
Y. Gavriel Ansara, MSc Y. Gavriel Ansara (席嘉力/
آتش
جاوید
/ גבריאל
יוסף)
recently was awarded a MSc with Distinction in Social Psychology
at the University of Surrey, UK and received a departmental bursary
toward his PhD commencing in October, 2009. Read
more.
Marc
Bekoff, PhD
Marc Bekoff
is a former Professor of Biology at the University of Colorado,
Boulder, and co-founder with Jane Goodall of Ethologists for the
Ethical Treatment of Animals and teaches through Roots and Shoots
at school and prisons. Read
more.
Robin
Bjork, PhD
Robin Bjork
is a Senior Scientist for SalvaNATURA, a non-profit non-governmental
environmental organization in El Salvador. She holds a doctorate
in wildlife science and a master’s degree in coastal ecology.
Read
more.
Martin
Brüne, Dr. med
Martin Brüne
graduated in Medicine from Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität
Münster, Germany, in 1988. He received specialist training
in neurology, psychiatry, and psychotherapy.
Read
more.
Carol Buckley Carol Buckley is an international leader in trauma recovery of Asian and Africa elephants. She has over thirty years experience with elephants in captivity and is co-founder of the first natural-habitat refuge for sick, old and needy endangered elephants, the Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee. Read more.
Ginger
Casto Ginger has been active
in llama rescue activities and education for llama care. She has
lived in the Rogue Valley, Oregon, for over 20 years in the social
service and non-profit consulting profession.Read more.
Casto
Margo
DeMello, PhD
Margo DeMello
is President and Executive Director of House Rabbit Society, an
international rabbit rescue and education organization. She holds
a Ph.D. in cultural anthropology and currently lectures at Central
New Mexico Community College, teaching sociology, cultural studies,
and anthropology.
Read
more.
pattrice
jones
pattrice jones
is the author of Aftershock:
Confronting Trauma in a Violent World, a Guide for Activists and
Their Allies
and the cofounder of the Eastern Shore Sanctuary and Education Center.
She received her graduate training in clinical psychology at the
University of Michigan. Read
more.
Lori
Marino, PhD
Lori is a Senior
Lecturer in Neuroscience and Behavioral Biology at Emory University,
Atlanta and a Faculty Affiliate of the Living Links Center for the
Advanced Study of Ape and Human Evolution. Her research expertise
and interests include the evolution of intelligence and self-awareness
in other species. Read
more.
Eileen McCarthy Eileen McCarthy is Founder, President & CEO of the Midwest Avian Adoption and Rescue Services (MAARS), a unique organization located in St. Paul, MN that has provided sanctuary, advocacy and rehabilitation for wild birds living in captivity since 1999. Read
more.
Joseph
Daniel Mitchell, MS
Joseph is a
fullblood citizen of the Creek Nation and a member of the Muskogee
Indian Community. For the past 26 years, he has worked in environmental
sciences and conservation on tribal and federal lands. Read more.
Michael Mountain Michael is the co-founder and President of Zoe, which is building a global community of people who care about the animals, nature and the environment.Read more.
Vera
Muller-Paisner, LCSW
Vera is a psychoanalyst and daughter of Holocaust survivors. She has spent the last dozen years studying the chronicity and transmission of trauma. Read more.
Susie
O'Keeffe, MS
Susie received
her Master's with distinction from Oxford University in England.
Her research explored the human / wolf relationship, with an emphasis
on how wolves can guide us toward sustainable agricultural systems.
For the past twenty years she has also worked with a variety of
environmental and local agriculture organizations in the United
States and Europe. Read more.
Dave
Perry, PhD
Dave is a Professor
(emeritus) in the Department of Forest Ecosystems and Society at
Oregon State University, and lead author of the acclaimed textbook,
Forest Ecosystems. Read
more.
Elke
Riesterer, CMT
Elke is a Certified
Massage Therapist and registered Jin Shin Do Practitioner with the
broad experience of having worked with people and animals for over
25 years. Read
more.
Charlie
Russell
Charlie Russell
is the founding director of the Pacific Rim Grizzly Bear Co-Existence
Study. Renowned worldwide for his ground-breaking work with grizzly
bears in Canada and Russia, Charlie has spent the better part of
48 years closely observing the nature of these animals in their
natural habitat. Read
more.
Allen
M. Schoen, DVM, MS, PhD (hon.)
Dr. Schoen
received his DVM from Cornell University, College of Veterinary
Medicine, in 1978. He also holds a Master's Degree in neurophysiology
and behavior from the University of Illinois. Dr. Schoen is a pioneer
who has dedicated his professional career to the advancement of
complementary and alternative veterinary medicine. Read
more.
Barbara Smuts, PhD.
Smuts received a Bachelors Degree in Anthropology from Harvard University and a Ph.D in neurological and biological behavioral science from Stanford Medical School and has studied baboons, dolphins, and chimpanzees. Read more.
Ann Southcombe Ann Southcombe is an Animal Relation Specialist and licensed wildlife rehabilitator who, for over 35 years, has dedicated her life to the care of gorillas, squirrels, lynx, bears, and many other species in captivity. Read more.
Ed Tick, PhD Edward Tick, Ph.D. is a holistic psychotherapist and transformational healer. He is a writer, educator, journey guide, activist and veterans’ advocate. He specializes in using psycho-spiritual, cross-cultural, nature-based and international reconciliation practices to bring healing to veterans, survivors, communities and nations recovering from the traumas of war and violence. Read more.
Thidi Tshiguvho, PhD Thidi Tshiguvho’s main research focus is on human-environment relationships, particularly the relationships between indigenous communities and wildlife. With a Ph.D. in Geography from Clark University and a background in conservation biology (M.Sc), Thidi’s work explores indigenous peoples’ perception of nature. Read more.
Joseph P. Yenkosky, PhD. Joseph P. Yenkosky, PhD. is Coordinator of Interagency Initiatives, MidWest Avian Adoption and Rescue Service (MAARS), Minnesota - and Coordinator of The Parrot Directed Research Initiative (PDSI), Kerulos Center, Oregon. Read more.
Y. Gavriel Ansara, MSc

