Tovar Cerulli

Engagement Strategist / Social Scientist

As a student of culture and values, Tovar has a talent for listening, distilling core meanings, and illuminating diverse perspectives. As a writer, he loves to craft concise, powerful prose.

His lifelong curiosity about human relationships with the larger-than-human natural world led him to apprentice with a forester-logger and learn to hunt after a decade as a vegan. It also inspired him to attend graduate school, where he coined the now-commonplace moniker “adult-onset hunter” and researched Ojibwe and Euro-American hunting communities’ ways of talking about wolves.

Tovar has collaborated with a wide array of state, federal, and nonprofit organizations on communication, messaging, and engagement efforts. He is the author of The Mindful Carnivore: A Vegetarian’s Hunt for Sustenance and has written for many publications, including Outdoor America, High Country News, and Northern Woodlands.

He holds a PhD in communication from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.

Skills & Expertise
Qualitative research
Writing and storytelling
Language and values analysis
Intercultural engagement
Office Phone
802-267-5335
Photo of Tovar Cerulli
Logo of the International Council for Game and Wildlife Conservation

2018

Keynote for CIC 65th General Assembly

Delivered keynote speech at the 65th General Assembly of the International Council for Game and Wildlife Conservation in Madrid, Spain.

Logo for the Wildlife Management Institute

2017

Plenary Talk at the 82nd North American

Delivered plenary talk on “Merging Conservation Values in the Quest for Relevancy” at the 82nd North American Wildlife and Natural Resources Conference in Spokane, WA. 

Wolf standing in woods

2016

PhD in Communication

Earned a PhD in social science with a focus on ethnography and environmental communication. His dissertation explored Ojibwe and Euro-American hunting communities' ways of talking about wolves: Of Wolves, Hunters, and Words: A Comparative Study of Cultural Discourses in the Western Great Lakes Region.

The Leopolds' first house in Tres Piedras, New Mexico

2015

Aldo and Estella Leopold Residency

Spent a month in residence at "Mi Casita," Aldo and Estella's first home in Tres Piedras, New Mexico. Residency co-sponsored by the Aldo Leopold Foundation and U.S. Forest Service.

Logo for Backcountry Hunters & Anglers

2013

BHA New England Chapter

Founding board member of the New England chapter of Backcountry Hunters & Anglers.

Logo for the Vermont Fish and Wildlife Department

2013

Certified Hunter Education Instructor

Certified as a Vermont Hunter Education Instructor.

Cover image for The Mindful Carnivore

2012

The Mindful Carnivore

Authored The Mindful Carnivore: A Vegetarian's Hunt for Sustenance, named Best Book of 2012 by the New England Outdoor Writers Association.

Logo for the University of Massachusetts at Amherst

2011

MA in Communication

Earned a master's degree in social science with a focus on environmental communication. His thesis explored what Tovar dubbed "adult-onset hunting."

Spotted owl catching a mouse in Mount Rainier National Park

1994

BA in Liberal Arts

Earned a bachelor's degree with a focus on conflict and social change. Senior work explored clashes and often-overlooked shared values and interests among loggers and ecology activists in the Pacific Northwest.