Brittany Foster
Marine social scientist & practitioner
About
My work is driven by a simple belief: when people who depend on an ecosystem, across multiple dimensions and multiple generations, have the power to care for it, they do. And it benefits us all.
As Director of People & Power at Catch Together, I am building a national movement to shift the benefits and responsibilities of fishing to the people who depend on them the most: small-scale, rural, and Indigenous producers.
I have a Master’s in Environmental Management from Duke University and a B.S. in Aquatic Biology from UC Santa Barbara. I am based in San Francisco, California and enjoy hiking with my husband and dog and getting in the ocean whenever I can (even though in the Bay, it usually means just a quick dip!).
Get in touch
I’m always open to talk about potential opportunities for collaboration or simply nerd-out about marine tenure and fisheries policy. Please don’t hesitate to reach out.
Publications
Published as Brittany Tholan
Tholan, B., Basurto, X., Cohen, P.J., Franz, N., Himes-Cornell, A., Govan, H., Fakoya, K., Akintola, S.L., and Aceves-Bueno, E. (2024). Accounting for existing tenure and rights over marine and freshwater systems. npj Ocean Sustainability, 3, 47. https://doi.org/10.1038/s44183-024-00084-4
Tholan, B. and Behnken, L. (2024). Tenure Rights/USA: By, and from, the sea (SAMUDRA Issue 91). International Collective in Support of Fishworkers. https://www.icsf.net/samudra/tenure-rights-usa-by-and-from-the-sea/
Cohen, P. J., Tholan, B., Dean Fitz, K., Pradhan, S. K., Solis Rivera, V., & Govan, H. (2024). Marine, Coastal and Shoreline Tenure. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.11515141
Tholan, B., Carlson, P., Tortolero-Langarica, J. J., Ketchum, J. T., Trejo-Ramírez, A., Aceves-Bueno, E., & Caselle, J. E. (2020). The biodiversity of fishes at the Islas Marías Biosphere Reserve, Mexico, as determined by baited remote underwater video. Ciencias Marinas, 46(4), 227-252.
Harborne, A., & Tholan, B. (2016). Tool use by Choerodon cyanodus when handling vertebrate prey. Coral Reefs, 35, 1069-1069.
I’m grateful for the people, places, and experiences this work has introduced me to.
Brittany Foster 