Kenneth Tunnell was born and raised in rural east Tennessee and currently makes his home in rural central Kentucky. He holds the Doctor of Philosophy in Sociology from the University of Tennessee. He is a faculty member at Eastern Kentucky University where he publishes in the academic disciplines of sociology and criminology. His work has appeared in a variety of academic journals. He also is the author of four previous books – Choosing Crime (Nelson Hall), Political Crime in Contemporary America (Garland), Living Off Crime (Rowman & Littlefield), and Pissing on Demand: Workplace Drug Testing & the Rise of the Detox Industry (New York University Press). Beyond academics, Tunnell’s interests are music and photography the latter of which he has studied (through short periods of instruction) with Berea, Kentucky’s Warren Brunner, Lisa Binnie at Edward Burtynsky’s Toronto Image Works, Richmond, Kentucky’s Tim Webb, and Tom Geisler of Knoxville, Tennessee. Once Upon a Place is Tunnell’s first photography book.
Books
Once Upon a Place: The Fading of Community in Rural Kentucky (2011)
Across the globe, something is amiss. Even pedestrian observation recognizes that rural communities and small...
Living Off Crime (2006)
A sociological exploration of highly active property offenders who commit themselves to careers in serious...
Pissing on Demand : Workplace Drug Testing and the Rise of the Detox Industry (2004)
Drug testing has become the norm in many workplaces. In order to get a job,...
Political Crime in Contemporary America: A Critical Approach (1993)
Nine essays explore not only politically motivated crimes against the state, but also harmful acts...
Choosing Crime: The Criminal Calculus of Property Offenders (1992)
How people make decisions to commit criminal acts is a growing area of research and...
Articles
Reflections on Visual Field Research, International Journal of Qualitative Methods (2012)
This article describes ongoing visual field research by focusing on its self-reflective and auto-ethnographic components....
Singing Across the Scars of Wrong: Johnny Cash and His Struggle for Social Justice (with Mark S. Hamm), Crime, Media, Culture (2009)
The life and music of Johnny Cash are explored in this article as we detail...
Illegal Dumping: Large and Small Scale Littering in Rural Kentucky, Southern Rural Sociology (2008)
Illegal dumping, a social problem greatly affecting some rural states, occurs at both the large...
Thinking Critically About Rural Gender Relations: Toward a Rural Masculinity Crisis/Male Peer Support Model of Separation/Divorce Sexual Assault (with Walter DeKeseredy, Joseph F. Donnermeyer, Martin D. Schwartz, and Mandy Hall), Critical Criminology (2007)
After decades of neglect, a growing number of scholars have turned their attention to issues...
In Our Own Backyard: Methamphetamine Manufacturing, Trafficking and Abuse in Rural America (with Joseph Donnermeyer), Rural Realities (2007)
The abuse of methamphetamine ( or meth) is dramatically evident in the "before and after"...
Presentations
Photos and Field Notes From Visual Research, American Society of Criminology Annual Meeting (2009)
This paper describes ongoing visual field research by focusing especially on its self-reflective and auto-ethnographic...
Illegal Dumping: Large and Small Scale Littering in Rural Kentucky, American Society of Criminology Annual Meeting (2008)
Illegal dumping, a social problem greatly affecting some rural states, occurs at both the large...
Photographic Observations on the Disorganization of Rural Communities, American Society of Criminology Annual Meeting (2006)
Across the globe, rural communities and small towns are undergoing fundamental and at times rapid...