Michael benanav biography

Michael Benanav is a writer and photographer whose work appears in The New York Times, Geographical Magazine, Lonely Planet Guidebooks, CNN.com, and other publications.
Follow Michael Benanav and explore their bibliography from Amazon's Michael Benanav Author Page.
Michael Benanov is an alum of the Pacifica Master's in Counseling program.

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New Mexico-based photojournalist will discuss his book "Himalaya Bound" Friday night at NMSU

Michael Benanav is a New Mexico-based author and freelance photographer known for immersing himself in foreign cultures and bringing stories and images back from distant places. His latest book, “Himalaya Bound: One Family’s Quest to Save Their Animals and an Ancient Way of Life”, will be read from and discussed Friday night at 7:30 in the Creative Media Theatre inside Milton Hall as part of NMSU’s Nelson-Boswell Reading Serires. Scott Brocato spoke with Michael Benanav about the book.

Scott Brocato:

As an author in freelance photographer, you're known for immersing yourself in foreign cultures to bring forth compelling stories and images. What drew you to that kind of immersive journalism?

Michael Benanav:

Basically it’s just what I really enjoy doing.

Scott Brocato:

How did it start?

Michael Benanav:

I started by...I’d been traveling, doing some very long-term, off the beaten path kind of traveling in the Middle East, and decided that I had to figure out a w

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The Van Gurjars ("forest Gurjars") are a nomadic Muslim people found in the Shivalik Hills area of Uttarakhand, India, at the base of the Himalayas. Each summer they migrate with herds of semi-wild water buffalo to alpine pastures high up the mountains. Their sole source of income is selling milk to local communities. They are vegetarian, and treat their animals with an unreasonable amount of love. They have been doing this for over a thousand years. In the 1990s, new national parks were show more created for tourism, and this conflicted with the Van Gurjars way of life - people came to see the wild lands, not grazing cows. In 2006 India enacted a "Forest Act" that would protect native peoples, but local park officials took a fiefdom approach and put pressure on the Van Gurjars to stop their nomadic trek. Thus conflicts in the forms of bribes, threats, protests, etc.. have been ongoing.

Michael Benanav is an American journalist and nomad at heart who attached himself to a family of Van Gurjars and followe

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Michael Benanov is an alum of the Pacifica Master’s in Counseling program. He’s an amazing guy who writes for the New York Times, has contributed to Lonely Planet Guide for India, and does incredible photography and documentation of the nomadic life in India – see his notes for details on that. He lives in Dixon, NM. A small village in the northern mountains.

Www.michaelbenanav.com

Dear friends,

I’m happy to announce the launch of Traditional Cultures Project’s new online multimedia piece: Alevis of the Munzur Valley<http://www.munzurvalley.com>!

If you happened to see the story I recently wrote about the Munzur Valley for The New York Times, this project will take you even deeper into the place and the culture – and you’ll find many more photographs, plus videos, that the paper had no room to run.

Please take some time and check it out – and please share it with others via email, Facebook, Twitter, or whatever social media you use.

To all of you who helped support this project – thank you!

Hope you all enjoy it!

Michael