Gavi has designed educational curricula and conducted professional training on numerous topics for psychologists, law enforcement, clergy, social workers, youth educators, and physicians, including a Grand Round at Rhode Island Hospital's Hasbro Developmental-Behavioural Paediatrics Division with internationally recognised paediatric transgender medical expert Dr Norm Spack and HIV expert Dr. Jody Rich. Gavi is the author of "Beyond Cisgenderism: Counselling People with Affirmed Gender Identities" in Ed. Lyndsey Moon's forthcoming text "Queer Dilemmas in Counselling and Psychotherapy" (in press). He is UK Speaker on Multicultural Issues for Organisation Intersex Internationale and the first elected Trans Representative Officer of Surrey’s LGBT Society. As a polycultural, traditionally observant Empath and Healer with ties to multiple continents, he is committed to Tikkun Olam (repairing the world and establishing sanctity within it), moving toward full dietary and lifestyle veganism and challenging human supremacist assumptions. His many trans-species friendships have taught him to appreciate the range of emotional, intellectual, cultural, and spiritual capacities possessed by our fellow beings.
Marc Bekoff, PhD

Robin Bjork, PhD

Programa de Ciencias para la Conservación, SalvaNATURA
Colonia Flor Blanca, 33 Ave. Sur # 640
San Salvador, El Salvador
Robin Bjork is a Senior Scientist for SalvaNATURA, a non-profit non-governmental environmental organization in El Salvador. She holds a doctorate in wildlife science and a master’s degree in coastal ecology. Her past research has focused on documenting spatial patterns of regional migrant tropical birds with a goal of providing guidance to regional conservation planning. Robin began working with wild psittacines in 1994 when she directed development of the first radio tracking device to withstand the force of macaw bills and used the device to track the movements of Great Green Macaws in Costa Rica. Her dissertation research identified the migration of Mealy Parrots across Guatemalan lowlands, the first detailed documentation of such a pattern in psittacines. She continues conservation research with wild parrots and macaws and is currently directing a program to reintroduce Scarlet Macaws to El Salvador and protect endangered Yellow-naped Parrots. Email Robin or visit her website.
Martin Brüne, Dr. med.

