Canción norteña: Los cumaná de coquimbo

A documentary film by Eileen Karmy & Martin Farias

Monday 29th January, 5.15

Andrew Stewart Cinema, University of Glasgow (Gilmorehill Campus)

The screening is free, but registration is required: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/screening-of-northern-song-in-glasgow-tickets-41709691811

Rivers with rights? Social and environmental conflict in Colombia

Colombia has experienced one of the most protected civil conflicts in the world, lasting over fifty years and  resulting in a high death toll, widespread displacement, and deep social scars. On 27 September 2016, the Colombian Government signed an historic peace agreement with Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia - People’s Army (FARC-EP), the main guerrilla group.  While the cessation of FARC-EP violence has brought with it great hope for peace, the complexity of the Colombian conflict and the persistence of a variety of legal and illegal armed groups also presents very real challenges. Instead of dissipating with the peace agreement the ‘humanitarian crisis has got worse’ for the citizens of the Chocó department (UMAIC, 2017), the poorest and most ethnically diverse region of the country. As one of the most biodiverse regions in the world, Chocó has attracted legal and illegal speculators who engage in extraction of natural resources. One of the most devastating of these has been gold mining which has caused widespread environmental destruction and displacement, particularly of riverine communities.  As a result of community activism,  the Colombian Constitutional Court passed a unique sentence  in 2017 which acknowledges ‘the inherent interdependency between the environment and communities ‘  of Chocó. Sentence T-622 specifically recognises the Atrato River as a bearer of rights alongside the recognition that communities’ identities and livelihoods cannot be separated from it.  This ruling has generated a new paradigm of rights in Colombia. Founded in the idea of a sustainable socio-environment, these have been expressed as ‘bio-cultural’ rights.  These rights are cornerstones for building sustainable and peaceful communities in the Atrato Basin and wider Chocó bio-region, but also ensure that the river too is a bearer of rights.

This public lecture features contributions from community leader Bernardino Mosquera Palacios, the Diocese of Choco Sterlin Londono Palacios, and Mauricio Cabrera Leal of WWF Colombia who will give an overview of the current situation in Chocó and the challenges and opportunities presented by the nascent peace process.

The event forms part of the Choco River Stories Glasgow workshop, which is bringing together activists and academics from Colombia with scholars and NGO representatives based in the UK in a two-day event (8-9th February 2018) at the University of Glasgow.

Please register at https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/rivers-with-rights-social-and-environmental-conflict-in-colombia-tickets-42669360205 (for catering purposes). 

In association with ABColombia, SCIAF, and WWF Colombia.

N.B. Event in Spanish with translation

Choco Lecture poster

Seminar & Reception: Regional cooperation for ecological sustainability: protecting migratory species in East Africa and South America

Wednesday, April 11^th, 2018, 16-17.30h

Gilbert Scott Room 355

Description: Addressing transboundary environmental concerns poses particular challenges. While ecosystems do not function according to the political and legal boundaries drawn up by humans, those national borders, different legislations and at times varying political priorities and rivalries have a significant impact on how, and how effectively, transboundary environmental concerns are governed. This interdisciplinary seminar provides a platform for discussing the opportunities and challenges in regional environmental governance by focussing on the protection of migratory species, a group of organisms that elicits a unique set of international policies due to their wide ranging movements that occur across political boundaries. The seminar will examine migratory species from two angles. Dr Thomas Morrison (Institute of Biodiversity, Animal Health and Comparative Medicine, College of Medical, Veterinary and Life Sciences) will present the ecological factors shaping the migration of animals and present some of the findings from his work on wildebeest and elephant migration in East Africa. Dr Karen Siegel (School of Social and Political Sciences, College of Social Sciences) will then discuss the broader political context of the protection of migratory species and outline how networks of researchers, NGOs and government officials have promoted the conservation of migratory species in South America. This case study is part of her book Regional Environmental Cooperation in South America: Processes, Drivers and Constraints (Palgrave Macmillan, International Political Economy Series, 2017). To mark the publication of the book and to provide an opportunity for informal discussion and networking, the seminar will be followed by a wine reception.

To register: Please e-mail Mary.Ryan@glasgow.ac.uk to register for this event

A screening of the powerful documentary "Watch Them Die" (Temoris Grecko) with a short discussion, to stand in solidarity with the 43 Mexican students that were forcefully disappeared 43 months ago - and to show their families, friends and other Mexican activists fighting for the truth of the case to be revealed that they are not forgotten.

