Department of Biological and Chemical Sciences

Bio

A rural-raised, first-generation college student and multiple award-winning teacher-scholar, my experience outside of university includes being a cook, stagehand, video game technician, naturalist, stock boy, survey engineer for a mining exploration company in Latin America, general farm work, janitor, and various retail positions (among other exciting gigs).

Since turning my focus to university/academia, I have not only held several faculty positions at universities around the world, but I’ve also been a professional academic advisor, created and supervised several successful and award-winning academic, support, and student programs, been a Fulbright Scholar, National Science Foundation Fellow, Early Career Scholar (Geographic Education), and earned awards for excellence in teaching, research, and service, including the Higher Education Distinguished Teaching award from the National Council for Geographic Education.

Qualifications

Research Areas

As a Geographer, I have difficulty separating the physical from the human, and routinely engage with both simultaneously. Broadly speaking, my specialties include geomorphology (the “Science of Scenery”), landscape studies, and stone/rock decay. Expertise in soils, rock art, humanistic geography, and curriculum/program development round out my topical background. Regionally, my specialties include Latin America and the Caribbean (the Lesser Antilles and Andes more specifically), Arabia (I was Fulbright Scholar to Jordan), Japan, and the Western US – though I do have a solid grasp of other regions, having spent significant time working, living, and studying in various places around the globe.

My research interests include:

• Urban geomorphology – the interaction between landforms and the built environment
• Rock decay and cultural heritage management
• (Inland) Relict tidal notches and their significance in assessing past landscapes
• Rock art in the Lesser Antilles
• Effects of sea level change on graveyards and cultural heritage in the Lesser Antilles

Teaching Areas

• Earth-Life Systems
• Landform Dynamics
• Natural Hazards

Publications

• Allen, C.D., ed. 2017. Landscapes and Landforms of the Lesser Antilles, Springer. 321 pages.
• Thornbush, M.J. and C.D. Allen, eds. 2018. Urban Geomorphology: Landforms and Processes in Cities. Elsevier. 362 Pages.
• Groom, K.M., N.V. Cerveny, C.D. Allen, R.I. Dorn, and J. Theurer. 2019. Protecting Stone Heritage in the Painted Desert: Employing the Rock Art Stability index in the Petrified Forest National Park. Heritage 2(3): 2111-2123.
• Groom, K.M., C.D. Allen, L. Mol, T.R. Paradise, K. Hall. 2015. Defining Tafoni: Re-examining Terminological Ambiguity for Cavernous Rock Decay Phenomena. Progress in Physical Geography 39(6): 775-793.
• Allen, C.D. 2011. On Actor-Network Theory and landscape. Area 43(3): 274-280.

Additional Info

Editor, The Geographical Bulletin, the peer-reviewed journal of the International Honour Society for Geography

Associate Director, Stone Heritage Research Alliance

See my website for more information: https://www.caseallen.com/

Keywords

geomorphology, geography, Lesser Antilles, rock art, stone decay, rock decay, weathering, landscape, cultural heritage, desert, arid lands, US West, biological soil crusts, biogeomorphology