Carol Buckley

Ginger Casto

Margo DeMello, PhD

She has recently had articles published in the Encyclopedia of Human-Animal Relationships (Marc Bekoff, ed.), Encyclopedia of Animal Rights (Marc Bekoff, ed.), and A Cultural History of Animals: The Modern Age (Randy Malamud, ed.). Her newest books, to be released in 2009 and 2010, will be A Cultural Encyclopedia of Feet and Footwear and the edited collection, Teaching the Animal: Human Animal Studies Across the Disciplines, and she is under contract to write Animals and Society, a textbook for Brill.
pattrice jones

Lori Marino, PhD

Lori is a Senior Lecturer
in Neuroscience and Behavioral Biology at Emory University, Atlanta
and a Faculty Affiliate of the Living Links Center for the Advanced
Study of Ape and Human Evolution. Her research expertise and interests
include the evolution of intelligence and self-awareness in other
species, noninvasive studies of brain and behavior, cognitive ethology,
human-nonhuman relationships, and animal welfare, ethics, and conservation.
She has worked extensively with dolphins and chimpanzees and, in 2001,
co-authored the first definitive evidence of mirror self-recognition
in a non-primate species, the bottlenose dolphin. She is also involved
in NASA Astrobiology Program initiatives on the evolution of intelligence
and active in many animal advocacy and sheltering efforts. She is
Co-founder of Act For Dolphins, an international coalition seeking
the end of the annual Japanese dolphin hunts. Dr. Marino also co-founded
the Atlanta Animal Studies Group, a group of faculty interested in
scholarly exploration of the cultural and ethical relationship between
humans and other animals.

More recently, the therapeutic environment and treatment program utilized by MAARS for the many birds in their care suffering from capture or captivity-related trauma has led to a partnership with The Kerulos Center and the development of the Avian Care and Recovery Center (ACRC). The foundation of ACRC is to create a model for scientific, animal directed trans-species psychology and psychiatry. The ACRC focuses on the treatment of common conditions including post-traumatic stress disorder, attachment disorders, affect dysregulation, obsessive-compulsive disorders, and other psychological and psychiatric conditions. Such condtions, and effective treatment interventions, are well-documented in the literature and research involving both human and non-human behavior, psychology, psychiatry and neurology. The mission, accomplishments and residents of ACRC will be the strongest evidence available in advocating for the protection and legal rights of non-human animals.
Joseph Daniel Mitchell, MS
Joseph is a fullblood citizen of the Creek Nation and a member of the Muskogee Indian Community. For the past 26 years, he has worked in environmental sciences and conservation on tribal and federal lands with the tribes, the USDA Forest Service, Washington, DC, and Bureau of Indian Affairs. He was Senior Executive Fellow at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, and has worked with more than 200 tribes across the nation. Joe consults with tribal governments and communities on Indian law and treaties and advocacy for tribes to exercise treaty rights on federal lands, and implement traditional practices. He has also been involved in the evolution of several of the 26 tribal colleges throughout the country and has assisted many with establishing traditional ecological knowledge programs.
Michael Mountain

