James Biles is a geographer, specializing in development policy and praxis in Mexico and Latin America. His research attempts to incorporate the knowledge and experiences of those often excluded from policymaking, while highlighting the place-specific practices and strategies that people devise for the purposes of improving livelihoods. These scholarly activities have been funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and its Mexican equivalent (CONAHCYT). Beyond the confines of academia, Biles forms part of INDAGAR, A.C., a non-profit community development organization in Yucatán, Mexico.
Education
- B.S.S., Urban and Environmental Studies, Ohio University, 1995
- M.A., Economic Geography, Michigan State University, 1998
- Ph.D., Economic Geography, Michigan State University, 2001
Courses
- Social Change in Developing Countries
- Globalization
- Urban Sociology
- Cities and Sustainability
- Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Water: Theory, Policy and Governance
- Latin American and Caribbean Civilizations
- J.J. Biles. (2023). Making sense of social housing policy in Mexico: Shortcomings, contradictions and alternatives. Ponte Journal 79, 10, 23-40.
- J.J. Biles and D.S. Lemberg. (2023). A multi-scale analysis of urban warming in residential areas of a Latin American city: The case of Mérida, Mexico. Journal of Planning Education and Research 43, 4, 881-896.
- J.J. Biles. (2023). Work, in S. Cruise et al. eds., Social Problems: A Case Study Approach. Kendall Hunt Publishers, pp. 165-186.
- J.J. Biles and A. Andrade. (2020). Latin American immigrants in New York face Covid-19 crisis. NACLA: North American Congress on Latin America.
- R. Bein, R. Wilkie, W.G. Lovell, W. Doolittle, J.J. Biles, et al. (2020). Fifty years of fieldwork in Latin America. Journal of Latin American Geography 19, 1, 115-131.
