Juanita Sundberg
University of British Columbia, Human Geography, Faculty Member
- Feminist Theory, Cultural Geography, Critical Race Theory, Political Ecology, Posthumanism, Political Geography and Geopolitics, and 9 moreU.S.-Mexico Border, Human Geography, US-Mexico Borderlands, Border Studies, Decolonialization, Eurocentrism, Borders and Borderlands, Borderlands Studies, and Feminist Geographyedit
- I am a feminist political ecologist working at the intersection of settler colonial studies and critical race theoriz... moreI am a feminist political ecologist working at the intersection of settler colonial studies and critical race theorizing, with an interest in US imperialism, Latin American Studies, militarism, and nature conservation.edit
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Contiene las memorias del seminario 'Geografía Crítica: Territorialidad, Espacio y Poder en América Latina', organizado por el Grupo de Investigación ESTEPA (Espacio, Tecnología y Participación)conjuntamente con los grupos... more
Contiene las memorias del seminario 'Geografía Crítica: Territorialidad, Espacio y Poder en América Latina', organizado por el Grupo de Investigación ESTEPA (Espacio, Tecnología y Participación)conjuntamente con los grupos GEOANDES (Geografía de MOntaña de lois Andes) y el Grupo GeoRaizAL (Geografía de Raíz Latinoamericana). Los dos primeros grupos estan adscritos a la Universoidad Nacional de Colombia y el último a la Universidad Externado. Las memorias están organizadas en las cinco mesas de discusión que se desarrollaron durante el evento: 1) Geografía Crítica Latinoamericana; 2) Territorialidad, Espacio y Poder; 3) Herramientas de Representación y Gestión del Territorio: SIG Participativos y Cartografías; 4) Ordenamiento Territorial para la vida; y 5) Ecología Política
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Webcast sponsored by Irving K. Barber Learning Centre and hosted by Common Energy UBC's NOW (No Other World) Forum. Dr. Juanita Sundberg brings the insights of femist geography and the sensibilities of an ethnographer to bear on the... more
Webcast sponsored by Irving K. Barber Learning Centre and hosted by Common Energy UBC's NOW (No Other World) Forum. Dr. Juanita Sundberg brings the insights of femist geography and the sensibilities of an ethnographer to bear on the cultural politics of nature conservation. Dr. Sundberg's work seeks to foster conversations between feminist theory, critical race theory, post-humanism, political ecology, and Latin American studies. In this webcast, Dr. Sundberg discusses why the environmental movement is dominantly female and strategies on building a community of climate activists.
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No abstract available
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As a cultural geographer, I find Ann Laura Stoler's Duress to be of enormous relevance to what we do. This is a text that challenges and inspires, pushing students of colonialism to reconsider ‘the...
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This paper situates recent events in the US–Mexico borderlands in relation to modalities of power used in the expansion of US imperial hegemony. Specifically, I link acts of legal suspension to expedite construction of border barriers on... more
This paper situates recent events in the US–Mexico borderlands in relation to modalities of power used in the expansion of US imperial hegemony. Specifically, I link acts of legal suspension to expedite construction of border barriers on the US southern border with genealogies of imperial dispossession and racial violence to build an argument about imperialism as a way of life in the US. In so doing, my goal is to support ongoing efforts to forge coalitions better able to contest legal suspension as a predominant technique of government.
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The subject of research ethics is one that has provoked and aggravated me throughout my entire academic life. The difficulties I encountered doing fieldwork in Guatemala as a white woman and citizen of the United States brought the... more
The subject of research ethics is one that has provoked and aggravated me throughout my entire academic life. The difficulties I encountered doing fieldwork in Guatemala as a white woman and citizen of the United States brought the question of complicity with empire to the fore, forcing me to examine the politics and ethics of knowledge production (Sundberg 2003, 2005). In what ways do geopolitical relations condition research? What are the ethics of producing knowledge under imperial conditions? And, how do geopolitics inform what comes to count as research ethics? Years of struggling with these issues have convinced me there is no disinterested place from which to engage in research and, therefore, to practice research ethics. For me, the burning question now is what it means to start from a place of entanglement, as scholars situated in and often beneficiaries of the very politico-economic systems under consideration in our research. This chapter asks how the interpretation and practice of ethics are transformed when knowledge production is framed in terms of entanglement. I begin by examining the ethical dilemmas of research as I see them. I then elaborate the notion of entanglement and ask what this shift implies for ethics.
