- MA, Sustainable Business and Communities, Goddard College
- BA, Economics and Political Science, University of Pennsylvania
Areas of expertise
Ecological and behavioral economics; degrowth theory, practice, and movement building; the roles of spirituality and right livelihoods in postgrowth transformation.
BIO
Nina Smolyar is a Ph.D. student and a member of the Leadership for the Ecozoic (L4E) project. After completing her B.A. in economics and political science at the University of Pennsylvania, she pursued her commitment to sustainability through roles in social justice and environmental organizations. She later lived and worked at two intentional eco-communities in Western Massachusetts, practicing material sufficiency, environmental awareness, and relational community-building while supporting ecospirituality and movement arts gatherings. These experiences inspired her to investigate community-building in graduate school, leading to a master’s thesis on conflict transformation in intentional community at Goddard College.
Her doctoral work initially centered on decolonization in higher education, examining power, land, and repair for historical dispossession. This research was enriched by her participation in the UVM Indigenous Peoples’ Working Group responding to the Land-Grab Universities research; advocacy at UVM and with the Vermont legislature on behalf of Odanak First Nation regarding Indigenous identity and sovereignty conflicts; and steering committee service for the Land-Grant Partners project.
Her intellectual trajectory has also been shaped by participation in international learning programs, including the 2019 Degrowth and Environmental Justice Summer School held in Spain and France and the 2020 Decolonial Methods in Social, Solidarity and Non-Hierarchical Economies intensive in Chiapas, Mexico.
In Fall 2022, she served as adjunct faculty at Champlain College, teaching from a self-designed syllabus for the course “Environmental Policy Assessment and Development,” which introduced students for the first time to degrowth, agroecology, and Indigenous identity conflicts. In April 2023, she spoke at the United Nations “Harmony with Nature forum in New York on degrowth and ecological economics. Nina’s current research investigates relationships between degrowth scholars and practitioners, exploring the roles of spirituality and right livelihoods towards postgrowth socio-ecological transformation.
Nina is involved with the Degrowth Institute and the International Degrowth Network, and currently serves as the elected Graduate Student Representative on the Board of Directors of the United States Society for Ecological Economics. Outside of academia, she can often be found dancing, playing ecoartsy tetris, or napping in the flowers on a shoreline.
Advisor: Jon Erickson
Bio
Nina Smolyar is a Ph.D. student and a member of the Leadership for the Ecozoic (L4E) project. After completing her B.A. in economics and political science at the University of Pennsylvania, she pursued her commitment to sustainability through roles in social justice and environmental organizations. She later lived and worked at two intentional eco-communities in Western Massachusetts, practicing material sufficiency, environmental awareness, and relational community-building while supporting ecospirituality and movement arts gatherings. These experiences inspired her to investigate community-building in graduate school, leading to a master’s thesis on conflict transformation in intentional community at Goddard College.
Her doctoral work initially centered on decolonization in higher education, examining power, land, and repair for historical dispossession. This research was enriched by her participation in the UVM Indigenous Peoples’ Working Group responding to the Land-Grab Universities research; advocacy at UVM and with the Vermont legislature on behalf of Odanak First Nation regarding Indigenous identity and sovereignty conflicts; and steering committee service for the Land-Grant Partners project.
Her intellectual trajectory has also been shaped by participation in international learning programs, including the 2019 Degrowth and Environmental Justice Summer School held in Spain and France and the 2020 Decolonial Methods in Social, Solidarity and Non-Hierarchical Economies intensive in Chiapas, Mexico.
In Fall 2022, she served as adjunct faculty at Champlain College, teaching from a self-designed syllabus for the course “Environmental Policy Assessment and Development,” which introduced students for the first time to degrowth, agroecology, and Indigenous identity conflicts. In April 2023, she spoke at the United Nations “Harmony with Nature forum in New York on degrowth and ecological economics. Nina’s current research investigates relationships between degrowth scholars and practitioners, exploring the roles of spirituality and right livelihoods towards postgrowth socio-ecological transformation.
Nina is involved with the Degrowth Institute and the International Degrowth Network, and currently serves as the elected Graduate Student Representative on the Board of Directors of the United States Society for Ecological Economics. Outside of academia, she can often be found dancing, playing ecoartsy tetris, or napping in the flowers on a shoreline.
Advisor: Jon Erickson
Publications
- Farley, J., Melgar, R. E. M., Hasan Ansari, D., Burke, M. J., Danielsen, J., Egler, M., Makombore, L., Neira, J., Poudel, S., Sellers, S., Smolyar, N. L., Sterlin, J., Taylor, J., & Vargas Roncancio, I. D. (2024). Rethinking Ecosystem Services from the anthropocene to the Ecozoic: Nature’s benefits to the biotic community. Ecosystem Services, 67, 101624.
- Smolyar, N.L. (2023). Social Justice. (p. 492.) Dictionary of Ecological Economics: Terms for the New Millennium, Haddad, B.M. & Solomon, B. D. (eds.). Edward Elgar Publishing Limited.
- Smolyar, N.L. & Schaffartzik, A. (2023). Political ecology. (pp. 408-409). Dictionary of Ecological Economics: Terms for the New Millennium, Haddad, B.M. & Solomon, B. D. (eds.). Edward Elgar Publishing Limited.
- Burke, M.J., Smolyar, N.L. (2022). Demilitarize for a just transition. In: Dunlap, A., Brock, A. (eds) Enforcing Ecocide: Power, Policing, and Planetary Militarization. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham.
- Kish, K., Mallery, D., Yahya Haage, G., Melgar-Melgar, R., Burke, M., Orr, C., Smolyar, N. L., Sanniti, S., & Larson, J. (2021). Fostering critical pluralism with systems theory, methods, and heuristics. Ecological Economics, 189, 107171.
- Smolyar, N. L. (June 19, 2020). A moment, a lifetime, for walking the tightrope. Leadership for the Ecozoic online blog.
- Smolyar, N. L. (2019). El Cambalache and inter-Change: Co-creating decolonial, Feminist, Solidarity Economies. Pp. 84-85. Women and Environments International Magazine: Celebrating Economies of Change: Brave Visions for Inclusive Futures. No.100 – 101, pp. 84-85.
- Vargas Roncancio, I., Temper, L., Sterlin, J., Smolyar, N. L., Sellers, S., Moore, M., Melgar-Melgar, R., Larson, J., Horner, C., Erickson, J. D., Egler, M., Brown, P. G., Boulot, E., Beigi, T., & Babcock, M. (2019). From the Anthropocene to mutual thriving: An agenda for higher education in the ecozoic. Sustainability, 11(12), 3312.