Stan Brunn labels himself a cosmopolitan Middle Westerner after being raised in small towns and rural areas in a half-dozen states.  He taught previously at the University of Florida and Michigan  State University.  He joined the University of Kentucky department as chair in 1980 and served as chair from 1980-88.   He was appointed by the Governor as State Geographer from 1988-89.  His teaching and research interests include political, social, and urban geography and time-space geographies and innovative cartographies.  He has offered seminars on technological hazards, cyberspace, humane geographies, peace and reconciliation.

  Stan's research record includes a number of authored and edited books and numerous articles that have appeared in geography and interdisciplinary journals. His current research projects include editing a book on Wal-Mart, editing an issue of GeoJournal about the geopolitics of natural disasters (Asian tsunami and Hurricane Katrina), and co-editing books on Gated Communities and Music Geographies. He is also working on several topics related to humane geographies in Central Asia, global transportation and telecommunications networks, and geographies of cyberspace.

   He has taught for short periods at more than a dozen European and Central Asian universities; these include Finland, Sweden, Ireland, Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia, the Netherlands, Bosnia, Kosovo, Kazakstan, and Kyrgyzstan. During the past four decades he has made presentations at dozens of national and international conferences.   He was elected University of Kentucky Distinguished Professor in the College of Arts and Sciences in 1989-90.  Stan has also been active in the Association of American Geographers, including editor of both The Professional Geographer and of the Annals, AAG.  He received AAG Honors in 1994 and in 2006 was merited with the Lifetime Achievement Award at SEDAAG (SouthEastern Division of American Geographers); also he has served on a number of IGU, NCGE, and AAG committees, including co-chair of the AAG Centennial Coordinating Committee.  During the past two decades he has worked with educators in Kentucky to train teachers and to improve the quality of instruction in the state's schools.  Among the many highlights of his professional career was his appearance on NBC's Today Show in 1971 to discuss his proposed political reorganization of the United States.

 His hobbies include collecting creative maps and landscape paintings, studying futuristic and endangered geographies, singing in a choir, learning other languages, working crossword puzzles, and writing poetry.