Event Details

Macalester alumna, Dr. Gabriela Valdivia (UNC-Chapel Hill) will give a lecture on Thursday March, 30 at 11:30am. Lunch provided. 

Of wounds and healing: Feminist political ecologies of self- determination, political consciousness, and resource extraction in the Ecuadorian Amazon

Stories and images of harm against Indigenous peoples raise consciousness of the enduring wounds caused by capitalism and resource extraction in the Americas. This talk is an invitation to both reflect on the axiology of stories favored in progressive accounts of resource extraction in Latin America, and to commit to storytelling that fosters healing work under existing conditions of extraction.  I argue for the need to hold space for companion narratives of “yes, and” that emphasize the liveliness of self-determination and political consciousness that is also present under conditions of resource extraction. I draw on plural feminisms from the Americas and from field examples in the Ecuadorian Amazon to make room for stories that center healing and dignity in the path towards Indigenous self-determination. This is not a denial of the atrocities lived or their afterlives, but a call for remaining attentive to and holding space for concurrent projects for reparations and healing of bodies, land, and territory. 

Hosted by Latin American Studies. Co-sponsored by Academic Programs, Alumni Engagement, Geography, History, Media & Cultural Studies, Mississippi River Project, Spanish & Portuguese.