kentucky

Carolyn Finney, PhD, is a storyteller, author and a cultural geographer. She is deeply interested in issues related to identity, difference, creativity, and resilience. In particular, Dr. Finney explores how issues of difference impacts participation in decision-making processes designed to address environmental issues.

More broadly she likes to trouble our theoretical and methodological edges that shape knowledge production and determine whose knowledge counts. Carolyn is grounded in both artistic and intellectual ways of knowing - she pursed an acting career for eleven years, but a backpacking trip around the world and living in Nepal changed the course of her life.

Motivated by these experiences, Carolyn returned to school after a 15-year absence to complete a B.A., M.A. (both of these degrees focused on gender and environmental issues in Kenya and Nepal, respectively) and Ph.D. (which focused on African Americans and environmental issues in the U.S.) The aim of her work is to develop greater cultural competency within environmental organizations and institutions, challenge media outlets on their representation of difference, and increase awareness of how privilege shapes who gets to speak to environmental issues and determine policy and action.

To this end, Carolyn has worked with the media in various capacities from personal appearances on (including, but not limited to) the Tavis Smiley Show, MSNBC, & Vice News Tonight; writing Op-Eds for Outside Magazine & Newsweek; was a guest editor & contributor for a special section on Race & the National Parks in Orion Magazine; interviewed with various media outlets including NPR, Sierra Club, Boston Globe & National Geographic; and even filmed a commercial for Toyota that highlighted the importance of African Americans getting out into Nature. Along with public speaking, writing and consulting, she served on the U.S. National Parks Advisory Board for eight years which assists the National Park Service in engaging in relations of reciprocity with diverse communities.

Carolyn is also privileged to be part of The Next 100 Coalition - a first-of-its-kind coalition of civil rights, environmental justice, conservation and community leaders from around the country who put together a vision statement and policy document on diversity and public lands for the Obama Administration with the intention of having President Obama issue a Presidential Memorandum.

Her first book, Black Faces, White Spaces: Reimagining the Relationship of African Americans to the Great Outdoors was released in 2014 (UNC Press). Carolyn is currently working on a number of projects including a new book that explores identity, race, lived experience and the construction of a black environmental imaginary (Desire Lines: The Geography of a Black Imagination), and a performance piece about John Muir (The N Word: Nature Revisited).

She has recently published a piece for a special issue of Harvard Design Magazine (themed Into the Woods) entitled “The Space Between the Words” (March 2018) and has another article under review for an edited volume (Not Just Green, Not Just White, T. Voyles and M. Mendoza Eds.) entitled “Radical Presence: The Shadows Take Shape”. In order to meet the demands of this work Dr. Finney has recently resigned from her full-time position at the University of Kentucky (as of June 2018).