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ABSTRACT Feminist political ecology is a subfield that brings feminist theory, objectives, and practices to political ecology, an analytical framework based on the assumption that ecological issues must be understood and analyzed in... more
ABSTRACT Feminist political ecology is a subfield that brings feminist theory, objectives, and practices to political ecology, an analytical framework based on the assumption that ecological issues must be understood and analyzed in relation to political economy (and vice versa). Feminist political ecologists suggest gender is a crucial variable – in relation to class, race and other relevant dimensions of political ecological life – in constituting access to, control over, and knowledge of natural resources. In addition, research in feminist political ecology demonstrates how social identities are constituted in and through relations with nature and everyday material practices. Feminist political ecology (FPE) is a subfield that brings feminist theory and objectives to political ecology, which is an analytical framework built on the argument that ecological issues must be understood and analyzed in relation to political economy (and vice versa). Feminist political ecologists suggest gender – in relation to class, race and other relevant axes of power – shapes access to and control over natural resources. In so doing, FPE also demonstrates how social identities are constituted in and through relations with nature and every day material practices. FPE builds bridges between sectors conventionally kept apart – academia, policy-making institutions, activist organizations – thereby connecting theory with praxis. In addition, FPE weaves threads between sites and scales to produce nuanced understandings of the socioecological dimensions of political economic processes. Rooted in feminist critiques of epistemology (the study of how knowledge is produced and legitimized), FPE asks compelling questions about who counts as an environmental actor in political ecologies and how ecological knowledges are constituted. As such, FPE has made substantive, epistemological, and methodological interventions in political ecology, environmental studies, and gender studies.
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United States-Mexico border, July 2005. At 6: 00 am, Karen stopped the truck on Arivaca Road, just twelve miles north of the US border with Mexico in Arizona. She had just caught a glimpse of two figures, blurred by the bright morning... more
United States-Mexico border, July 2005. At 6: 00 am, Karen stopped the truck on Arivaca Road, just twelve miles north of the US border with Mexico in Arizona. She had just caught a glimpse of two figures, blurred by the bright morning sunshine, emerging from the brush. ...
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As researchers working at the intersection of gender, race, nature, and geopolitical boundaries, Gendering Border Studies immediately caught our attention. This collection of essays challenged our ...
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Commentary 1 Confronted by ongoing crises in neoliberal capitalism and the environment, a new wave of social mobilizations–concerning resistance to economic austerity measures, and demands for environmental justice–have begun to... more
Commentary 1 Confronted by ongoing crises in neoliberal capitalism and the environment, a new wave of social mobilizations–concerning resistance to economic austerity measures, and demands for environmental justice–have begun to materialize across the world. For ...
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Research Interests: Human Geography, Geopolitics, Political Science, Body, Intimacy, and 4 moreCuerpo, Objects, Geopolítica, and Objetos
Research Interests: History, Social Psychology, Developmental Psychology, Human Geography, Border Studies, and 10 moreSocial Representations, Political Science, Politics, Intergroup Relations, Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, Political Geography, Public Policy and Administration, Contact Hypothesis, Public Administration and Policy, and Public health policy and administration
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This article presents a story about a plant – Lacandonia schismatica – which subverted disciplinary traditions in botany and reconfigured its geopolitical orders of knowledge. To tell this story, we focus on Lacandonia's... more
This article presents a story about a plant – Lacandonia schismatica – which subverted disciplinary traditions in botany and reconfigured its geopolitical orders of knowledge. To tell this story, we focus on Lacandonia's 'plantiness', Lesley Head and colleagues' (2012) concept to signify each kind of plant's unique biophysical characteristics, capacities, and potentialities, and through which they co-produce the world. We trace how L. schismatica intervened in, and (re)configured processes of knowledge production, environmental politics, and identity formation in the Lacandon Forest, Chiapas, Mexico, where it was found. Lacandonia's plantiness came into being through sudden macromutations; this unexpected but viable plant species participated in reviving an old debate in evolutionary biology: macroevolution versus gradualism. We also analyze how Lacandonia's plantiness compelled shifts in environmental politics in Chiapas and identity formation in Fronter...
