McKay Jenkins
Biography
McKay Jenkins is a journalist, nonfiction writer, and the Cornelius Tilghman Professor of English, Journalism, and Environmental Humanities, Jenkins is the author of the book Food Fight: GMOs and the Future of the American Diet (Avery, January, 2017), which examines the contentious national debate over the safety, politics, and environmental implications of genetic engineering and industrial food. He is also the author of ContamiNation (Avery, 2016 – previously published as What’s Gotten Into Us: Staying Healthy in a Toxic World (Random House, 2011), which chronicles his investigation into the myriad synthetic chemicals we encounter in our daily lives, and the growing body of evidence about the harm these chemicals do to our bodies and the environment; and the co-author (with E.G. Vallianatos) of Poison Spring: The Secret History of Pollution and the EPA (Bloomsbury, 2014) that Booklist (in a starred review) called "a jaw-dropping expose" and "a resounding call for genuine and sustained environmental responsibility." Along with his colleagues in the science and nonprofit environmental education sector, Jenkins is currently helping build a statewide Master Naturalist Certification Program for the state of Delaware. At the university, he is a recipient of both the University Excellence in Teaching Award and the College of Arts and Sciences Excellence in Teaching Award.