My research, environmental sociology:
My primary research investigates society’s relationship to the environment, the discursive practices around this relationship, and how this both reflects and affects economic and policy considerations. It explores the social insecurities that arise in the face of global environmental crises, the role of life politics within this context, and society's relationship with technology as both a cause and potential solution. Drawing upon theories of risk, modernity, and the politics of unsustainability, my dissertation research applied the “politics of representation” to analyze the discourse of geoengineering (the notion of addressing climate change through large-scale technological projects). My analysis reveals how discursive practices have affected this emerging technology’s trajectory toward increasingly mainstream consideration, both scientifically and politically.
My research, law and society:
I have also collaborated on an extensive law and society research project examining common law as a global knowledge system through investigation of judicial practices within post-colonial Asian jurisdictions. We created a unique data set based on review of judicial opinions from Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Singapore to analyze and evaluate the significance of how these judicial communities invoke international common law through legal and cultural practices.
My publications:Brynna Jacobson. 2022. Geoengineering Discourse Confronting Climate Change: The Move from Margins to Mainstream in Science, News Media, and Politics. Lexington Books.
Charles Thorpe and Brynna Jacobson. 2021. “Abstract Life, Abstract Labor, Abstract Mind.” Pp. 59-105 in The Capitalist Commodification of Animals. Eds. B. Clark and T.D. Wilson. Research in Political Economy, Volume 35. Brynna Jacobson. 2018. “Constructing Legitimacy in Geoengineering Discourse: The Politics of Representation in Science Policy Literature.” Science as Culture. 27(3): 322-348. Kwai Hang Ng and Brynna Jacobson. 2017. “How Global is the Common Law? A Comparative Study of Asian Common Law Systems – Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Singapore.” Asian Journal of Comparative Law. 12(2): 209-232. *Recipient of the Inaugural Best Paper Prize by the Asian Journal of Comparative Law (AsJCL). Charles Thorpe and Brynna Jacobson. 2013. “Life Politics, Nature, and the State: Giddens’ Sociological Theory and The Politics of Climate Change.” The British Journal of Sociology 64(1): 99-122. |