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En este trabajo describimos la emergencia y desarrollo de una nueva generación de estudios en ecología política conocida como ecología política posthumanista. A partir de una amplia revisión de literatura, trazamos sus principales... more
En este trabajo describimos la emergencia y desarrollo de una nueva generación de estudios en ecología política conocida como ecología política posthumanista. A partir de una amplia revisión de literatura, trazamos sus principales influencias, sus temas centrales de análisis y las ventajas que aporta para comprender nuestra relación con el entorno, en un momento en el que es cada vez más difícil distinguir entre los dominios de lo social y lo natural. La ecología política posthumanista, hace uso de conceptos como ontología relacional, agencia más que humana y performación, útiles para superar definiciones limitadas de lo humano y asignar grados variables de agencia a lo no humano. El desarrollo de metodologías adecuadas es un reto importante en esta área, pero es necesario considerar que no se trata de mejorar nuestras representaciones de lo no humano, sino de experimentar el entorno de nuevas maneras. La ecología política posthumanista nos ofrece nuevas vías para pensar y explorar ...
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This paper engages my struggles to craft geo-graphs or earth writings that also further broaden political goals of decolonizing the discipline of geography. To this end, I address a body of literature roughly termed ‘posthumanism’ because... more
This paper engages my struggles to craft geo-graphs or earth writings that also further broaden political goals of decolonizing the discipline of geography. To this end, I address a body of literature roughly termed ‘posthumanism’ because it offers powerful tools to identify and critique dualist constructions of nature and culture that work to uphold Eurocentric knowledge and the colonial present. However, I am discomforted by the ways in which geographical engagements with posthumanism tend to reproduce colonial ways of knowing and being by enacting universalizing claims and, consequently, further subordinating other ontologies. Building from this discomfort, I elaborate a critique of geographical-posthumanist engagements. Taking direction from Indigenous and decolonial theorizing, the paper identifies two Eurocentric performances common in posthumanist geographies and analyzes their implications. I then conclude with some thoughts about steps to decolonize geo-graphs. To this end,...
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This paper presents a story about a plant – Lacandonia schismatica – who subverted disciplinary traditions in botany and reconfigured its geopolitical orders of knowledge. To tell this story, we focus on Lacandonia’s plantiness, Lesley... more
This paper presents a story about a plant – Lacandonia schismatica – who subverted disciplinary traditions in botany and reconfigured its geopolitical orders of knowledge. To tell this story, we focus on Lacandonia’s plantiness, Lesley Head and colleagues’s (2012) concept to signify each kind of plant’s unique biophysical characteristics, capacities, and potentialities, and through which they co-produce the world. We trace how L. schismatica intervened in, and (re)configured processes of knowledge production, environmental politics, and identity formation in the Lacandon Forest, Chiapas, Mexico, where it was found. Lacandonia’s plantiness came into being through sudden macromutations; this unexpected but viable plant species participated in reviving an old debate in evolutionary biology: macroevolution versus gradualism. We also analyze how Lacandonia’s plantiness compelled shifts in environmental politics in Chiapas and identity formation in Frontera Corozal, the Chol community wh...