Through the 1990s, as editor of Best Friends magazine, he brought together grassroots groups and people all across the country to help build the no-kill movement that helped bring the number of homeless pets being killed in shelters down from 17 million a year to fewer than 5 million.
“Today,” he says, “it’s not just dogs and cats who are losing their homes. Our fellow animals are being made homeless all over the world: from elephants and tigers, who are being hunted and encroached upon to extinction ... to life in the oceans, where 90 percent of predatory fish are now gone due to overfishing, and where the coral reefs, where most fish are birthed, are now dying due to warmer, polluted waters ... to animals large and small who are being forced to leave their homes in search of new habitat due to climate change ... to dolphins who are torn from their homes to entertain people by doing party tricks in tanks.
“Zoe will do online what we did with Best Friends magazine in the 1990s, becoming the go-to place for news, both serious and light, philosophical and quirky, and bringing us all together to help transform the way people relate to the animals, nature and, by extension, each other.”Michael adds that he’s delighted to be part of the Kerulos faculty: “Speaking as an Oxford dropout from the 1960s, I’d say that the Kerulos Institute is providing the kind of education that all universities should be offering!” As part of Kerulos, Michael is particular concerned with helping people understand that almost all the ills of the world today stem from our sense of disconnection from the natural world – and therefore from our own nature. “The Earth is our home,” he says, “and the other animals are our family and our neighbors. We’re destroying our home and killing our neighbors. No good can come of this. It’s time to build a whole new relationship to our fellow animals. And Kerulos will be laying the foundations and providing much of the key groundwork for this.”
Vera Muller-Paisner, LCSW

Susie O'Keeffe, MS

The educational element of Susie's work includes an undergraduate course that examines contemporary and historic case studies of naturalists who have used creative perception, and prolonged contemplation, as forms of inquiry and understanding. Traditional conservation approaches are compared and contrasted with emerging ideas about our capacity for mutual exchanges with other beings, and the emerging understanding of animal cultures, intelligence and emotion. Students are introduced to the idea of creative perception, moral consciousness and forms of contemplative practice as valid tools of inquiry. They explore role that these practices and ways of understanding play in addressing our ongoing destruction of life and landscape. Students express what they have discovered, felt, dreamed and imagined through art forms of their choice.
Dave Perry, PhD

Dave’s research interests have focused on various aspects of ecosystem function, including especially how cooperation among species contributes to ecosystem health. He has taught ecology, silviculture, ecosystem management, and currently an online course in the ecology of sustainable resource management. He has conducted short courses on ecosystem management in Canada, Chile, and Brazil.
Elke Riesterer, CMT

Charlie Russell

Charlie's visionary and courageous work has overthrown countless widely held convictions concerning the nature of grizzly bears. He is the only person to ever successfully demonstrate that, when treated as intelligent beings, worthy and deserving of respect, grizzly bears will co-exist peacefully with humans.
His experience includes an 18 year exploration of how grizzlies used and shared his ranch situated on the boundary of Waterton / Glacier International Park near the border between Alberta and Montana. During this time he developed systems that allowed his cattle and the bears to co-exist. In 1992-93, Charlie lived on Princess Royal Island to create a film about the Spirit Bear with award winning wildlife filmmakers Jeff and Sue Turner. His first book, Sprit Bear—Encounters with the White Bear of the Western Rainforest, chronicles the two years spent living with and filming these little understood animals.
From 1996 to 2006 Charlie explored how human fear, anger and aggression have shaped the human-bear conflict. Determined to examine whether or not trust, kindness, openness and respect could transform our relationships with grizzlies, Charlie lived at the heart of a very dense population of bears in Kamchatka, Russia. In this rugged and remote area, he pioneered raising ten orphaned cubs rescued from a Russian zoo. To gain maximum understanding about bears that do not fear humans, Charlie and his project partner, Maureen Enns, established deep and lasting bonds with the cubs, as well as several of the wild bears in the region. Wild and free after six years, the cubs grew into peaceful, trustworthy adult bears. They demonstrated no signs of violence or aggression toward humans.
Charlie's latest best selling book, Grizzly Heart – Living Without Fear Among the Brown Bears Of Kamchatka, chronicling this extraordinary story and visionary work, is published in five languages. He also co-authored with Maureen Enns a companion photo album, Grizzly Seasons – Life with the Brown Bears of Kamchatka. Several films have brought this remarkable story to the world, including the 1997 documentary for PBS Nature: Walking with Giants: The Grizzlies of Siberia. In 2005 the BBC film Bear Man of Kamchatka was made. Jeff and Sue Turner created a 90 minute theatre production entitled The Edge of Eden from which much of the footage for the BBC film was taken. To date this moving film has won 12 awards in both European and North American film festivals.
At 67, Charlie is working to bring co-existence home through the Pacific Rim Grizzly Bear Co-Existence Study. When he is not out sharing his experience and knowledge with audiences throughout the World, he is enjoying his granddaughter and his other great passion – flying the airplane he built himself.
Allen M. Schoen, DVM, MS, PhD (hon.)

