at the University of Florida (BS, 2000) I completed graduate degrees in geography at the University of Montana (MA, 2005) under Jeffrey Gritzner and at Louisiana State University (PhD, 2010) under Kent Mathewson. With the able guidance of these mentors I steeped myself in the literatures of cultural geography, environmental history, anthropology, and human ecology in preparation for my current efforts in teaching, research, and outreach.

​

Now I am an Associate Professor in the HTC Honors College at Coastal Carolina University and a Principal Investigator with the Nippon Foundation Ocean Nexus at the University of Washington. I previously spent a year as a Fulbright scholar in the Institute of Island Studies at the University of Prince Edward Island, in Canada, and taught at the University of Denver, the University of the South, and the University of the West Indies-Cave Hill, in Barbados.