2026 Award Winners 

Tarla Rai Peterson Book Award in Environmental Communication (Formerly the Christine L. Oravec Research Award in Environmental Communication (book category)

• Lisa Phillips, Texas Tech University, Olfactory Rhetoric: Sniffing Out Environmental Problems (Ohio State UP, 2025).

Stephen P. Depoe Book Chapter Award in Environmental Communication:

• Joshua Trey Barnett, Penn State University, “Rhetorical Ecologies of Violent Care: Thinking with Spotted Lantern Flies” in Pleasure and Pain in U.S. Public Culture edited by John Lucaites and Christopher Gilbert. 

Christine L. Oravec Journal Article Award in Environmental Communication

• Keri K. Stephens, Mir Rabby, Matthew S. McGlone, Anny Kreiser, Kyudong Kim, Roselia Mendez Murillo, Kasey Faust, and Sergio Castellanos, “Preparing for the Extreme Cold: Linking Motivations, Water Infrastructure, and Communication Practices to Protective Actions,” Weather, Climate, & Society, volume 18 (2026), 519-529. 

J. Robert Cox Award in Environmental Communication and Civic Engagement

• Not awarded

Catalina de Onís Dissertation Award in Environmental Communication

• Eddie Gamboa “Border Productions of Loss: Naturalized Violence and Sensorial Solidarities from the Paso del Norte” (Northwestern)

Top Student Paper

• Zepeng Tong, Indiana University Bloomington, “Mapping the Structure of Climate Change Discourse: A Concept Co-occurrence Network Analysis of Press Media”