Dr. Emily Doyle

Dr. Emily Doyle

Postdoctoral Fellow, Memorial University of Newfoundland

Biography/ Academic Background

I was born in and currently live in St. John’s with my husband and three children. I descend from European settlers in what is now known as the province of Newfoundland and Labrador. I recognize the place I call home as the ancestral homelands of the Mi’kmaq and Beothuk and recognize the Inuit of Nunatsiavut and NunatuKavut and the Innu of Nitassinan as the original people of Labrador.

My PhD research in the Faculty of Medicine’s Division of Community Health and Humanities at MUN was an interdisciplinary investigation of the school food system. It involved examining health, education and food systems theory and practice as they interact in schools in this place. The goal of my research was to explore how a systems-thinking approach can lead to new and different insights which have the potential to improve the NL school food system. I investigated current policies and programs, knowledge and attitudes of stakeholders and the way programs interact in the NL context. My research helps to narrate some of the tensions in the school food system through emphasizing values such as sustainability and community which have been extraneous to traditional purely financial reductions of school food.

I have been personally engaged in the school food system (as a researcher, a mother, a teacher, a community member, a school health promotion consultant) and a core principle of my research is to be able to learn from studying and being engaged in the system: how it works and how this understanding can be applied to help build together a more healthy sustainable school food system. This methodology of phronetic social science offers practical knowledge as the key to making social science matter. Knowledge is developed in collaboration with local people and places.

I now work as a postdoctoral fellow at Grenfell Campus in the School of Science and the Environment. I am working with Dr. Kelly Vodden to support the work of the Rural Resilience Lab. In this role, I will be coordinating the Atlantic PhiLab project. I also am working with Dr. Mumtaz Cheema in supporting food and agricultural research initiatives.

Previous to this position I have taught both inside and outside the school system. I have worked and volunteered with a number of food sustainability organizations and initiatives. I have a Master of Philosophy from MUN, a Bachelor of Education Conjoint with a Diploma in Technology Education, a BA in Psychology from Acadia University and a Diploma in Farm Management from McGill University.