The anthropology of disaster, transdisciplinary approaches to the human dimensions of environmental crises, Social, cultural and economic impacts of climate and environmental change, the politics of energy, fuel poverty, human security and the creation of sustainable communities, human responses to environmental disasters, issues of resilience and vulnerability to ‘natural’ and ‘technological’ environmental crises, the potential of local, indigenous and traditional knowledge in regional and National policy development, mitigation of contemporary climate change issues, knowledge transfer activities and strategies, community representation and participatory-action research, arctic and sub-arctic anthropology, the anthropology of Scotland, European Anthropology, rural anthropology, the sociology of the urban environment, multi-disciplinary and trans-disciplinary research, issues of power, resistance, voice and local representation, the social, cultural and political barriers to participation and empowerment, public engagement in research, ethnography, oral-history, participatory-action research, collaborative project development, impact research.
2013 Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Social Anthropology
University of Aberdeen, UK, completed April 2013, graduated July 2013.
Passed viva examination with minor typographical corrections only
Thesis Title: Environments of Loss, Disempowerment and Distrust: Alutiiq stories of the aftermath of the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill
2005 Master of Research (MRes) in Social Anthropology, Ethnology and Cultural History (encompassing Postgraduate Diploma in Social Research)
University of Aberdeen, UK,
Dissertation Title: Oral Narratives and the reaffirmation of Alutiiq identity in aftermath of an environmental crisis
Courses completed as part of degree – Methodology and Methods in the Social Sciences; Qualitative and Quantitative Research Skills
2004 Master of Arts (MA Hons) in Anthropology and Philosophy
University of Aberdeen, UK, Pass with Upper Second Class Honours (2.1)
2014 – Present – Currently employed as Postdoctoral Research Associate on a Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP), Department of Geography, University of Dundee and Scottish and Southern Energy Power distribution.
Project title: Improving the response to energy disruption for vulnerable people in extreme weather events: from representation, to participation to co-creation
Forthcoming –
Connon, Irena, L. C., (forthcoming), ‘Changing weather, contested spaces and diverse places: The complexity of experience of prolonged power outages and extreme weather events in contemporary rural Scotland’, Environmental Hazards. Taylor and Francis.
I am currently working on finishing the necessary editorial revisions that I have been asked to make to article.
Complete –
Connon, Irena, L. C., 2011. ‘Subsistence activities, cultural security and maintaining well-being: The significance of the sharing of locally harvested food resources in a changing environment’ in Daveluy, M., and F. Levesque (eds.) Climate change and Arctic Environments: Papers originally presented at the 6th seminar series of the International School for studies of Arctic society, May 19 – 30th 2010 in Edmonton, Canada, Canadian Circumpolar Institute Press/Occasional Publication Series
In Progress –
Lyon, Christopher, & Irena L C Connon, ‘Governance, Power and Complexity in Community Resilience Planning’, Article is being prepared for submission to Global Environmental Change, SAGE Publications LTD. Target submission date April 2016
Connon, Irena, L. C., (Working title), ‘New Scratches, Fructures and ‘Lifescales’ of (in)security: Beyond dichotomies of ‘natural versus technological’ and ‘lifestyle versus lifescape’ change in post-environmental disaster human security analysis’, Article being prepared for submission to the International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, Target submission date April 2016
Connon, Irena L. C. (Working title) ‘New winds of change in local responses to global climate change? Resilience thinking as a new politics of identity?’ Aiming for submission to Resilience. Target for submission August 2016
