Newcastle University

I am an interdisciplinary environmental researcher with a broad interest in human-environment relations.  My work is informed by social anthropology, rural sociology and rural geography and focuses on the relationship between sociocultural values and environmental practices, interventions, policies and governance. I am interested in a conception of values as incessantly negotiated through interaction, and in applying this idea to our understandings of cultural change, power relations and environmental behaviours.  I have conducted long-term ethnographic research amongst British farmers and am particularly interested in farming culture, agri-environmental schemes and farmer cooperation.

I completed my PhD in Anthropology and Geography at Durham University in 2010, having previously worked as an environmental consultant and completing an MSc and BSc (Hons) in Environmental Management at Lancaster University.

I currently contribute to the following modules:

ACE2009 Qualitative Techniques 

• Emery SB, Perks MT, Bracken LJ. Negotiating river restoration: The role of divergent reframing in environmental decision-making. Geoforum 2013. In Press.
• Franks JR, Emery SB. Incentivising Collaborative Conservation: Lessons from existing Environmental Stewardship Scheme options. Land Use Policy 2013, 30(1), 847-862.
• Emery S, Franks J. The potential for collaborative agri-environment schemes in England: Can a well-designed collaborative approach address farmers' concerns with current schemes?. Journal of Rural Studies 2012, 28(3), 218-231.
• Carrithers MB, Bracken LJ, Emery SB. Can a species be a person? A trope and its entanglements in the anthropocene era. Current Anthropology 2011, 52(5), 661-685.
• Emery SB, Oughton EA. Interventions in managing environment conflicts: what works, in what contexts and why? Final report to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. London: Policy Studies Institute - Defra, 2011.
• Bell S, Vanner R, Oughton EA, Emery SB, Lock K, Cole L. Defra NE0109 Social Research Evidence Review to Inform Natural Environment Policy. Final Project Report to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. London: Policy Studies Institute - Defra, 2011.
• Franks JR, Emery SB, Whittingham MJ, McKenzie AJ. Options for landscape scale collaboration under the UK's environmental stewardship scheme. Newcastle upon Tyne, UK: Newcastle University CRE Research Report, 2011.
• Emery SB. In Better Fettle: Improvement, Work and Rhetoric in the Transition to Environmental Farming in the North York Moors, Doctoral Thesis, Department of Anthropology. Durham: Durham University, 2010. Available at: http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/379/.
• Emery SB, Smith DN, Johansson S, Cope J. Demonstrating how plasterboard can be collected more efficiently on construction and demolition sites in the UK. In: Chun, Y-M;Claisse, P;Naik, TR;Ganjian, E, ed. Sustainable construction materials and technologies. London: Taylor & Francis, 2007, pp.575-588.
• Emery SB, Gaterell MR, Sammons G, Moon D, Smith DN. Estimation of the recycled content of an existing construction project. Resources, Conservation and Recycling 2007, 52, 395-409.