Department of Sociology

I am an Assistant Professor of Sociology and the Jack Meyerhoff Chair in American Environmental
Studies. I primarily study environmental justice in urban areas. My research tries to untangle how
decisions about urban development were often based in valuing some groups more than others, namely by
race, and how those processes have led to unequal exposure to environmental hazards and unequal access
to environmental goods. In my position at Brandeis, I can work with students to investigate these
dynamics and, importantly, explore how cities can begin to repair harm and create racially just and
sustainable futures.

I’ve been interested in environmental issues for as long as I can remember. I grew up in Chattanooga,
Tennessee and my dad used to take us camping over in Polk County near the Ocoee River. We would visit
the Cooper Basin, a site where extensive copper, iron, and sulfur mining, mineral processing and sulfuric
acid production occurred from the 1850s until the late 1980s. Industrial activities caused extensive
damage there. The EPA once called it the “largest man-made biological desert in the nation.” I did a
history project on environmental devastation at the Copper Basin in middle school. My school picked
several projects to be represented in a statewide competition. Mine was not chosen because the teachers
said it was too depressing. I’m stubborn so that just motivated me to get more involved. I joined the earth
club at my school and participated in numerous environmental cleanups and educational days around
southern Appalachia. 

My family also suffered from numerous illnesses growing up. I had severe asthma as a child and now
have a rare autoimmune disease. My mom had chronic lung disease. And my dad has been battling cancer
for around 14 years. He left Northern Ireland in the 1980s during the troubles to work at a chemical
bleachery in Asheville, NC. He was exposed to all sorts of toxins. Diseases are often framed as individual
troubles, which ignores the broader environmental and systemic factors that contribute to health
disparities. That is why the sociological imagination is so important. It allows us to connect personal
experiences, such as our family’s health issues, to larger social structures and historical contexts. I believe
that sharing personal narratives allows us to connect with others and build collective power to advocate
for change.

Two books written by Sociologists that have had the greatest impact on me are David Pellow’s Garbage
Wars and Phil Brown’s Toxic Exposures. There are also several non-sociologists whose work I greatly
admire: Ruth Wilson Gilmore, bell hooks, Anne Braden, Sylvia Wynter, and many, many more.

I worked with David Hess when I was a graduate student at Vanderbilt University. He is the kindest
mentor and gave me countless opportunities to grow as a sociologist.
I also draw inspiration from so many activists, organizers, and everyday people who are working to create
a better world for all of us. Most importantly, I have been so inspired by Gen-Z students advocating for
measures to address climate change and environmental injustice at local, national, and international
levels. We all have a lot to learn from our students.

I’ve been working on several projects that examine how historic racial projects, such as redlining and the
construction of interstate-highways, co-create geographies of environmental racism through the
preservation of whiteness in U.S. cities. One project that Danielle Jacques (Sociology PhD student) and I
have been working on uses qualitative coding and exploratory text analysis to explore the Home Owners’
Loan Corporation’s (HOLC) residential security maps. Using Los Angeles as a case study, our analysis
reveals how elements of the built environment and topography of the land were perceived as protectors of
whiteness, laying the groundwork for spatial racialization, differential valuation of property, and
environmental racism. What is most striking is that A-graded neighborhoods that were designed to be
exclusively for Whites are also places that face serious natural hazards like fires and mudslides.
Essentially, HOLC surveyors identified people of color as “hazards” completely ignoring the actual risks
posed by nature. Another project I’ve been working on explores the connection between historic
redlining, interstate-highways, and contemporary on-road transportation emissions. I use random intercept
and coefficient panel models with 9661 neighborhoods nested in 194 cities. The findings suggest that
historic redlining is connected to CO 2 emitted from transportation processes.

Growing up in southern Appalachia, nature and music were a big part of my life.  I grew up playing the
fiddle, so I try to practice when I have the time. My partner and I enjoy identifying edible plants and
mushrooms through foraging walks with our friends. We have around 8 raised beds in our backyard and
grow all sorts of things – tomatoes, lettuces, okra, pumpkins, squash, radishes, peppers, watermelon,
various herbs etc. In the spring and summer, you can find me in the garden listening to music while
battling the squirrels, earwigs, and vine borers. I’m also deeply passionate about reducing animal deaths
in urban areas. I’ve saved more than one opossum from New England’s treacherous roadways.