I am a sociologist working as a qualitative social researcher in the Social, Economic and Geographical Sciences Department (SEGS) [2]. I lead the People and Places [3]science group. I joined the Institute in 2009 following a post-doc position at the University of Sussex, on the project Queer Spiritual Spaces, an investigation into the spirituality of LGBTI people in non-mainstream religions. My undergraduate and postgraduate degrees were taken at the University of Aberdeen. My PhD looked at the relationship between claims to knowledge, authority and social order in a spiritual community. I live in Aberdeenshire.
My research interests are around social change, sustainability and justice, including food and climate justice. I am interested in the ways in which different groups draw on knowledge and understandings, and how this influences relationships and institutional formation. I am also interested in the ways in which knowledge and authority enables and/or constrains forms of resistance and control, and the role of knowledge and power in socio-technical change.
My research topics include rural and urban communities; community-led action tackling climate change; relationships between community food growing, local food systems and household food security.
Previous projects have included looking at conflict management between different land users; the relationship between the natural environment and human health; and the cultural/institutional aspects of hunting in Scotland, including cultural traditions but also property rights.
I use primarily qualitative methods to understand how people construct meanings about (and hence make sense of) the world around them from their everyday experiences, and how these meanings create the cultural patterns, norms and institutions which make up society. My work mostly delivers to Hutton's Science Challenge 3 [4] - delivering technical and social innovations that support sustainable and resilient communities.
The role of locally grown food [5] in enhancing household food security and community resilience, funded by Scottish Government, 2016-2021
Future Food - the role of Controlled Environment Agriculture in sustainable food systems (Seedcorn project 2019-20)
Citizen Social Science and local food growing (Seedcorn project 2017-18)
Links:
[1] https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8016-5961
[2] https://www.hutton.ac.uk/research/groups/social-economic-and-geographical-sciences
[3] https://www.hutton.ac.uk/research/our-people-and-structure
[4] https://www.hutton.ac.uk/sites/default/files/files/publications/James-Hutton-Institute-Transformative-Science-2016-2021.pdf
[5] https://www.hutton.ac.uk/research/projects/enhancing-food-security
[6] http://fp7hunt.net/Home.aspx
[7] http://www.sac.ac.uk/mainrep/pdfs/govanddecisionmaking.pdf
[8] http://www.climatexchange.org.uk/