Dr Matthew Kearnes

Overview

Matthew Kearnes is Co-Convenor of Environmental Humanities, in the School of Humanities. 

Matthew completed his BSc (honours) in Human Geography at Macquarie University and his PhD at the University of Newcastle. Before arriving at UNSW he held post-doctoral positions at the Department of Geography at the Open University and the Department of Sociology at Lancaster University. Most recently he held a Research Council’s UK Academic Fellowship at the Institute of Hazard, Risk and Resilience Department of Geography, Durham University.

Matthew's research is situated between the fields of Science and Technology Studies (STS), environmental sociology and contemporary social theory. His current work is focused on the social and political dimensions of nanotechnology and synthetic biology, climate change and society, and the social and political dimensions of climate modification and geoengineering. His research has been funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC, UK), the European Commission and the UK Government.

He holds editorial positions with Science as Culture and Environmental Humanities. He is also a member of the Society for Social Studies of Science (4S), the European Association for the Study of Science and Technology (EASST), the Science and Democracy Network and the Asia-Pacific Science, Technology and Society Network.

Teaching

ARTS2242: The politics of Climate Change

ARTS3243: Remaking Nature: The Politics of Biotechnology

HPSC5500: Society, Environmental Policy and Sustainability

Publications

Books
Kearnes, M. B., Klauser, F., and Lane, S. N., eds. 2012: Critical Risk Research: Practices, Politics and Ethics. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.

Journal Articles
Anderson, B., Kearnes, M., McFarlane, C., and Swanton, D. 2012: On assemblages and geography. Dialogues in Human Geography.

Kearnes, M. and Wienroth, M. 2011: Tools of the trade: UK research intermediaries in science policy practice. Minerva 49(2): 153-74.

Davies, S. Kearnes. M. and Macnaghten P. 2009: "All things weird and scary": Nanotechnology, theology, and religious affiliations. Culture and Religion 10(2): 201-220.

Kearnes, M. 2009: Informationalising matter: systems understandings of the nanoscale. Spontaneous Generations: A Journal for the History and Philosophy of Science 1(2): 99-111.

Hinchliffe, S., Kearnes, M. B., Degen, M., and Whatmore, S. 2007: Ecologies and economies of action - sustainablity, calculations and other things. Environment and Planning A: Environment and Planning 39: 260-82.

Kearnes, M., and Wynne, B. 2007: On nanotechnology and ambivalence: the politics of enthusiasm. Nanoethics 1(2): 131-42.

Kearnes, M. 2007: (Re)making matter: design and selection. Area 39(2): 143-55.

Grove-White, R., Kearnes, M. B., Macnaghten, M., and Wynne, B. 2006: Nuclear futures: assessing public attitudes to new nuclear power. Political Quarterly 77(2): 238-46.

Kearnes, M. 2006: Chaos and control: nanotechnology and the politics of emergence. Paragraph 29(2): 57-80.

Kearnes, M. B., Grove-White, R., P, M., Wilsdon, J., and Wynne, B. 2006: From bio to nano: learning lessons from the agriculture biotechnology controversy in the UK. Science as Culture 15(4): 291–307.

Hinchliffe, S., Kearnes, M. B., Degen, M., and Whatmore, S. 2005: Urban wild things: a cosmopolitical experiment. Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 23: 643-58.

Macnaghten, P. M., Kearnes, M. B., and Wynne, B. 2005: Nanotechnology, governance and public deliberation: what role for the social sciences? Science Communication 27(2): 268-87.

Kearnes, M. B. 2003: Geographies that matter – the rhetorical deployment of physicality? Social & Cultural Geography 4(2): 139-52.

Book Chapters
Kearnes, M. 2012: Technologies of risk and responsibility: attesting to the truth of novel things. In: M Kearnes, F Klauser and S. N Lane (eds.) Critical Risk Research: Practices, Politics and Ethics. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.

Kearnes, M., Klauser, F., and Lane, S. N. 2012: Risk Research after Fukushima. In: M Kearnes, F Klauser and S. N Lane (eds.) Critical Risk Research: Practices, Politics and Ethics. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.

Kearnes, M., and Doubleday, R. 2010: United Kingdom. In: D Guston (ed.) SAGE Encyclopaedia of Nanoscience and Society. London: Sage.

Wienroth, M., and Kearnes, M. 2010: Science policy as discourse: the governance of nanotechnology in the United Kingdom. In: U Feideler, C Coenen, S. R Davies and A Ferrari (eds.) Understanding Nanotechnology: Philosophy, Policy and Publics. Heidelberg: Akademische Verlagsgesellschaft, pp. 101-20.

Kearnes, M. 2009: Nanotechnology and the constitution of the social. In: S Gammel and A Ferrari (eds.) Visions of Nanotechnology. Berlin: Akademische Verlagsgesellschaft.

Kearnes, M. B. 2009: The time of science: deliberation and the ‘new governance’ of nanotechnology. In: S Maasen, M Kaiser, M Kurath and C Rehmann-Sutter (eds.) Governing Future Technologies: Nanotechnology and the Rise of an Assessment Regime. Heidelberg: Springer (Sociology of the Sciences Yearbook).

Kearnes, M. B., and Rip, A. 2009: The emerging governance landscape of nanotechnology. In: S Gammel, A Lösch and A Nordmann (eds.) Jenseits von Regulierung: Zum politischen Umgang mit der Nanotechnologie. Berlin: Akademische Verlagsgesellschaft.

Hinchliffe, S., Kearnes, M. B., Degen, M., and Whatmore, S. 2008: Urban wild things: a cosmopolitical experiment. In: J Hillier and P Healey (eds.) Contemporary Movements in Planning Theory: 3 Aldershot: Ashgate, pp. 501-16.

Research Reports
Davies, S., Macnaghten, M., and Kearnes, M., eds. 2009: Reconfiguring Responsibility: Lessons for Public Policy. Durham: Durham University.

Kearnes, M. B., Macnaghten, M., and Wilsdon, J. 2006: Governing at the Nanoscale: People, Policies and Emerging Technologies. London: Demos.

Grove-White, R., Kearnes, M. B., Macnaghten, M., and Wynne, B. 2006: Public Perceptions and Community Issues: Nuclear Power Project. London: Sustainable Development Commission.

Contributions

Member European Association for the Study of Science and technology (EASST)

Member Society for the Social Studies of Science (4S)

Member Science and Democracy Network (SDN)

Member Asia-Pacific Science, Technology and Society Network (APSTSN)

Member ESRC Seminar Series on Synthetic Biology and the Social Sciences

Personal Links

techno-fables blog