Megan Prunty is currently a third year doctoral student in the department of Anthropology, with a focus on Environmental Anthropology.  She received her undergraduate degree in English from the University of Colorado at Boulder.

Megan’s research looks at cultural understandings of the environment and how these understandings inform environmental social movements.  Her local research in Philadelphia examines ‘greening projects’ throughout the city and examines the ways in which various projects, such as urban farms, community gardens and brownfield redevelopment, employ ideas about nature.  Central to this project is how discourses of nature and the environment, as aesthetic ideals, are further depicted as having the power to create ‘community’ and transform urban neighborhoods. 

For her dissertation, Megan intends to look at how definitions of nature and the environment shape the work of non-profit organizations engaged in work abroad.  This work will examine how new environments are created through the process of addressing ‘global’ environmental concerns.