Patriarchal State Violence: Nicaraguan Feminists/LGBT Activists Speak

Wednesday 28th November 2018, 5pm to 7pm

Glasgow University, Room 234, St Andrew’s Building,

20 Eldon St, Glasgow G3 6NH

Patriarchal State Violence Poster      

Wednesday 13^th February 2019 at 1pm in Hetherington 317

An AHGBI research seminar at the University of Glasgow, hosted by Dr Eamon McCarthy:

La mirada documental en la literatura latinoamericana contemporánea (Sergio Chejfec, Mario Levrero, Valeria Luiselli y Alejandro Zambra).

NOTE – the talk will be in Spanish

Luz Horne is a Professor of Literature at the Humanities Department at Universidad de San Andrés in Buenos Aires. She received her PhD in Spanish and Portuguese from Yale University (2005) and her “Licenciatura” in Philosophy from the University of Buenos Aires (1999). Before joining San Andrés (2010), she was an Assistant Professor at Cornell University (2006-2010) and a Visiting Assistant Professor at Northwestern University (2005-06). Her main area of research is 20^th and 21^st century Brazilian and Spanish American literature and culture, with a special interest in the fields of film, visual culture, cultural studies and critical theory. She has published several articles in prestigious peer-reviewed academic journals and her book, Literaturas reales: Transformaciones del realismo en la literatura latinoamericana contemporánea, was published in 2012 by Beatriz Viterbo Editora (Argentina).

Title:  Social Movements' Claims for Political Incorporation in Latin America

Presenter: Federico M. Rossi

Date and location: Thursday 21^st February at 3.30pm, Boyd Orr Building, Room 507 (LTC)

Abstract:

How has the sociopolitical arena expanded to include the interests of the poor and excluded strata of society in Latin America? In this talk, based on his acclaimed book The Poor’s Struggle for Political Incorporation, Federico Rossi argues that it was through contentious political dynamics that marginalized members of society claimed to be recognized. Protests, marches, pickets, strikes, and–sometimes–more violent methods have been part of the relational process of building and rebuilding institutions that modified the relationship of the ‘popular sectors’ with the state. These contentious dynamics pushed political elites to define a new “social question,” innovating in both social and repressive policies to deal with the claims of the poor for being (re)incorporated in the sociopolitical arena. The popular movement’s repertoire of strategies for social change has been associated with different types of movements in each historical period of Latin America. The labor and/or peasant movements, the main organizers of the popular sectors in their claim for well-being through reform or revolution, were in the liberal period (1870s–1930s) that preceded the first incorporation (1930s–1950s). In the second incorporation (2000s–2010s), a different type of movement emerged in response to the neoliberal period (1970s–2000s) as the central popular actor in the quest for stopping the exclusionary consequences of authoritarianism and neoliberalism while claiming for the re-incorporation of the popular sectors as citizens and wage earners. Putting poor people’s movements into the long-term perspective of societal transformations produced by neoliberalism, this book talk will present these dynamics of reincorporation into society as citizens and workers in Latin America.

Bio:

Federico M. Rossi, Visiting Professor at the Centre on Social Movement Studies (COSMOS) of the Scuola Normale Superiore (Italy), is a Research-Professor of Argentina’s National Scientific and Technical Research Council (CONICET) at the School of Politics and Government of the National University of San Martín (UNSAM), Buenos Aires.

Rossi is the author of The Poor’s Struggle for Political Incorporation: The Piquetero Movement in Argentina (Cambridge University Press – Contentious Politics Series, 2017), and La participación de las juventudes hoy (Prometeo, 2009). He is the editor of The Oxford Handbook of Latin American Social Movements (Oxford University Press, forthcoming), and the coeditor (with Marisa von Bülow) of Social Movement Dynamics: New Perspectives on Theory and Research from Latin America (Routledge – Mobilization Series, 2015), and (with Eduardo Silva) of Reshaping the Political Arena in Latin America: From Resisting Neoliberalism to the Second Incorporation (University of Pittsburgh Press – Latin American Series, 2018).

Rossi holds a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from the Universidad de Buenos Aires and a Doctoral degree in Political and Social Sciences from the European University Institute in Florence, Italy. He has been Visiting Professor at Singapore Management University and the American University of Cairo, Global Visiting Scholar at New York University, Visiting Researcher at the Universidade de Brasília, and Postdoctoral Fellow at Tulane University and the European University Institute. He has just been awarded the prestigious Humboldt Fellowship for Experienced Researchers for 2020-2021.

Wednesday 5th February 2020 - Translating Jorge Consiglio by Charco Press

This translation workshop will focus on the translation of Jorge Consiglio's work by Charco Press - https://charcopress.com/

Eamon McCarthy will lead a discussion in Spanish and English with Jorge Consiglio and Carolina Orloff.

Please contact Eamon.McCarthy@glagsow.ac.uk for further details.