Karl Offen
Professor, Geography and the Environment Department
Senior Research Associate and Advisory Board Member, Program on Latin America and the Caribbean
Courses
- 2024 Fall
- GEO 300 Selected Topics - Historical Geo-Latin America
- 2024 Spring
- GEO 103 Environment and Society
- GEO 300 Selected Topics - Latin American Historical Geo
- 2023 Fall
- GEO 300 Selected Topics - Maps, Power, History
- 2023 Spring
- GEO 610 Qualitative Methods in Geography
- GEO 300 Selected Topics - EnvHistory-LatinAmer&Caribbean
- 2022 Fall
- GEO 300 Selected Topics - Historical Political Ecology
Highest degree earned
Areas of Expertise
Selected Publications
- Books
- Journal Articles
- Offen, K. H., "Subsidio de la naturaleza: Las tortugas verdes en el gran caribe colonial." Mesoamerica, 2023.
- Offen, K. H., "The lifeworld of Elizabeth Symons: Family biography and Atlantic geographies in the eighteenth century." Journal of Historical Geography, 2023.
- Offen, K. H., "A Miskitu Critique of British Trade Practices." Ethnohistory, 2022.
- Offen, K. H., "English Designs on Central America: Geographic Knowledge and Imaginative Geographies in the Seventeenth Century." Early American Studies, 2020.
- Offen, K. H., "Subsidy from Nature: Green Sea Turtles in the Colonial Caribbean." Journal of Latin American Geography, 2020.
- Offen, K. H., "Mapping Amerindian captivity in colonial Mosquitia." Journal of Latin American Geography, 2015.
- Offen, K. H., "Historical Geography III: Climate Matters." Progress in Human Geography, 2014.
- Book Chapters
- Offen, K. H., "Cartography and Environment in Colonial Latin American History." In Oxford Research Encyclopedia in Latin American History. Oxford University Press, 2024.
- Offen, K. H., "Logwood, masterless men, and British interests in Yucatan and Central America." In Colours, Commodities and the Birth of Globalization: A History of the Natural Dyes of the Americas, 1500-2000. Bloomsbury, 2024.
- Offen, K. H., "Environment, Space and Place: Cultural Geographies of Colonial Afro-Latin America." In Afro-Latin American Studies: An Introduction. Fuente, A. d., Andrews, G. R. (eds.) Cambridge University Press, 2018.
- Offen, K. H., Rundstrom, R., "Indigenous Peoples and Western Cartography." In Cartography in the Twentieth Century, vol. 6: History of Cartography. Monmonier, M. (ed.) University of Chicago Press, 2015.
- Offen, K. H., Dym, J., "Introduction." In Mapping Latin America: A Cartographic Reader. Dym, J., Offen, K. H. (eds.) University of Chicago Press, 2011.
- Offen, K. H., "Race and Place in Colonial Mosquitia." In Blacks and Blackness in Central America: Between Race and Place. Gudmundson, L., Wolfe, J. (eds.) Duke University Press, 2010.
- Offen, K. H., "The Geographical Imagination, Resource Economies, and Nicaraguan Incorporation of the Mosquitia, 1838-1909." In Territories, Commodities and Knowledges: Latin American Environmental Histories in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries. Brannstrom, C. (ed.) Institute for the Study of the Americas, 2004.
- Book Review
- Offen, K. H., "The Last Turtlemen of the Caribbean: Waterscapes of Labor, Conservation, and Boundary Making." In H-Environment Roundtable. H-Environment Roundtable, 2023.
- Coordinator of book review forum who authored an introduction and edited the submission
- "Introduction, book review forum, Palm Oil Diaspora: Afro-Brazilian Landscapes and Economies on Bahia's Dendê Coast." Offen, K. H. (ed.) Journal of Latin American Geography, 2023.
- Journal Special Issue Editor
- "Mapping Latin American Geographies." Offen, K. H. (ed.) Journal of Latin American Geography, 2015.
- Online Libraries
- Offen, K. H., "Introduction to and annotation of M.W.'s 'The Mosqueto Indian and his Golden River' of 1699." Revista Temas Nicaragüense, 2013.
- Offen, K. H., "Isthmus Designs." In Cartographic Conversations, John Carter Brown Library. , 2012.
- Offen, K. H., "La cartografía colonial de Centroamérica y el topónimo ‘Mosquito’." Boletín de la AFEHC (Asociación para el Fomento de los Estudios Históricos en Centroamérica), 2011.
- Offen, K. H., "Mapping Land Politics on the Mosquito Shore." In I Found It at the JCB. , 2010.
- website
- Offen, K., "Atlantic Bristol: Connecting the City to Central America and the western Caribbean." University of Bristol Library, Special Collections Blog, 2022.
Presentations and Events
37th Conference of Latin American Geographers, CLAG, "The Lifeworld of Elizabeth Symons: Family biography and Atlantic geographies in a multigenerational letter collection" (January 3, 2023 - January 6, 2023)
Offen, K. H., Lovejoy, P., Múltiples facetas de la Independencia: La emancipación de América Central en retrospective, Conmemoraciones por el bicentenario de la Independencia Centroamericana (1821-2021), "The Interesting Narrative of Intrigue and Deception on the Mosquito Shore, 1773-1781" (October 14, 2021 - October 16, 2021)
36th Conference of Latin American Geographers, "Subsidy from Nature: Green Sea Turtles in the Colonial Caribbean" (January 2, 2020 - January 4, 2020)
3rd World Congress of Environmental History, "‘Infinitt numbers’: Green Sea Turtles in the Colonial Caribbean" (July 22, 2019 - July 26, 2019)
"Robert Hodgson of the Mosquito Shore: Mapping a Trans-Atlantic and Trans-Imperial Life" (June, 2019)
Previous Teaching Appointments
Chair, Environmental Studies Program, Oberlin College (2019-2021)
Professor, Environmental Studies Program, Oberlin College (2017-2021)
Associate Professor, Environmental Studies Program, Oberlin College (2015-2017)
Associate Professor, Department of Geography, University of Oklahoma (2006-2015)
Assistant Professor, Department of Geography, University of Oklahoma (2000-2006)