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Resumen En este trabajo describimos la emergencia y desarrollo de una nueva generación de estudios en ecología política conocida como ecología política posthumanista. A partir de una amplia revisión de literatura, trazamos sus principales... more
Resumen En este trabajo describimos la emergencia y desarrollo de una nueva generación de estudios en ecología política conocida como ecología política posthumanista. A partir de una amplia revisión de literatura, trazamos sus principales influencias, sus temas centrales de análisis y las ventajas que aporta para comprender nuestra relación con el entorno, en un momento en el que es cada vez más difícil distinguir entre los dominios de lo social y lo natural. La ecología política posthuma-nista, hace uso de conceptos como ontología relacional, agencia más que humana y performación, útiles para superar definiciones limitadas de lo humano y asignar grados variables de agencia a lo no humano. El desarrollo de metodologías adecuadas es un reto importante en esta área, pero es necesario considerar que no se trata de mejorar nuestras representaciones de lo no humano, sino de experimentar el entorno de nuevas maneras. La ecología política posthumanista nos ofrece nue-vas vías para pensar y explorar nuestros encuentros con lo no humano y, al mismo tiempo, para reflexionar sobre lo que, hoy en día, significa ser humanos. Abstract In this paper we describe the emergence and development of a new generation of studies in political ecology known as posthumanist political ecology. Based on a wide literature review, we trace its main influences, its central topics of analysis and the advantages it provides to understand I Doctorado en Antropología por la Universidad Nacional
The 2000 United States census revealed that Hispanics had surpassed African Americans to become the largest minority group and that the South has become the second largest home to Hispanics. Latinos in the New South is an essential guide... more
The 2000 United States census revealed that Hispanics had surpassed African Americans to become the largest minority group and that the South has become the second largest home to Hispanics. Latinos in the New South is an essential guide to understanding these ...
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Feminist political ecology is a subfield that brings feminist theory, objectives, and practices to political ecology, an analytical framework based on the assumption that ecological issues must be understood and analyzed in relation to... more
Feminist political ecology is a subfield that brings feminist theory, objectives, and practices to political ecology, an analytical framework based on the assumption that ecological issues must be understood and analyzed in relation to political economy (and vice versa). Feminist political ecologists suggest gender is a crucial variable – in relation to class, race and other relevant dimensions of political ecological life – in constituting access to, control over, and knowledge of natural resources. In addition, research in feminist political ecology demonstrates how social identities are constituted in and through relations with nature and everyday material practices.
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The subject of research ethics is one that has provoked and aggravated me throughout my entire academic life. The difficulties I encountered doing fieldwork in Guatemala as a white woman and citizen of the United States brought the... more
The subject of research ethics is one that has provoked and aggravated me throughout my entire academic life. The difficulties I encountered doing fieldwork in Guatemala as a white woman and citizen of the United States brought the question of complicity with empire to the fore, forcing me to examine the politics and ethics of knowledge production (Sundberg 2003, 2005). In what ways do geopolitical relations condition research? What are the ethics of producing knowledge under imperial conditions? And, how do geopolitics inform what comes to count as research ethics? Years of struggling with these issues have convinced me there is no disinterested place from which to engage in research and, therefore, to practice research ethics. For me, the burning question now is what it means to start from a place of entanglement, as scholars situated in and often beneficiaries of the very politico-economic systems under consideration in our research. This chapter asks how the interpretation and practice of ethics are transformed when knowledge production is framed in terms of entanglement. I begin by examining the ethical dilemmas of research as I see them. I then elaborate the notion of entanglement and ask what this shift implies for ethics.
Research Interests:
This paper situates recent events in the US–Mexico borderlands in relation to modalities of power used in the expansion of U imperial hegemony. Specifically, I link acts of legal suspension to expedite construction of border barriers on... more
This paper situates recent events in the US–Mexico borderlands in relation to modalities of power used in the expansion of U imperial hegemony. Specifically, I link acts of legal suspension to expedite construction of border barriers on the US southern border with genealogies of imperial dispossession and racial violence to build an argument about imperialism as a way of life in the US. In so doing, my goal is to support ongoing efforts
to forge coalitions better able to contest legal suspension as a predominant technique of government.
to forge coalitions better able to contest legal suspension as a predominant technique of government.
