Join the Institute for Policy and Social Research for our November 2025 research luncheon! Lunch will be provided. Please email ipsr@ku.edu if you would like to attend. Let us know if you require any accommodations or have any dietary restrictions.

Wildfire Resilience: Indigenous Fire Research, Policy, and Data in the U.S.

Melinda Adams (Langston Hughes Assistant Professor, Department of Geography & Atmospheric Science, Indigenous Studies Program)

In the Western United States, wildfire has become seasonal, altering ecosystems and setting records for acreages burned. For millennia, Tribes around the world engaged in fire stewardship, or cultural burns, as eco-cultural land-tending responsibilities. However, persistent “no burn” fire suppressive policies have contributed to the current wildfire predicament. State and federal agencies are now calling on Tribes to deploy “cultural burns”, as a wildfire mitigation and ecological restoration tool. This talk with synthesize the opportunities and barriers as well as policy-to-practice execution of cultural fire, concentrating first on California, then offering examples throughout the U.S. With particular attention to data-gathering protocol, discussion will elucidate the significance of working with Tribes and state/federal agencies while offering research frameworks towards addressing the wildfire crisis.

IPSR is a research center supporting social scientists who focus on social problems and policy-relevant questions. Our monthly research luncheons provide a space for affiliated faculty and staff researchers to share their own ongoing work with the KU community.

Photo by Mike Yoder for the Lawrence Journal-World