9: Tina Harris on What Pilots Do When Technology Fails, and Why Cows Matter in Aviation

Anthropologist Tina Harris studies aviation - flying - in countries like Nepal, where landing strips are short and the weather can change quickly from clear skies to dangerous storms. How do pilots and aviation staff navigate safe flights? It's not through the type of high-tech you might expect, discovers Harris. Learn how cows, birds, and old-fashioned cellular phones help travelers safely reach their destination.  

Tina Harris is Associate Professor of Anthropology and a member of the Moving Matters research group at the University of Amsterdam. She holds a PhD from the City University of New York Graduate Center, and her research focuses on aviation, infrastructure, cross-border mobility, and the circulation of commodities across borders. She is the author of Geographical Diversions: Tibetan Trade, Global Transactions (University of Georgia Press, 2013), is co-Managing Editor of Roadsides journal, and is one of the main organisers of the Asian Borderlands Research Network.