Research Interests

My research is broadly concerned with the economic organisation of food and farming in Britain. I am interested in understanding what kind of economic organisation we need for flourishing and socially just agroecological systems. This work current has three strands:

First, I am interested in understanding the long history and evolution of England's current agricultural economy. I study how contemporary capitalism evolved from agrarian roots in England, and what this agricultural history tells us both about contemporary British society and classical economic theory. Here, I use postcolonial theory to understand the origins of the English agrarian economy, and the way land relations were fundamental to the development of the British economy. As part of this historical project, I am interested in how changing agricultural technologies, particularly the use of organic chemicals for fertilisation, have influenced political economy in Britain. My research aims to understand how our relationships with, and access to, nitrogen and phosphorous are built into both heterodox and orthodox economic theory. I also study the history of English radicalism and social movements organised around land and food, the alternative economic models proposed by these, and their salience for contemporary agricultural transition.

Second, I am interested in current environmental transitions, particularly in agriculture, and the impact of economic and financial structures on these. I study contemporary projects attempting to effect environmental change, the effectiveness of the economic models adopted by these projects, and how these interact with established economic policies and financial institutions. I am particularly interested in the most effective economic organisation for successful community ownership. My earlier research in this field explored the ecological, economic and social consequences of the application of economic modelling to fisheries policy, and the political struggle of the UK's small-scale fleet in the face of scientific environmental management that did not recognise their heterodox forms of communal economic organization and the myriad benefits these brought.

Finally, I'm keen to see how we can imagine and engage otherwise with agriculture, land and the economy through radical approaches to pedagogy. To this end, I am actively engaged in land-based and alternative approaches to education, both within and beyond the university. I have designed and delivered a range of public and political education progammes around land and the economy, in collaboration with (among others) the Landworkers' Alliance, The Apricot Centre, Black Mountains College and Food Futures. I also run LEC's "Forest University" initiative, which integrates forest school principles into pedagogy for undergraduate environment students.

I'm interested in what sub-altern and post-colonial theory can tell us about the 'colonial core'. I conduct research primarily in the UK, but work closely with Majority World academics, theories and movements, particularly in Brazil (the Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra, MST) and Mexico (La Via Campesina).

I am a member of the LEC Political Ecology rearch cluster and lead the Political Ecology of Agrarian Transitions (PEAT) research group with Kai Heron.

Current Teaching

I am convenor of the undergraduate Economic and Political Geography module in LEC, and lead the dissertation projects for Geography with Economics BA students. I co-convene Food and Agriculture in the 21st Century with Kai Heron.

I am particuarly interested in the expansion of education and creative educational methods. As such, I have also contributed to the Sustainable Agriculture and Responding to Environmental Challenges modules of the JWL BA in Sustainable Development: this is a free online degree designed for and delivered to students in refugee camps across the world. I have delivered pedagogic sessions at Black Mountains College, The MST's Florestan Fernandes National School, The Apricot Centre, Food Futures' The Plot, The Kindling Trust, the Land Skills Fair, the Land Justice Gathering, and have collaborated with Universidad de la Tierra in Oaxaca. I am currently working with the Landworkers' Alliance to develop socioeconomic and political education for agroecology.

Career Details

I joined Lancaster Environment Centre in 2022 as a Lecturer in Economic Geography. Before this, I was a Lecturer in Human Geography in Animal, Rural and Environmental Sciences at Nottingham Trent University from 2020 to 2022, where I designed and led the human geography strand of the Geography BSc, and a Lecturer in Environmental Geography at the University of Glasgow from 2018 to 2020, where I taught food systems and natural resource management, and designed and co-convened the Earth Futures MSc.

I studied a DPhil in Economic Geography at the University of Oxford. I have an MSc in Nature, Society and Environmental Policy, also from Oxford (for which I won the MSc prize for best disseration), and a BSc in Environmental Policy at the London School of Economics (for which I won the George and Hilda Ormsby prizes for best disseration and best overall performance in Geography and Environment, and the Reynes prize for best final year performance university-wide).

I grew up on a livestock farm in Yorkshire. Before joining academia, I had a number of jobs that have influenced my academic trajectory, including farm labour, horse care, catering, and for the public library system. I am a qualified Playworker and Forest School leader, and have worked with children in a range of play settings. This includes out of school clubs for 5-16 year-olds in South and East Yorkshire; free youth schemes in Edmonton, North London; the family-run Love Kids children's home in Nkoranza, Ghana; the Toybox charity for children of inmates at Barlinnie Prison, Glasgow; and Global Link in Lancaster, working with the children of refugees and asylum seekers. I am very interested in haptic, experiential and non-traditional learning, for both children and adults, particularly in outdoor settings.

PhD Supervision Interests

I am available to supervise PhD students interested in working on:1) Land, economics, farming and food production from feminist or postcolonial standpoints, and 2) the economic dimensions of community ownership and/or environmental transition.