Research Interests:
This paper engages my struggles to craft geo-graphs or earth writings that also further broaden political goals of decolonizing the discipline of geography. To this end, I address a body of literature roughly termed ‘posthumanism’ because... more
This paper engages my struggles to craft geo-graphs or earth writings that also further broaden political goals of decolonizing the discipline of geography. To this end, I address a body of literature roughly termed ‘posthumanism’ because it offers powerful tools to identify and critique dualist constructions of nature and culture that work to uphold Eurocentric knowledge and the colonial present. However, I am discomforted by the ways in which geographical engagements with posthumanism tend to reproduce colonial ways of knowing and being by enacting universalizing claims and, consequently, further subordinating other ontologies. Building from this discomfort, I elaborate a critique of geographical-posthumanist engagements. Taking direction from Indigenous and decolonial theorizing, the paper identifies two Eurocentric performances common in posthumanist geographies and analyzes their implications. I then conclude with some thoughts about steps to decolonize geo-graphs. To this end, I take up learnings offered by the Zapatistas. My goal is to foster geographical engagements open to conversing with and walking alongside other epistemic worlds.
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The concept of the Anthropocene is creating new openings around the question of how humans ought to intervene in the environment. In this article, we address one arena in which the Anthropocene is prompting a sea change: conservation.... more
The concept of the Anthropocene is creating new openings around the question of how humans ought to intervene
in the environment. In this article, we address one arena in which the Anthropocene is prompting a sea
change: conservation. The path emerging in mainstream conservation is, we argue, neoliberal and postnatural.
We propose an alternative path for multispecies abundance. By abundance we mean more diverse and autonomous
forms of life and ways of living together. In considering how to enact multispecies worlds, we take inspiration
from Indigenous and peasant movements across the globe as well as decolonial and postcolonial scholars.
With decolonization as our principal political sensibility, we offer a manifesto for abundance and outline political
strategies to reckon with colonial-capitalist ruins, enact pluriversality rather than universality, and recognize
animal autonomy. We advance these strategies to support abundant socioecological futures. Key Words:
abundance, Anthropocene, biodiversity, conservation, decolonization.
in the environment. In this article, we address one arena in which the Anthropocene is prompting a sea
change: conservation. The path emerging in mainstream conservation is, we argue, neoliberal and postnatural.
We propose an alternative path for multispecies abundance. By abundance we mean more diverse and autonomous
forms of life and ways of living together. In considering how to enact multispecies worlds, we take inspiration
from Indigenous and peasant movements across the globe as well as decolonial and postcolonial scholars.
With decolonization as our principal political sensibility, we offer a manifesto for abundance and outline political
strategies to reckon with colonial-capitalist ruins, enact pluriversality rather than universality, and recognize
animal autonomy. We advance these strategies to support abundant socioecological futures. Key Words:
abundance, Anthropocene, biodiversity, conservation, decolonization.
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This paper engages my struggles to craft geo-graphs or earth writings that also further broader political goals of decolonizing the discipline of geography. To this end, I address a body of literature roughly termed ‘posthumanism’ because... more
This paper engages my struggles to craft geo-graphs or earth writings that also further broader political goals of decolonizing the discipline of geography. To this end, I address a body of literature roughly termed ‘posthumanism’ because it offers powerful tools to identify and critique dualist constructions of nature and culture that work to uphold Eurocentric knowledge and the colonial present. However, I am discomforted by the ways in which geographical engagements with posthumanism tend to reproduce colonial ways of knowing and being by enacting universalizing claims and, consequently, further subordinating other ontologies. Building from this discomfort, I elaborate a critique of geographical-posthumanist engagements. Taking direction from Indigenous and decolonial theorizing, the paper identifies two Eurocentric performances common in posthumanist geographies and analyzes their implications. I then conclude with some thoughts about steps to decolonize geo-graphs. To this end, I take up learnings offered by the Zapatistas. My goal is to foster geographical engagements open to conversing with and walking alongside other epistemic worlds.
