Logan T. Buffa is a graduate student studying the role of the native peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands in the development of the United States and white American identity. He hopes to use the experiences of these peoples as a case study in the understanding which Americans - particularly white Southerners - had of race in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Before coming to Rice, Logan's previous work focused on the role of discourse surrounding race and the natural landscape in the desire to remake wilderness and borderlands territories into landscapes congruent with white understanding of land use and economics.