Carmel Price, Ph.D., MSW

Carmel Price is an environmental sociologist with an interdisciplinary background. She earned her BA in Elementary Education from the University of North Carolina, her MSW from Tulane University, and her PhD in Sociology from the University of Tennessee. Her unique background strongly influences her as an academic. Her pedagogical training from the University of North Carolina has guided her in the classroom and her social work experiences have helped her conduct meaningful, community-based research. 

Teaching and Research

Carmel's research thematically falls into two categories: food insecurity and environmental justice. Themes of inequality related to gender, socio-economic class, and race/ethnicity are laced throughout her work. At the University of Michigan-Dearborn, she co-founded the Environmental Health Research-to-Action (EHRA) and College and University Pantries (CUP) research teams. She teaches courses in poverty and inequality, gender, and research methods. In addition, as a sociologist and former social worker, she values community-based participatory research and actively engages undergraduate students in her projects.

Selected Publications

Sampson, Natalie R., Carmel E. Price, Harmony A. Reppond, Karen Thomas-Brown, and Monica De Roche. 2020. “Feminist Action Research in Response to Food Insecurity Among College Students.” Action Research – published online February 19, 2020. 

Price, Carmel E., Emma Watters, Harmony A. Reppond, Natalie R. Sampson, and Karen Thomas-Brown. 2020. “Problem-Solving Challenges: Operating a Campus Food Pantry to Improve Student Food Security.” Journal of Social Distress and Homelessness, 29(1):47-56. 

Price, Carmel E. and Stephanie A. Bohon. 2019. “Eco-Moms and Climate Change: The Moderating Effects of Fertility in Explaining Gender Differences in Concern.” Social Currents, 6(5):422-439. 

Price, Carmel E., Natalie R. Sampson, Harmony A. Reppond, Karen Thomas-Brown, and Jessica K. Camp. 2019. “Creating a Community of Practice among Michigan College Campuses Food Pantry Directors.” Journal of Community Practice, 27(1):96-109. 

Sampson, Natalie R., Carmel E. Price, Julia Kassem, Jessica Doan, and Janine Hussein. 2019. ““We’re Just Sitting Ducks”: Examining Recurrent Household Flooding as an Underreported Environmental Health Threat in Detroit’s Changing Climate.” Extreme Weather Events and Health special issue of International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 16(1). 

Reppond, Harmony, Natalie Sampson, Karen Thomas-Brown, and Carmel E. Price. 2018. “Addressing Food Insecurity in College: Mapping a Shared Conceptual Framework for Campus Pantries in Michigan.” Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy 18(1):378-399. 

Price, Carmel E. and James N. Maples. 2018. “Disturbing the Dead: Community Concerns over Fracking below a Cemetery in the Utica Shale Region.” Pp. 85-106 in Fractured Communities: Risk, Impacts, and Protest against Hydraulic Fracking in U.S. Shale Regions, edited by Anthony E. Ladd. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.

• Faculty Affiliate of the HUB for Teaching and Learning Resources, University of Michigan - Dearborn, 2021
• Chancellor’s Honors Extraordinary Graduate Student Teaching (Campus-Wide) Award, University of Tennessee, 2010
• Department of Sociology Graduate Student Teaching Award, University of Tennessee, 2010