Scott Burnett

Scott Burnett is an Assistant Professor at Pennsylvania State University, holding dual appointments in African Studies and Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies. His work critically examines intersections of race, gender, and environmental discourse through a postcolonial lens. Born in apartheid South Africa, Burnett’s research traces the persistence of white supremacist structures in post-apartheid contexts, including analyses of conservation rhetoric, far-right masculinities, and environmentalist advocacy. He earned a PhD from the University of the Witwatersrand (2018) and holds degrees from LSE and Rhodes University.

His research focuses on two core areas: (1) environmental discourses that reproduce racial and class hierarchies, and (2) far-right online movements’ gendered ideologies. Theoretical frameworks include critical discourse studies, critical race theory, and queer theory. His monograph White Belongings: Race, Land, and Property in Post-Apartheid South Africa (2022) analyzes how white property ownership perpetuates racialized power structures through discursive strategies.

Recent publications explore topics like NoFap communities’ political radicalization, visual rhetoric of South African far-right groups, and Indigenous resurgence movements. His current project critiques 'green' environmentalism’s entanglement with colonial and heteropatriarchal systems. Professional activities include co-creating ethnographic films with South African communities and developing critical diversity literacy frameworks.