Robert Owen Gardner

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Robert Owen Gardner
Professor and Department Chair

Walker Hall 216

Rob Gardner joined the faculty of Linfield in 2004. His research examines the growth of temporary or “portable” communities cultivated within settings as diverse as post-disaster relief centers, bowling alleys and bluegrass music festival campgrounds. Professor Gardner's teaching interests include community (SOAN 330), environment and sustainability (SOAN/ENVS 250), social theory (SOAN 385), and music subcultures (SOAN 254). He has taught month-long travel courses to post-Katrina New Orleans to study disaster-induced community change and to Mumbai and Varanasi, India to examine the role of non-governmental organizations in addressing persistent poverty.

Education

B.A., Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, Ohio, 1997
Ph.D., University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado, 2004

Academic Interests

My academic interests center around the concept of “community” as it is found and expressed in many different social contexts. My recently published book, The Portable Community: Place and Displacement in Bluegrass Festival Life from Routledge Press (2020), examines the communities that form around bluegrass music and festival culture in the American West. Building on this research, I also explore grassroots volunteer relief organizations after major disaster events and community resilience in the face of environmental change.

My teaching interests include community sustainability, environment, social theory, ethnographic methods, service-learning, rural homelessness and music subcultures.

Publications

Gardner, Robert Owen. The Portable Community: Place and Displacement in Bluegrass Festival Life. London: Routledge. 2020.
Gardner, Robert Owen "The Emergency Community: a Grassroots Model for Post Disaster Redevelopment" in Michèle Companion, ed. Disasters' Impact on Livelihoods and Cultural Survival: Losses, Opportunities, and Mitigation. CRC Press. Taylor and Francis Group, 2015.
Gardner, Robert. "The Emergent Organization: Improvisation and Order in Volunteer Relief Groups." Symbolic Interaction, 35:3. 2013 (selected as lead article).
Gardner Robert Owen. "Kenneth Burke" in Jon R. McGee and Richard L. Warms. Theory in Social and Cultural Anthropology. 2013. Sage Publications.
Schneider, Christopher, Robert Owen Gardner and John Bryce Merrill (Guest Editors). Special Issue of Studies in Symbolic Interaction: Music and Interaction. Greenwich, CT: JAI Press. Vol. 34 Spring, 2010.
Gardner, Robert Owen. "Spaces of Music Interaction: Subcultures, Scenes, and Communities." Studies in Symbolic Interaction. Vol 34. Spring, 2010.
Gardner, Robert Owen. "The Role of Grassroots Organizations and Volunteers in Southeast Texas after Hurricane Ike." Quick Response Research Report #212. 2008. Boulder, CO: University of Colorado Natural Hazards Center.
Gardner, Robert Owen. "Tradition and Authenticity in Popular Music." Symbolic Interaction, 28:1, 2005. Gardner, Robert Owen. "The Portable Community: Mobility and Modernization in Bluegrass Festival Life." Symbolic Interaction, 27:2, 2004.
Sanda Kaufman, Robert Gardner, and Guy Burgess. "Just the Facts, Please: Framing and Technical Information." Environmental Practice Vol. 5:3, 2003.
Eliott, Michael, Sanda Kaufman, Robert Gardner, and Guy Burgess. "Teaching Conflict Assessment and Frame Analysis Through Interactive Web-Based Simulations." International Journal of Conflict Management. Vol. 13:4, 2003.
Gardner, Robert and Guy Burgess. "Analysis of Colorado Growth Conflict Frames." Making Sense of Intractable Environmental Conflicts: Concepts and Cases. Roy J. Lewicki, Barbara Gray, Michael Elliott, eds. Island Press, 2002.
Gardner, Robert, Carol Conzelman, Karen Mockler, Kim Sanchez, and Guy Burgess. "Colorado Growth Related Environmental Conflicts." in Making Sense of Intractable Environmental Conflicts: Concepts and Cases. Roy J. Lewicki, Barbara Gray, Michael Elliott, eds. Island Press, 2002.

Robert Owen Gardner