Taran Robert Cross
DPhil Student - Corpus Christi College
Research Topic: ‘The Roots That Clutch’: Enslaved Life in the Botanical Archive
Supervisor: Katherine Paugh
My research explores the emotional and mundane lives of enslaved individuals within the botanical archive. It examines colonial botany not for its appropriation of enslaved knowledge or enslaved people's contributions to European science, but for its sideways glances at enslaved life that offer glimpses into ways of living, healing, eating, and being beyond enslaved people's encounters with power.
Before starting my DPhil, I earned my MSt in History (British and European History 1700-1850) from Oxford, where I studied at Corpus Christi College, and graduated Summa Cum Laude from Southern Oregon University with a double major in History and Innovation & Leadership. Prior to my academic career, I worked for seventeen years in Information Technology, specializing in database and systems administration, data analysis, development, and Information Security. For the past decade, I served as the Vice President of Client and Information Service for a US software company.
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tr-cross