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The paper argues that wall building in the southern U.S. is implicated in walling up democracy. The suspension of law at the edges of the nation’s territory has numerous implications that have yet to be fully considered by political... more
The paper argues that wall building in the southern U.S. is implicated in walling up democracy. The suspension of law at the edges of the nation’s territory has numerous implications that have yet to be fully considered by political geographers.
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This article makes the case for addressing nonhumans as actors in geopolitical processes such as boundary making and enforcement. The challenge of this line of argumentation is to account for nonhumans as actors without enacting dualistic... more
This article makes the case for addressing nonhumans as actors in geopolitical processes such as boundary making and enforcement. The challenge of this line of argumentation is to account for nonhumans as actors without enacting dualistic ontologies that locate the natural and social in separate realms. To address this methodological challenge, I present a posthumanist political ecology. I elaborate my argument and methodological approach in relation to my research on the environmental dimensions of U.S. border security. Specifically, I examine how deserts, rivers, Tamaulipan Thornscrub, and cats inflect, disrupt, and obstruct the daily practices of boundary enforcement, leading state actors to call for more funding, infrastructure, boots on the ground, and surveillance technology. As my research illustrates, taking nonhumans seriously as actors alters explanations for the escalation of U.S. enforcement strategies.
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This article argues that human-environment relations are important, yet neglected sites in which racial hierarchies are constituted in Latin America. Unmapping how race articulates with environmental formations to constitute subjects,... more
This article argues that human-environment relations are important, yet neglected sites in which racial hierarchies are constituted in Latin America. Unmapping how race articulates with environmental formations to constitute subjects, determine their social and geographical place, and organize space will enable better understandings of how environmental injustices in Latin America are organized, justified, but also reconfigured.
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This paper draws attention to the intimate frontiers of geopolitics to analyze how quotidian political boundaries are delineated and disputed through mundane discursive practices. My empirical focus is the USA–Mexico borderlands wherein... more
This paper draws attention to the intimate frontiers of geopolitics to analyze how quotidian political boundaries are delineated and disputed through mundane discursive practices. My empirical focus is the USA–Mexico borderlands wherein US citizens frequently encounter material evidence of undocumented immigrants and their (unauthorized) border crossings. The materials encountered include identity documents and personal mementos as well as objects needed for survival like water bottles, backpacks, medication, shoes, and clothes. Close encounters with these intimate objects, I argue, have become primary sites wherein everyday framings of belonging are constituted in the borderlands. Drawing on field research in Arizona, I illustrate how cultural prescriptions for bodily comportment in relation to these objects are enlisted in the production and disruption of quotidian framings of ‘American’ or ‘those who don't belong in America.’
Cet article se focalise sur les limites intimes de la géopolitique afin d'examiner de quelle façon les frontières politiques ordinaires sont définies et contestées par des pratiques discursives banales. Cette recherche empirique porte sur la région frontalière des États-Unis et du Mexique dans laquelle des citoyens américains trouvent des preuves matérielles d'immigrants sans papiers et de leur passage (non autorisé) de la frontière. Parmi ces matériaux, on retrouve des cartes d'identité et des souvenirs personnels en plus des objets de première nécessité tels que des bouteilles d'eau, des sacs à dos, des médicaments, des chaussures et des vêtements. Il est soutenu que les rencontres de proximité avec ces objets intimes sont devenues les principaux lieux par lesquels s'élaborent les définitions du sens d'appartenance dans la région frontalière. Une étude de terrain menée en Arizona montre à quel point les prescriptions d'ordre culturel concernant le comportement corporel en lien avec ces objets servent à la production et au bouleversement des cadres ordinaires de définition pour les termes «Américain» et «ceux qui n'ont pas leur place aux États-Unis».
