Professor Sokolov Vasey is a biological anthropologist specializing in primatology. Her research centers on the behavioral ecology and conservation of Madagascar’s lemurs, with particular focus on how ecological and life history traits influence species survival under varied environmental conditions and through geological time. Her work integrates long-term behavioral, ecological, and demographic monitoring, most prominently at a site she established in northeastern Madagascar on the Masoala Peninsula.
Several dozen students have earned graduate degrees under Natalie’s mentorship, both at Portland State University and at the University of Antananarivo, Madagascar. Her primatology field training course at the Lemur Conservation Foundation has spawned the careers of over 50 undergraduates in areas spanning primatology, conservation biology, and veterinary medicine. Natalie serves as Curator of the Biological Anthropology Teaching and Research Collections at Portland State University. In 2021 she established the Marc. R. Feldesman Laboratory of Primatology and Human Evolution.
Agencies supporting Natalie’s work include the National Geographic Society, the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, and the LSB Leakey Foundation. She pays it forward by engaging with public audiences about Earth’s most endangered mammals, the most notable being an invitation to speak at OMSI’s Empirical Theatre for the premier of “Jane” (2017).
Natalie’s interest in biological anthropology crystallized as an undergraduate while working as an intern curator at the Hearst Museum of Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley. Prior to her appointment at Portland State University, she held several other academic positions including a Postdoctoral Fellowship at Pennsylvania State University with the late Alan C. Walker.
Courses Natalie currently teaches include:
- Introduction to Biological Anthropology (Anth 101)
- Human Variation (Anth 372)
- Primate Ecology and Behavior (Anth 373)
- The Roots of Human Biology (Anth 472/572)
- Primatology (Anth 473/573)
- Primatology Field Methods (Anth 477/577)
- Human Osteology (Anth 478/578)
- Core Seminar in Physical Anthropology (Anth 570)