Rate My Professor Meg Sherval

Associate Professor Meg Sherval is a legal and environmental geographer working in the Discipline of Geography and Environmental Studies within the School of Environmental and Life Sciences at the University of Newcastle. She earned her PhD and Master of Environmental Science from Macquarie University. Her research revolves around constructs of nature, resource use, and the social, cultural, legal, and political impacts of environmental change. Key areas include the spatial and temporal dynamics of natural resource development, economic processes shaping environmental visualization and utilization, transitions amid resource stock declines, and decarbonisation of industry. Sherval critiques the commodification of nature in modern economic development. Her expertise spans community engagement, energy development, environmental law and ethics, governance, impacts of resource depletion, land-use transformation, mining impacts, remoteness, resource contestation, resource nationalism, rurality, and the social, cultural, and economic effects of climate change. Fields of research include environmental geography, rural and regional geography, and other law and legal studies.

Sherval's career includes her current role as Associate Professor at the University of Newcastle, following positions as Lecturer at Macquarie University Department of Environment and Geography (2007-2009) and Associate Lecturer in the Department of Human Geography (2003). She serves as Vice-President of the Geographical Society of New South Wales since 2017 and holds memberships in organizations such as the Institute of Australian Geographers (Fellow since 2023), International Arctic Social Sciences Association, National Institute for Rural and Regional Australia, and Institute of Australian Geographers Rural Geography Study Group (Convener 2011-2016). Notable awards include the Vice Chancellor's Award for Teaching Excellence and Contribution to Student Learning (Science) (2018), Faculty of Science Staff Teaching Excellence Award (2018), Deputy Vice-Chancellor's Merit List for Teaching and Learning Excellence (2020), and a Visiting Academic Fellowship at St. Mary's College, Durham University (2016). Key publications feature her book 'The Geopolitics of Gold - Narratives of Globalisation and Remote Resource Economies' (2009); journal articles 'The emotional geographies of a coal mining transition: a case study of Singleton, New South Wales, Australia' (2024), 'Community resistance and the role of justice in shale gas development in the United Kingdom' (2023), 'Exploring the minescape: engaging with the complexity of the extractive sector' (2016), and 'Canada's oil sands: the mark of a new 'oil age' or a potential threat to Arctic security?' (2015); and chapters such as 'Activating rural spaces in the pursuit of unconventional energy and justice' (2021).