Originally from Germany, I did most of my academic work in the US, first in Nebraska and then my unfinished PhD work in Kentucky. In 1996 I went to Oaxaca, Mexico to start my doctoral research on indigenous autonomy and quickly became part of several social processes and movements, culminating in the founding several NGOs in Oaxaca. My main connection to UK is as director of the geography summer program, which allows students to participate in some of the the activities of our Organization SURCO http://www.surcooaxaca.org/ while learning about social and environmental justice. In particular, there are projects on community media and indigenous movements, on coalition building, on resistance against mining, and the questionable use of a discourses of sustainability in land dispossession.
My situation on the interface between academia and social movements has also led me to rethink the purpose of research and theory in a more practical way. Much of the work I am involved in in Oaxaca is on using academic tools and connections for social movements, i.e. the formulation of theories and production of data to achieve a particular goal. In that sense, I see a lot of overlap and potential for academic research and knowledge production in contributing to the struggles of people pushing for social and political change. One of our initiatives currently under development is establishing ways in which academic research can contribute more to communities and social movements, while letting itself guided by the same. In that sense, our organization aspires to be a think-tank for and by social movements in southern Mexico.
MA Geography, University of Nebraska-Lincoln (1993)
- Political Ecology
- non-governmental organizations
- digital media
- Social Movements
- Social Theory
- knowledge production
- Geography
- International Studies