Jennifer Spinney

Faculty Fellow, Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies

Faculty Fellow

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Jennifer Spinney is an assistant professor in York University's Disaster and Emergency Management program. She is a trained as a sociocultural anthropologist, with a focus on raising critical awareness regarding the social and human dimensions of disaster and disaster risk management.

In her research, Jennifer studies the various connections between groups of people living and working at the intersections of environment and society. She takes a holistic and comparative approach, and draws on qualitative research methods to examine how people make meaning, assess and communicate risk, engage in protective action decision making, and recover from disaster and emergency situations, such as tornadoes and flooding.

Jennifer’s work also focuses on interaction and language in use within and across groups to learn how virtual, face-to-face and individual-environmental encounters shape understanding, influence disaster response, and create differing experiences with recovery following disastrous events.

Research keywords:

Risk perception; sense-making; interaction; policy and governance; discourse; social recovery; early warning and preparedness

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