Research

Critical examinations of ecosystems and science

Environmental science is a human endeavor, shaped by individual and institutional structures, processes, and biases. Part of our research program centers on understanding how these factors shape contemporary ecosystem service sciences, using both qualitative (e.g. feminist biology) and quantitative (e.g. informatics) approaches. Feminist biology is an approach to biology that explicitly acknowledges historic and current biases at the micro- and macro-levels, from the naming of species, to prize awarding, to study methods. A truly feminist biology must not only address gender/sex though - an intersectional feminist biology is also anti-racist and anti-disablist.  SWEET is interested in environmental biology incorporating intersectional feminism, in particular bringing a critical eye to environmental projects that ignore (or the opposite - surveil) marginalized bodies.

Example recent publications:

• Kaitlin Stack Whitney. 2023. Ladybugs: The (Natural) Enemy of My Enemy Is My Friend? Enlisting Ladybugs into the War on Insect Pests. Catalyst: feminism, theory, technoscience 9 (1): 1-11.  https://doi.org/10.28968/cftt.v9i1.38252
• Kaitlin Stack Whitney. “Deerly Held Beliefs: feminist biology and white-tailed deer population control.” Lady Science, The New Inquiry. August 16, 2018.

Ableism and accessibility in biology and society

SWEET is committed to inclusion, accessibility, and reproducibility. Yet while “openness” is now becoming more accepted in research fields as ‘best’ practice, it is not an inherently positive attribute or goal. Open science is an umbrella term that includes movements aimed at democratizing science, to make science available to "everyone. Yet there can be significant individual (e.g. cost) and structural (e.g. cultural context) barriers. Open data and research must not benefit some at the expense of marginalized communities, particularly nonwhite, Indigenous, and multiply-marginalized communities and their data. SWEET is committed to ongoing learning, research, and engagement in conversations on ethical open scholarship and critical open studies.  In particular, we focus on disability access and inclusion (or lack thereof) in science.