Rachel Herrington University of Kentucky
Dr. Rachel Herrington earned a Ph.D. in History in 2023 from the University of Kentucky. She lived and farmed in South Africa for over twenty years and currently teaches Writing, Rhetoric, and Digital Studies at UK for the 2023/24 academic year. Herrington's research focus is global commons systems and land dispossession of Indigenous and marginalized communities. Her dissertation was a Transatlantic comparative case studies project titled, From Displaced to Displacers: Scottish Crofters, First Nation Peoples and Commons Enclosure from the 1700s to the 1800s, which examined the eviction of Scottish tenant farmers and their subsequent emigration to Mi’kmaw lands in Eastern Maritime Canada. Herrington’s passion and ambition is to teach and research in an Environmental Humanities program focusing on global Indigeneity, commons, and land rights. Her time teaching as a visiting professor at Transylvania University for one year and at the University of Kentucky as a graduate student and instructor since 2017 has shown the necessity for Indigenous and environmental history instruction in postsecondary institutions. Herrington believes that to tackle the challenges of the global climate catastrophe, students' connections to Indigenous land stewardship, coupled with the knowledge of historical narratives of colonialism and imperial hegemonic governance, will produce students capable of addressing our current global crises with positive long-term solutions.
Research Areas: Global Commons Enclosure, Environmental History, Indigenous and Marginalized Commons Users
Collaborative Interests: department seminars, graduate committees, grant collaborations, guest lectures, public lectures, publications, research collaborations, student advising
