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Paola Solís

PhD researcher Paola Solís


Research Interests

  • Feminist political ecology, human – nonhuman agroecological relations, affects.
  • Decolonial theories, decolonial methodologies.

 

PhD project: ‘Other ways of farming’: Andean peasant women’s more-than-human agricultural care relations as collective insurgent practices.

The modern/colonial project has material and subjective consequences that are threatening the existence of the pluriverse - e.g. the Andean peasant women’s world – while intensifying agroextractivist interventions. Latin American governments supporting extractivist operations are embracing the economization of nature, against peasant women’s affections. In Peru, peasant women have been considered the target for social welfare programs rather than actors with potential to manage their own economies and political life. Despite policy guidelines, women’s agricultural work is still deemed irrelevant in a world that glorifies monetized flows – a situation that the pandemic COVID-19 has only magnified. Feminists have used the concept of care to underscore unpaid labor’s misrecognition and to rethink economics. Humans and urban/domestic contexts have been the main focus under these studies. I introduce different lenses to analyze care in women’s agricultural work, using as case study the relations of Andean peasant women who practice ‘other ways of farming’ (OWF), i.e.: practices closer to – but not only- agroecology. My approach considers symmetric more-than-human care relations in rural settings. In addition, I include a decolonial perspective to consider the wider context where care relations are enacted; and the use of affect theory to establish connections between decolonial cracks and the subjectivities of Andean peasant women.

 

Curriculum Vitae

  • Since 10/2021: Member and scholarship holder at the International Graduate Center for the Study of Culture (GCSC) at the University of Giessen
  • From June 2021 to 15th of December 2021: Independent researcher on Sustainable Food Systems at the Bartolomé de las Casas Center (Cusco, Peru), funded by McKnight Foundation.
  • 2018-2020: Master in Organic Agriculture at Wageningen University & Research. Nuffic scholarship holder. Thesis: “From anti-poison subjects to agroecological farmers: affects in sustainable markets of Zona da Mata – MG, Brazil”.
  • 2013-2017: Research assistant at the Nutritional Research Institute (Peru); and public servant at different ministries of Peru.
  • 2012-2013: Experiences in agroecological farms in Cusco, Peru and Bahía, Brazil.
  • 2009: Bachelor exchange year at the University of Sao Paulo (Brazil).
  • 2004-2011: Bachelor in Social Sciences with mention in Anthropology at the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru.