Applied Cultural Ecology, LLC is a woman-owned small business that provides services in areas of heritage resource management for living cultural groups and communities, social impact assessment, public involvement, community-based conservation, and environmental impact assessment.

Staff

Ginny Bengston, Managing Partner

M.A. Anthropology

Ginny Bengston has a strong background in applied cultural anthropology and, over the last three decades, has worked for cultural resource and environmental consulting firms and as a private consultant conducting ethnohistoric and ethnographic research of Native American cultures of the Great Basin and Southwest. She received a B.A. in Anthropology from the University of Washington and an M.A. in Applied Anthropology from Northern Arizona University. She has worked with numerous federal and state agencies and Native American communities throughout the Great Basin and Southwest as a liaison, facilitating communications between project proponents, government agencies, and Native American and other cultural communities. Ms. Bengston has also collaborated with government agencies and cultural communities to produce ethnographic/ethnohistoric assessments and overviews and traditional cultural place inventories. As a cultural anthropologist working in the field of applied anthropology for 30 years, Ms. Bengston has accumulated a set of skills and tools that enable her to come up with unique solutions for a variety of issues and client needs. She has become adept at quickly building rapport with clients, government agency staff, and Native American tribal and other cultural community representatives. She uses her organizational skills for effective project management, such as coordinating and facilitating large tribal information meetings for federal agencies, streamlining fieldwork, and report preparation. By utilizing all these skills, as well as the ability to assess situations from both an emic and etic perspective, Ms. Bengston can take on a variety of tasks that involve working with different cultural communities. After three decades of gathering research data and writing the results up in numerous technical reports, she has become a proficient writer and editor. Ms. Bengston currently uses cultural anthropological methods and skills to develop unique solutions in response to environmental assessment and other industry needs.

Megan Fuller, Partner

MA Anthropology

Megan S. Fuller is a self-motivated and team-oriented, anthropologist with experience in historic preservation and environmental compliance who enjoys working with people from varied educational, social, and cultural backgrounds. A creative and critical thinker who practices a “big picture” approach and the flexibility to meet organizational priorities and deadlines with strategic and successful outcomes for projects both large and small. Over the past 20 years, Megan has assembled an eclectic body of knowledge working with consulting firms, non-profits, artists, a monthly publication, and as a contract anthropologist. These varied experiences, along with traditional anthropological research techniques, provide a solid basis for building relationships with clients, cultural experts, and regulators, as well as aiding in ethnographic analysis and innovating client solutions. Megan’s knowledge, skills, and abilities range from event coordination, public presentations, and literature review, to interviewing cultural experts, data analysis, and communicating results so they are understood by stakeholders of all backgrounds.