Lisa Fink, Ph.D.
- Assistant Professor
- pronouns: they, she
- LB Course Subject Area: Science and Society
- Department of English
- Holmes Hall, W-35
- 919 E. Shaw Lane
- East Lansing, MI 48825
- lfink@msu.edu
LBC COURSES
- LB 133: Introduction to Science and Society
- LB 325: Science and the Environment
- LB 492: Senior Seminar
BIOGRAPHY
Dr. Lisa Fink's research and teaching focus on human-environment relations, land management, and Tribal sovereignty. They contribute to the fields of feminist science studies, science and technology studies, environmental humanities, political ecology, Indigenous studies, and Asian American studies. Their current book project is an Indigenous, race, and ethnic studies account of environmental discourse, thought, and practice concerning species invasion as it intersects with anti-immigrant, anti-Asian, and anti-Indigenous discourse—and abolitionist forms of environmental thought and practice that emerge in contestation. Their scholarly writing can be found in American Quarterly, ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment, and Park Science (among others). Dr. Fink is also a poet, and their poetry can be found in magazines such as Ecotone, Boston Review, and Minnesota Review. They are the author of the poetry chapbook Her Disco (dancing girl press, 2013).
EDUCATION
- Ph.D., Environmental Studies & English, University of Oregon
- M.A., English, University of Oregon
- M.F.A., Creative Writing (Poetry), University of Virginia
- B.S., Zoology, University of Wisconsin–Madison
HONORS & AWARDS
- Lokey Science Doctoral Fellowship, University of Oregon
- Oregon Humanities Center Dissertation Fellowship
- University of Oregon Dorys Grover Award
- Western Literature Association
- Jane Campbell Krohn Fellowship in Literature and the Environment
- University of Oregon Henry Hoyns Fellowship in Poetry
- University of Virginia Fulbright Fellowship in Literature, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
- Fink, Lisa. “Powerful Humanities Research Methods Can Help Us Avoid Overburdening Tribes.” Park Science, vol. 38, no. 1., 2024, https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/powerful-humanities-research-methods-can-help-us-avoid-overburdening-tribes.htm.
- Fink, Lisa. “Alienated Species and Unsettled Ecologies: Locating ‘Redneck’ Conservation in the Racial Discourse of ‘Asian’ Carp Invasion.” American Quarterly, vol. 75, no. 4, 2023, pp. 821–845, http://doi.org/10.1353/aq.2023.a913523.
- Fink, Lisa. “Refusing the Colonial Discourse of Animality: Insects, Farmworkers, and Ecological Solidarity in Helena María Viramontes’ Under the Feet of Jesus.” ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment, vol. 31, no. 2, 2022, pp. 395–415, http://doi.org/10.1093/isle/isac055.
- Fink, Lisa. “‘Sing the Bones Home’: Material Memory and the Project of Freedom in M. NourbeSe Philip’s Zong!” Humanities, vol. 9, no. 1, 2020, http://doi.org/10.3390/h9010022.