Megan Kaminski
- Poet and Professor of Environmental Studies
- Director of Undergraduate Studies, Environmental Studies
Contact Info
Personal Links
Biography —
Megan Kaminski is a poet, essayist, and Professor of Environmental Studies at the University of Kansas. Her work operates at the intersection of environmental humanities, virtue ethics, and contemplative practice — exploring how regional landscapes call us into relationships of reciprocity, responsibility, and mutual healing across political and cultural difference.
Her scholarly work examines how individuals and communities cultivate the values — attention, care, resilience, and grace — that make genuine environmental stewardship and public life possible. This work spans ecotheology and agapeology, elemental philosophy and atmospheric studies, and the ethics of place-based care.
As a writer, Kaminski explores the boundaries of eco-arts, plant studies, and land stewardship. She is the author of three books of poetry: Gentlewomen (2020), Deep City (2015), and Desiring Map (2012). She is currently completing an expansive three-book creative cycle dedicated to the tallgrass prairie ecosystem: Blazing Star (Noemi Press, 2028), Prairie Oracle — a collection of science-grounded essays paired with a community oracle deck (University Press of Kansas, 2027) — and Tender Ground, a lyric memoir combining contemplative practice, natural history, and personal narrative, currently in progress.
Beyond the page, Kaminski’s civic practice includes place-based sound, poetry, and multimedia installations featured at museums, public gardens, and libraries across the United States and internationally. Her public humanities work encompasses community stewardship workshops, place-based poetry walks, and curated collaborative volumes of nature poetry and art designed to foster climate resilience and shared ecological witness. This work is informed by earlier professional experience in the nonprofit environmental sector and by sustained research partnerships with plant biologists, social welfare scholars, and regional conservation organizations.
Her research and writing have been supported by Dumbarton Oaks at Harvard University, the Plant Animacies Workshop at Harvey Mudd College, the Vashon Artist Residency, the Tallgrass Artist Residency, the Hall Center for the Humanities, the Spencer Museum of Art, and a Keeler Family Intra-University Professorship.
Research —
Research Interests
- Ecotheology, Agapeology & Contemplative Ecology: Exploring divine love, grace, and somatic rootedness as material forces in interspecies reciprocity and community resilience; drawing on contemplative traditions — including the work of Simone Weil, Howard Thurman, Thomas Merton, and Thích Nhất Hạnh — to rethink the ethical foundations of ecological care.
- Elemental Philosophy, Phenomenology & Atmospheric Studies: Philosophical and creative investigations into the elements, affect, climate grief, and the lived phenomenology of landscapes; examining how weather, water, and ecological change shape human attention, memory, and moral imagination.
- Eco-Arts, Poetics & Multi-Genre Writing: Cross-genre scholarship in poetry, literary nonfiction, and lyric memoir as modes of environmental witness, deep place-centered inquiry, and plant studies; exploring the aesthetic and ethical dimensions of writing the more-than-human world.
- Biocentric Public Humanities & Civic Practice: Investigating how place-based art, community stewardship, and public ecological witness can build cross-cultural coalitions and foster collective resilience; developing theory and practice at the intersection of environmental humanities and civic life.
- Ecological Ethics & Values-Based Environmental Leadership: Scholarship examining how individuals and institutions cultivate the values — attention, reciprocity, care, and grace — that make genuine environmental stewardship and public service possible; informing pedagogy, organizational culture, and environmental policy.
- Institutional Leadership & Academic Administration: Drawing on scholarship in virtue ethics, agapeology, and contemplative practice, Kaminski approaches academic leadership as an extension of her intellectual commitments — cultivating institutional cultures of attention, care, and shared flourishing. Her administrative work spans faculty mentorship and professional development, program leadership, and institutional change management.
Teaching —
Teaching Interests
- Environmental Humanities, Eco-Arts & Contemplative Creative Practice: Teaching poetry, essay, and multimedia art as practices of ecological attention, moral formation, and cultural witness. Drawing on contemplative traditions to cultivate presence, care, and creative rigor alongside environmental knowledge.
- Environmental Storytelling, Science Communication & Public Humanities: Training future scientists, policymakers, and environmental leaders to translate complex ecological, botanical, and climate data into compelling public narratives that reach across cultural and political difference.
- Environmental Philosophy, Virtue Ethics & Leadership for the Anthropocene: Moral formation and character development for students navigating ecological complexity and climate anxiety; fostering ethical leadership, psychological resilience, and a grounded sense of civic responsibility.
- Place-Based Learning, Prairie Studies & Community-Engaged Pedagogy: Experiential and field-based learning rooted in regional geography — particularly the tallgrass prairie ecosystem. Connecting students directly to local ecological histories and community stewardship networks.
- Graduate Mentorship & Interdisciplinary Doctoral Education: Supervising doctoral and MFA students across the humanities, interdisciplinary studies, and the arts; developing mentorship approaches grounded in self-direction, contemplative practice, and equity-centered professional formation.