Dr. Schoen has held faculty positions at Colorado State University College of Veterinary Medicine and Tufts University College of Veterinary Medicine in addition to being a faculty member of the Chi Institute for Traditional Chinese Medicine. He is certified in both veterinary acupuncture (1982) and veterinary chiropractic (1990). He is a former President of the International Veterinary Acupuncture Society (IVAS).
Dr. Schoen is a pioneer who has dedicated his professional career to the advancement of complementary and alternative veterinary medicine. He is the founder and director of the Center for Integrative Animal Health, a division of Global Communications for Conservation, Inc. (GCC). He is the co-editor of Complementary and Alternative Veterinary Medicine, Principles and Practice, and the editor of both Veterinary Acupuncture: Ancient Art to Modern Medicine and Problems in Veterinary Medicine: Veterinary Acupuncture. Dr. Schoen is the author of Kindred Spirits, How the Remarkable Relationship between Humans and Animals Can Transform our Lives (Broadway, Random House, 2001) and author of Love, Miracles & Animal Healing (Simon & Schuster, 1995). He has published numerous research articles on complementary and alternative veterinary medicine (CAVM). He has lectured on CAVM throughout the world including Europe, Scandinavia, Australia, New Zealand, South America, Africa, the U.S. and Canada.His research grants include one from the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation for developing CAVM curriculums for veterinary schools, and one from the Gauntlett Foundation for developing new approaches to chronic disease. He has received research grants through GCC, Inc., from the Janet Stone-Jones Foundation, and from the McIntosh Foundation. Dr. Schoen is a charter fellow of the American College of Acupuncture, an organization of physicians dedicated to scientific acupuncture. Dr. Schoen was appointed to the American Veterinary Medical Association's (AVMA) six member committee on alternative and complementary veterinary medicine for whom he developed approved guidelines for CAVM in 1996. He has been on numerous editorial boards of journals and advisory committees of various veterinary nutritional companies. He authored a column with Time-Warner's Pathfinder web site titled The Healing Arts. He was a consultant for a new Public Broadcasting System television series on health care as well as having his own radio show.
In addition, Dr. Schoen maintains a referral practice in large and small animal integrative veterinary medicine. Through this practice he has developed new approaches to such degenerative conditions as cancer, arthritis, liver disease and others. Dr. Schoen continues to create innovative natural nontoxic approaches to animal health, environmental health and human health care and integrate them into a new interdisciplinary program with a commitment to compassionate care for all beings.
Dr. Dame Daphne Marjorie Sheldrick, DBE, MBS

