Tanzania: Wildlife Conservation and Political Ecology

Key Features

"SIT Tanzania helped me develop a different perspective on the world and to view things through a very different, non-western lens."

Tara Boggaram, The University of Texas at Austin

Tanzania is a beautiful and diverse country in East Africa spanning the Serengeti Plains; Mount Kilimanjaro, Africa’s highest peak; and the Zanzibar archipelago. The Serengeti ecosystem (approximately 25,000 square km) includes Oldupai Gorge, a formation of the Great Rift Valley system and the site of renowned early hominid fossil discoveries by Mary and Louis Leakey.

The Serengeti also contains the immense Ngorongoro Crater, a UNESCO world heritage site and the world’s largest volcanic caldera. The Serengeti is home to a large and diverse population of wildlife. More than 120 ethnic groups live in Tanzania, comprising tremendous cultural and linguistic diversity, though unified by a single national language — Kiswahili.

Scale and Location
Two key watchwords for this program are "scale" and "location." Students consider a few essential questions throughout the semester, exploring how changes in scale and location affect the answers to these inquiries. To fully appreciate the diversity and complexity of this region, students are on the move, exploring the variety of natural habitats. Excursions are chosen specifically to provide a variety of locations and scale.

Not Just Science
In this interdisciplinary program, students realize that ecosystems are inseparable from the human ecology of the region and that issues related to development and human population growth inevitably affect the natural habitat (and vice versa). Through the Environmental Research Methods and Ethics course and through other field work, students learn to integrate their scientific learning with the social sciences, creating a more complete and complex picture of ecology and conservation.

Supportive Partners
The program has three major in-country partners: Sokoine University of Agriculture, Klub Afriko Cultural Orientation Center, and the host communities. These partners are instrumental in the success of the program, and many students have returned to work with the program’s partners in future endeavors.

Independent Study Project
Students spend four weeks near the end of the semester working on an Independent Study Project (ISP), pursuing original research on a selected topic of individual interest. The ISP is conducted in Arusha, Moshi, or surrounding areas, or with program approval, in other parts of Tanzania.

Sample topic areas include:

Impact of tourism on the natural environment or cultures
Management options in designated wildlife areas
Environmental education
Soil conservation in Mayo Village
Wildlife-livestock disease interactions in the Kwakuchinja corridor
Behavior of Colobus guereza in Sagara Forest
Canopy and habitat use in sympatric primate species
Modernized farming methods in Mgambo
Kibosho youths’ views on population and the environment
Vegetation analysis of elephant damage at Ndarakwai Ranch

Note: Because of restrictions on fieldwork in Tanzania, students should expect to spend all or most of the Independent Study Project outside the boundaries of Tanzania’s national parks.

Credits: 16

Duration: 15 weeks

Program Base: Arusha

Language Study: Kiswahili

Prerequisites: Coursework in environmental studies, biology, sociology, anthropology, or international relations. Read more...

View Student Evaluations for this program:

About the Evaluations (PDF)

Fall 2012 Evaluations (PDF)
Spring 2012 Evaluations (PDF)
Fall 2011 Evaluations (PDF)

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