Jenna A. Lamphere

Assistant Professor
Department of Liberal Studies

E-mail: jlamphere@tamug.edu

Phone: +1 (409) 740.4758

Fax: +1 (409) 740.4962

Classroom Lab Building (CLB), Office 124

Learn more about Jenna A. Lamphere

Get To Know Jenna A. Lamphere

What in your life drew you to your current field of study?

I grew up in a small town outside of Detroit, Michigan. Once the automotive capital of the world, the twin processes of neoliberal globalization and deindustrialization left the region fraught with severe and pervasive socio-environmental problems, including high unemployment, widespread poverty, increased social instability, dirty water and air, as well as vacant and polluted land. I was nine years old when the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement entered into force, which in many ways transformed the U.S. auto industry, prompting factories to relocate to the Global South where regulations tend to be weaker and labor cheaper. Problems were exacerbated by the 2008 financial crisis, which bankrupted U.S. automakers. Many of my family and friends were devastated, their livelihoods having depended upon the auto industry. Neighborhoods were increasingly boarded up, as families able to move did, increasing strain on city leaders to provide for vulnerable populations with depleting resources. In 2013, Detroit filed bankruptcy, struggling with emptying communities, crime, unpaid utility bills, inadequate public services, and an expensive pension system.

Growing up outside of Detroit significantly impacted my professional development goals. Early on as an undergraduate student, I discovered the sociological perspective as a systematic understanding of the political-economic forces that profoundly impacted the people and communities about whom I cared. Given my interest, I deliberately selected the University of Tennessee’s graduate program for sociology, which is predicated on social justice, and in 2017, I was excited to join the Texas A&M system to help coordinate the Galveston campus’s new Tourism and Coastal Community Development program.

What do you hope your students gain from studying or working with you?

Sociology’s promise lies in its ability to transform students’ views of the social world, rendering visible the structures organizing their lives and the power they have to reconstitute them in more socially just ways. As a professor, I foster the critical and analytic skills students need to realize this promise. By teaching foundational disciplinary knowledge and the methods sociologists employ to create and assess this knowledge, I help students better understand social processes and see how their actions work to maintain, as well as change, structures. I challenge students to integrate their life experiences and substantive interests with the science of sociology, and through doing so, invest in a science that aims to make significant societal contributions.

What are you passionate about in your personal life?

I see my personal and professional life as intrinsically linked. I am passionate about helping build equitable and ecologically sound communities. When considering the effects of climate change, socio-environmentally just development is especially important for our coastal communities, as we can expect rising sea levels and more frequent and extreme weather events. How we plan for and respond to such disasters is deeply important to the sustainability of our coastal communities, including that of my new home, Galveston. I am hopeful! I believe that through raising awareness, civic empowerment, and inclusive planning, we can develop economically prosperous and environmentally sustainable communities.

Publications

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Bream-McIntosh, Ollie, Amy Burnett, Ira Feldman, Jenna A. Lamphere, Thomas Reuter, and Emmanuelle Vital. 2021. “Can Sustainability Knowledge-Action Platforms Advance Multilevel Sustainability Transitions?” Conference Proceedings at the 5^th International Conference on Public Policy, Barcelona, July 6-8 (https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5235334)

Simcock, Alan, Austin Becker, Marcelo Bertellotti, Tony Charles, Leandra Gonçalves, Miguel Iniguez, Osman Keh Kamara, Paula Keener, Jenna Lamphere, Candace May, Ishmael Mensah, Essam Yassin Mohammed, Tanya O’Gara, Christina Pita, Jean Edmond Randrianantenaina, Maria Sahib, Regina Salvador, Anastasia Strati, and Jean-Claude Tibe. 2021. Chapter 8A: Coastal Communities and Maritime Industries in World Ocean Assessment II

Lamphere, Jenna A. and Jon Shefner. 2018. “How to Green: Institutions and Actors in Three U.S. Cities.” Critical Sociology 44(2): 303-322.

Lamphere, Jenna A. and Elizabeth A. East. 2017. “Monsanto’s Biotechnology Politics: Discourses of Legitimation.” Environmental Communication 11(1): 75-89.

Lamphere, Jenna A. and Jon Shefner. 2015. “Situating the Green Economy: Discourses, Cooptation, and State Change.” Current Perspectives in Social Theory 34: 101-124.

Presentations

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“Localization of the SDGs: What Platform Functionality is Needed to Advance Alignment with the Goals?” (Emmanuelle Vital, Ollie Bream-McIntosh, Ira Feldman, Jenna A. Lamphere, and Thomas Reuter), session organized at the annual meeting of the Sustainability Research and Innovation Congress, June 20-24, Pretoria, South Africa, Virtual

Frontier Mythologies: An Ecofeminist Analysis of the Trans-Alaskan Pipeline” (Jenna A. Lamphere and Elizabeth Nyman), paper presented at the annual Ocean Sciences Meeting, February 27- March 4, Honolulu, HI (Moved online due to COVID-19)

“Greening TAMUG: Integrating Sustainability Curriculum with Project-Based Learning” (Jenna A. Lamphere, Irfan Khan, and Syed Rahman), poster presented at annual meeting of Texas A&M Transformational Teaching and Learning Conference, April 30, Virtual

“Sustainability Transitions Meets Critical Urbanism: Socio-Environmental Equity in the ‘Greenest City in America’” (Jenna A. Lamphere), paper presented at the annual meeting of the Sustainability Transitions Research Network, August 18-21, Vienna, Austria (Virtual due to Covid-19)

Grants and Fellowships

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Texas A&M University Presidential Transformational Teaching Grant, “TAMUG Sustainable Campus Initiative,” (PI) Jenna A. Lamphere and (Co-PI) Irfan Khan ($60,000)

Texas A&M University Triads for Transformation Grant, “Polar Tourism: Virtual Visits and Long-Term Growth,” (PI) Elizabeth Nyman and (Co-PIs) Jenna A. Lamphere and Patrick Suermann ($30,000)

Texas Comprehensive Research Fund, “Governance of Offshore Oil and Gas in the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska,” (PI) Elizabeth Nyman and (Co-PI) Jenna Lamphere ($11,000; $10,000 Match)

National Science Foundation REU Site: Ocean and Coastal Research Experiences for Undergraduates, (PI) Jenna A. Lamphere ($399,058; Award Number 1950910)

Sao Paulo Research Foundation International Collaboration Initiative for “An Institutional Interplay Perspective into Multi-Level Environmental Governance: The Case of Offshore Oil Governance in Gulf of Mexico and Santos Basin,” (PIs) Pedro Jacobi and Elizabeth Nyman and (Co-PIs) Leandra R. Goncalves, Jenna A. Lamphere, Ashley Ross, Drielli Peyerl, and Celio Berman ($20,000)

National Science Foundation REU Site: Ocean and Coastal Research Experiences for Undergraduates, (PI) Patrick Louchouarn and (Co-PIs) Jenna A. Lamphere and Elizabeth Borda ($390,259; Award Number 1560242)