Rebecca is a sociocultural anthropology Ph.D candidate who’s research centers on human-elephant relations in northern Thailand. She has conducted 16 months of ethnographic fieldwork in Thailand, collaborating with Thai and Karen scholars at Chiang Mai University, Payap University, Chiang Mai Rajabhat University, and NGO collaborators from Mahouts Elephant Foundation and Indigenous North West (INW). Her dissertation, tentatively titled “Acting on Behalf of Elephants: The Ethics and Politics Human-Elephant Relations in Northern Thailand” explores how how Karen communities relations with elephants contradict nationlaist historiography, and trouble epistemological boundaries between wild and domestic, village and forest, and human and animal social worlds. Here at Penn, Rebecca is co-founder with other graduate students of Upenn SEAG, a graduate student led critical southeast asian studies working group (https://www.upennseag.com), and is a 2024-2026 fellow with the Netter Center for Community Partnerships. Rebecca is commited to scholar activism, and volunteers as an administrative coordinator for the Karen Community Association of Philadelphia (KCAP). In this role she uses her language skills in Sgaw Karen as well as her knowledge of Karen culture and history to support resettled Karen refugees working to better resource their growing community in Philadelphia