Este papel se enfoca en las fronteras íntimas de la geopolítica para analizar cómo se delinean y discuten las fronteras políticas cotidianas a través de prácticas discursivas rutinarias. Mi enfoque empírico se basa en los terrenos fronterizos de los Estados Unidos y México, donde los ciudadanos estadounidenses a menudo encuentran pruebas materiales de inmigrantes no documentados y pruebas de sus pasos fronterizos (no autorizados). Los materiales que se encuentran incluyen documentos de identidad, recuerdos personales y también objetos necesarios para sobrevivir, como botellas de agua, mochilas, medicamentos, zapatos y prendas de ropa. Sugiero que los encuentros íntimos con estos objetos íntimos se han convertido en sitios primarios donde las enmarcaciones cotidianas de pertenencia se constituyen en los terrenos fronterizos. Haciendo uso de investigación de campo de Arizona, ilustro el modo en que las normas culturales para el comportamiento corpóreo con relación a estos objetos son alistados en la producción y el desbarato de enmarcaciones cotidianas de ‘americano’ o ‘aquellos que no pertenecen en América.’
Cet article se focalise sur les limites intimes de la géopolitique afin d'examiner de quelle façon les frontières politiques ordinaires sont définies et contestées par des pratiques discursives banales. Cette recherche empirique porte sur la région frontalière des États-Unis et du Mexique dans laquelle des citoyens américains trouvent des preuves matérielles d'immigrants sans papiers et de leur passage (non autorisé) de la frontière. Parmi ces matériaux, on retrouve des cartes d'identité et des souvenirs personnels en plus des objets de première nécessité tels que des bouteilles d'eau, des sacs à dos, des médicaments, des chaussures et des vêtements. Il est soutenu que les rencontres de proximité avec ces objets intimes sont devenues les principaux lieux par lesquels s'élaborent les définitions du sens d'appartenance dans la région frontalière. Une étude de terrain menée en Arizona montre à quel point les prescriptions d'ordre culturel concernant le comportement corporel en lien avec ces objets servent à la production et au bouleversement des cadres ordinaires de définition pour les termes «Américain» et «ceux qui n'ont pas leur place aux États-Unis».
Este papel se enfoca en las fronteras íntimas de la geopolítica para analizar cómo se delinean y discuten las fronteras políticas cotidianas a través de prácticas discursivas rutinarias. Mi enfoque empírico se basa en los terrenos fronterizos de los Estados Unidos y México, donde los ciudadanos estadounidenses a menudo encuentran pruebas materiales de inmigrantes no documentados y pruebas de sus pasos fronterizos (no autorizados). Los materiales que se encuentran incluyen documentos de identidad, recuerdos personales y también objetos necesarios para sobrevivir, como botellas de agua, mochilas, medicamentos, zapatos y prendas de ropa. Sugiero que los encuentros íntimos con estos objetos íntimos se han convertido en sitios primarios donde las enmarcaciones cotidianas de pertenencia se constituyen en los terrenos fronterizos. Haciendo uso de investigación de campo de Arizona, ilustro el modo en que las normas culturales para el comportamiento corpóreo con relación a estos objetos son alistados en la producción y el desbarato de enmarcaciones cotidianas de ‘americano’ o ‘aquellos que no pertenecen en América.’
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This paper argues that critical geographies of Latin America begin with an analysis of how and why the bodies and geographies of geographers themselves matter. To focus on the geographer as a producer of knowledge is not to advocate the... more
This paper argues that critical geographies of Latin America begin with an analysis of how and why the bodies and geographies of geographers themselves matter. To focus on the geographer as a producer of knowledge is not to advocate the kind of navel gazing so abhorrent to many scholars. Rather, it is an effort to call attention to and critically assess how the geographer's embodied social position and geographic location inform the production of knowledge about and representations of Latin American people and nature. To illustrate how and why bodies and geographies matter, I draw from feminist and post-colonial theory and include examples from my own experiences and those of other researchers doing fieldwork in Latin American countries. I conclude by exploring the notion of situated knowledge as a tactic that writes bodies and geographies into academic texts. Ultimately, situating knowledge represents a political intervention and contribution to the broader goals of emancipatory politics shared by critical human geographers.