Jeffrey Shenton

BIOGRAPHY

Jeff Shenton joined Centre’s faculty in 2019 as Visiting Assistant Professor of Anthropology. He was hired as Assistant Professor in 2023. Jeff teaches courses in cultural anthropology, linguistic anthropology, environmental anthropology, anthropology of religion, anthropology of tourism, anthropology of violence and nonviolence, anthropological theory, oral history methodologies, community-based learning, and writing.

Jeff’s areas of research interest include human-landscape-ecology interrelationships, environmentalism, cultural and conceptual change, environmental education, and Indigenous studies. He has done long-term field work in both Chiapas, Mexico and Napo Province, Ecuador.

At Centre, Jeff has developed an interest in the possibilities for teaching partnerships between undergraduates and regional community members to promote collective action on behalf of historical underrepresentation and environmental recovery.

Jeff earned his BA in English and French from the University of Pennsylvania, and his MA and PhD in Anthropology from Vanderbilt University.

PUBLICATIONS

• Shenton, Jeffrey, Michael Hughes, Santiago De La Paz, and Cindy Zamarripa. 2025. Integrating Participatory Action Research in the Anthropology Classroom through Black Oral History: Process, Outcomes, Future. Annals of Anthropological Practice 49(2). https://doi.org/10.1111/napa.70026
• Shenton, Jeffrey. “The Sisters of Loretto Share a Kinship with the Earth.” SAPIENS Anthropology Magazine, November 11, 2021. https://www.sapiens.org/culture/sisters-of-loretto-activism/
• Shenton, Jeffrey. 2019. Going to School in the Forest: Changing Evaluations of Animal-Plant Interactions in the Kichwa Amazon. Journal of Ecological Anthropology 20 (1). https://doi.org/10.5038/2162-4593.20.1.1211
• Shenton, Jeffrey, Norbert Ross, Michael Kohut, and Sandra Waxman. 2011. Maya Folk Botany and Knowledge Devolution: Modernization and Intra-community Variability in the Acquisition of Folkbotanical Knowledge. Ethos 39 (3): 349-367. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1548-1352.2011.01197.xDigital Object Identifier (DOI)

EXHIBITIONS

“‘We Were Here’: The African American Experience in Boyle County”

A multimedia exploration of the history of African American communities in Danville and Boyle County after the US Civil War, with an emphasis on the legacy of urban renewal projects on these communities in the mid-20^th century. Exhibited at the Norton Center for the Arts, August 2022 – June 2023.