Jerry Shannon

Education

Research

I'm a geographer studying how to make urban neighborhoods and food systems healthier and more equitable. My broad interests are in urban development and inequality, geographic information systems, political geography, and place effects on health. More specifically, my research focuses on the role of maps in shaping our understanding of hunger, housing, poverty, and neighborhood development.

I am an assistant professor in the Department of Geography and the Department of Financial Planning, Housing, and Consumer Economics at the University of Georgia. I also direct the Community Mapping Lab in the Department of Geography and am an assistant director of the Housing and Demographics Research Center on campus.

You can find more information on my specific research projects on my research page. Among other things, I am currently aiding in a participatory planning process with the Atlanta Community Food Bank, studying the local effects of changes to SNAP (food stamps) in Georgia during the Great Recession, doing participatory mapping of the housing landscape in several Georgia cities, and developing a data dashboard for open data here in Athens-Clarke County. I am currently seeking graduate students interested in open data, participatory research, data visualization, and community development.

Teaching

I teach courses in the Geography Department related to GIS, spatial analysis, and engaged research and teaching methodologies.

Outreach

I maintain working partnerships with multiple organizations in Athens and around the state of Georgia. One of those includes working with mostly rural communities around the state on housing issues through the Georgia Initiative for Community Housing.

Journal Articles

Shannon, J., Hauer, M., Weaver, A., and Shannon, S. (2018). The Suburbanization of Poverty: An Analysis of Projected Trends in the Atlanta Metropolitan Area. Professional Geographer. 70:1, 84-93.

Abraham, A., Andrews, C. and Shannon, J. (2017). Geographic Disparities in Availability of Opioid Use Disorder Treatment for Medicaid Enrollees. Health Services Research.

Shannon, J., Shannon, S., Bagwell, G., and Lee, J.S. (2016.) Changing SNAP enrollment and benefits increased the number of small SNAP retailers in Georgia during the Great Recession. Health Affairs. 35:11, 2100-2108.

Shannon, J. and Christian, W. J. (2016). What is the relationship between food shopping and daily mobility? A relational approach to analysis of food access. GeoJournal.

Shannon, J. (2016). Beyond the supermarket solution: Linking food deserts, neighborhood context, and everyday mobility. Annals of the American Association of Geographers. 106:1, 186-202.