Affected peoples’ LIVED experiences ground my research agenda:

one that seeks answers to fundamental questions about the technologies designed to mitigate environmental harms and their consequences for people's lives and livelihoods. Focusing on questions encompassing – what does the technical do? – I seek to provide insight into the social, political, historical, and embodied impacts of environmental issues and the limitations of current policy infrastructure to grapple with them.

My research focuses on THREE related themes:

• how lay publics shape, use, and resist technologies designed for “public good”;

• how logics of carcerality, racial capitalism, and surveillance pervade environmental technologies; and

• the politics of expertise, knowledge, and quantification in public policymaking — particularly how defining problems as “technical” and solutions as “data-driven” can exclude social, political, and historical considerations and prevent the full inclusion of affected communities in science and technology public policy.

My work thus far has primarily focused on the politics of air pollution monitoring technology and U.S. environmental justice activism; however, I have also written about the carceral conservation technologies, environmental justice screening tools, risk screening tools in the carceral system, the use of race variables in public health research, and more. I am committed to publishing in both scholarly journals and in avenues accessible to lay publics. Examples of this, alongside my full publication record, can be found on my CV/Resume. If you do not have institutional access to any paywalled publication I have written, please contact me at: emm7555 [at] psu [dot] edu.