“Wealth and Remaking the American West”; discussion with Justin Farrell author of Billionaire Wilderness followed by panel discussion with Farrell, Claire Boyles, Nick Bowlin, Rachel Monroe. Chaired by Chelsey Johnson.
Justin Farrell is a professor and author at Yale University. His research focuses on cultural sociology and environmental politics. Mostly epistemologies and power. He blends ethnographic fieldwork with large-scale computational techniques from network science and machine learning.
His books BILLIONAIRE WILDERNESS, THE BATTLE FOR YELLOWSTONE, and articles have won national scholarly awards, and he regularly presents to policymakers, including the U.S. Senate, the United Nations, the Vatican, and in major media outlets such as the New York Times, The Economist, New York Review of Books, LA Times, NPR, Washington Post, HBO, and the Financial Times. Justin is a proud first-generation college grad and Wyoming native.
Rachel Monroe is a contributing writer at The New Yorker, where she covers Texas and the Southwest. Previously, she was a contributing writer at The Atlantic and has also written for the New York Times Magazine, New York, Esquire, Harper’s, and many other publications. Her first book, “Savage Appetites: True Stories of Women, Crime, and Obsession,” was published in 2019; it was named a New York Times Editor’s Choice, and a Best Book of the Year by the Chicago Tribune, Esquire, and Jezebel. She lives in Marfa, Texas.
Claire Boyles (she/her) is a writer, mom, and former farmer who lives and writes in Colorado. A 2022 Whiting Award winner in fiction, she is the author of Site Fidelity, which was longlisted for the PEN/Robert W. Bingham Award and the Best of the West Award and is a finalist for the Colorado Book Award. Her writing has appeared in VQR, Kenyon Review, Boulevard, and Masters Review, among others. She is a Peter Taylor Fellow for the Kenyon Review Writing Workshops and has received support from the Kimmel Harding Nelson Foundation, the Bread Loaf Orion Environmental Writers Workshop, and the Community of Writers. She teaches in Eastern Oregon University’s low-residency MFA program in Creative and Environmental Writing.
Nick Bowlin is a correspondent for High Country News and a freelance writer. His work has appeared in The Guardian, Politico Magazine, The Nation, The Drift and other publications. He lives in Gunnison.
