Eliza Jane Darling

Eliza Jane Darling is an Adjunct Associate Professor at the Department of Anthropology, John Jay College of Criminal Justice (CUNY). Her work bridges ethnography, political ecology, and critical white studies with a focus on environmental justice and gentrification dynamics in the Adirondack Park, New York.

Education:

• PhD, CUNY Graduate Center (2004, Anthropology)
• MPhil, CUNY Graduate Center (2001, Anthropology)
• BA, American University (1994, Anthropology)

Her research examines how wilderness preservation under late capitalism leads to working-class dispossession in ex-industrial regions. She investigates forest enclosure, rural labor precarity, housing crises, and class conflicts in the Adirondacks through a Marxist political ecology lens aligned with radical urban geography theories.

Scholarly Trends: Her publications center on the Adirondack Park, analyzing gentrification, environmental justice, and rural political ecology through historical and ethnographic methodologies. Key themes include the criminalization of forest subsistence, social reproduction, and critical white studies perspectives on rural politics.

Scientific Awards:

• Local Government Records Management Improvement Fund ($60,043), New York State Archives (2018)
• Humanities in the Public Square ($149,517), National Endowment for the Humanities (2016)
• Hunt Postdoctoral Fellowship ($40,000), Wenner-Gren Foundation (2007)
• Center for Place, Culture and Politics Graduate Fellowship ($10,000), CUNY (2001)
• Community Forestry Dissertation Fellowship ($13,000), Ford Foundation (1999)

Grants & Advising: She has secured significant grants for public history projects while balancing teaching roles across multiple institutions. Her career reflects systemic challenges in academia, particularly for adjuncts in underfunded disciplines.

Labs & Teams: Her fieldwork is based in Adirondack Park, where she documents rural political ecology through collaborative public history initiatives and ethnographic research.