Summer Gray

Biography

Summer Gray is Associate Professor of Environmental Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. With a background in Sociology and Science, Technology, and Society (STS), her research spans climate justice, critical resilience, and disaster studies, focusing on inequities in the distribution of environmental risks and benefits. She examines how technological and infrastructural systems intersect with social inequalities. Her book, In the Shadow of the Seawall (2023, University of California Press), explores how historical and structural inequities shape vulnerability and contribute to disparities in climate adaptation efforts. Summer teaches courses in qualitative methods, climate resilience, infrastructure and the built environment. In addition to her academic work, she engages in public and cinematic sociology.