Robin Renée Robinson

Robin Renée Robinson serves as a Research Fellow at the Center for the Humanities through the interdisciplinary Art, Activism, and the Environment research group, affiliated with the Mellon Seminar on Public Engagement and Collaborative Research.

Her scholarly work investigates the collision between federal/state/municipal legal frameworks and Indigenous land governance systems rooted in oral histories, with particular emphasis on environmental justice conflicts in U.S. government versus Native American land use decision-making. Her dissertation "Moving to Opportunity While Staying Put: Recognition as the Means for Native Americans" examines recognition politics as survival strategies for Native communities facing external legal incursions.

Research spans Native American sovereignty, environmental conflict resolution, and the intersection of colonial legal systems with Indigenous knowledge traditions. Her fieldwork at locations like the Sweetwater Prayer Camp provides empirical grounding for analyzing how environmental justice issues compound jurisdictional tensions on Native lands.