91´óÉñ

Aaron Foote is an urban/environmental sociologist and activist from Flint, Michigan. His research examines the policy, practices, and actors, that carried out a neocolonial project in southeast Michigan to strip water rights away from the City of Detroit, which would go on to create the Flint Water Crisis. Dr. Foote’s research details how state and suburban actors take over water rights in Southeast Michigan, under the guise of rectifying urban fiscal irresponsibility, which ultimately led to the poisoning of tens of thousands of Flint residents. Professor Foote’s research centers the lived experiences of families who fought back against the neocolonial project in Flint and Detroit that would forever alter their health and livelihoods. 

More broadly, Professor Foote is interested in how neocolonialism will (re)shape Black and Brown communities and their assets, in addition to the ways in which this neocolonialism will create environmental devastation in the future. 

In the classroom, Dr. Foote engages students through thoughtful discourse, critical reading and reflection, and experiential learning to help students connect their individual ideas and experiences to larger social systems of power. More specifically, Professor Foote challenges students to confront what they believe to be true with evidence-based inquiry to help students consider differing perspectives and synthesize new ideas to prepare them to be stewards of a more equitable society.