For over 25 years, from 1955 until
1976, Daphne Sheldrick lived and worked alongside her late husband,
David, the famous founder Warden of Kenya's giant Tsavo National
Park. During that time she raised and rehabilitated back into the
wild community orphans of misfortune from many different wild species,
including Elephants aged two and upwards; Black Rhinos, Buffaloes,
Zebra, Eland, Kudu, Impala, Duikers, Reedbuck, Dikdiks, Warthogs
and many smaller animals such as civets, mongooses and birds. She
is a recognized International authority on the rearing of wild creatures
and is the first person to have perfected the milk formula and necessary
husbandry for both infant milk dependent Elephants and Rhinos. The
key to her success has been her life-long experience of wild creatures,
an in-depth knowledge of animal psychology, the behavioral characteristics
of the different species, and, of course, that most essential component,
a sincere and deep empathy. For her work in this field Daphne Sheldrick
was decorated by the Queen in 1989 with an M.B.E., elevated to U.N.E.P.’s
elite Global 500 Roll of Honour in 1992, among the first 500 people
worldwide to have been accorded this particular honour, and awarded
an Honorary Doctorate in Veterinary Medicine and Surgery by Glasgow
University in June 2000. In December 2001 her work was honoured
by the Kenya Government through a prestigious decoration - a Moran
of the Burning Spear (M.B.S.), and in 2002 by the B.B.C. when she
received their Lifetime Achievement Award. In the November 2005
issue of the Smithsonian Magazine Daphne Sheldrick was named as
one of 35 people worldwide who have made a difference in terms of
animal husbandry and wildlife conservation. In the 2006 New Year’s
Honours List, Queen Elizabeth II appointed Dr. Daphne Sheldrick
to Dame Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire,
the first Knighthood to be awarded in Kenya since the country received
Independence in 1963.
Barbara Smuts,
PhD
Smuts received a Bachelors Degree in Anthropology from Harvard University
and a Ph.D in neurological and biological behavioral science from
Stanford Medical School and has studied baboons, dolphins, and chimpanzees.
In the 1970s she began research with Jane Goodall on chimpanzees
in Gombe National Park. She uses perspectives derived from evolutionary
theory, studies of complex systems, and developmental research to
examine the dynamics and functions of long-term social relationships.
Her work focuses on social behavior in primates, wolves, and domestic
dogs in the areas of play, social reciprocity, cooperation, greetings,
conflict resolution, emotions, and mood. Questions that inspire
her wok include: How do other animals develop trusting relationships
in the absence of spoken language? What do animals understand about
the beliefs and intentions of their social partners? And how can
understanding of nonhuman social relationships help us to better
understand human behavior?
Ann
Southcombe

Ed Tick, PhD

Ed is Co-founder, Director and Senior Clinician of Soldier’s Heart: Veterans’ Safe Return Initiatives. He has been a psychotherapist for 35 years, specializing in working with veterans and others suffering with Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) since the late 1970s. He has served as distinguished visiting faculty at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, West Point, Ft. Hood, and numerous universities, colleges and cultural centers around the world. He is internationally recognized as an expert on veterans, PTSD, and the psychology of military-related issues.
Ed leads semi-annual international educational, healing and reconciliation journeys to Greece and Viet Nam. He has published four books: Sacred Mountain, Encounters with the Vietnam Beast (1989), The Practice of Dream Healing (Quest, 2001), The Golden Tortoise: Viet Nam Journeys (Red Hen, 2005), and the award-winning War and the Soul (Quest, 2005), credited with transforming the trauma field to include spiritual and cultural dimensions of wounding and healing. His work has been translated and published in Greece, Japan, Viet Nam and Bulgaria. He is also a poet and author of over 100 articles in psychology, holistic health, mythology and spirituality, literature, philosophy, culture and travel.
Spirituality, soul, the Earth, and their well-being are at the center of all Ed’s work.
Thidi Tshiguvho, PhD

Thidi’s work highlighted how snakes were believed able to communicate with humans about the biological and social condition of sacred forests they inhabit. Her research also compares the basis for (1) respectful vs. abusive treatment of plants and animals within indigenous and western societies, and (2) “othering” other beings in general. Thidi’s recent interest is on the behavioral similarities between humans and other species, particularly in terms of how they respond to environmental stress.
For the past 10 years, Thidi has taught ecology, conservation biology, geography, and other environmental science courses at several universities in South Africa and the USA. She is currently at Clark University, the Department of International Development, Community and Environment, working on Aids 2031 and other projects. Previously, she was part of National Science Foundation task force to establish a Long-term Ecological Research site in South Africa.
Joseph P. Yenkosky, PhD

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2009 Kerulos Center All rights reserved
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under skin, fin, feather and fur"

