Colloquium Series

This presentation focuses on the traditional Brazilian community of Kalunga. It is one of the remaining Quilombo, which are Afro-Brazilian settlements initially established by escaped slaves. I will contextualize the locality from a historical-geographical point of view, in which I consider the physical environment, as well as political, social, economic, and cultural issues.

Maria Lidia Bueno Fernandes has a PhD in Geography from the University of São Paulo - USP. Magister Artium in Ethnology and Social Psychology by Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich, Germany. Graduated in Geography from the University of São Paulo - USP. Professor of the Faculty of Education and the Postgraduate Program in Education - PPG E of the University of Brasília - UnB, in the Line of Research: School, Learning, Educational Processes and Subjectivity. She completed post-doctoral training at the Universidade Federal Fluminense - UFF with the theme: Geography and childhood: culture and territory in dialogue with Cultural Historical Theory. She is the leader of the Research Group, Territories and the Construction of Knowledge - GPS / CNPq; member of the Research and Study Group on Childhood Geography; member of the Interdisciplinary Research Network on the protagonism and human rights of Latin American infants; member of the Rural Studies Network on Families, Infancy and Youth - RER-FIJ and the Latin American Network for Research and Reflection with Children and Youth - REIR.

Settler colonialism as a violent land-orientated, social-spatial system/structure isdeeply committed to projects of spatial dominance that include conceptions of “nation” and “home” as fixed, bounded, and unchanging sites. In addition to this allegiance to spatial rigidity, settler colonialism also has dominant andoppressive attitudes toward both movement and migration, especially that of non-dominant, non-white Others. Critical geographers, especially those invested in complicating hegemonic constructions of space and place through exploring investigations of Black and Indigenous geographies, give us insight into how dominant spatial constructions cannot only be disrupted, but also (re)storied for the purposes of resistance. In this presentation, I will focus on the (re)storying of both migration and movement as a site of resistance, futurity, and self-determination as presented in the centering of Black and Indigenous women’s lived knowledges in North America. Specifically, I will examine how the migration and movement, as well as the obstacles to such migration andmovement, of Black and Indigenous women reveals ruptures ripe for theorizing the indeterminacy and incompleteness of settler colonial projects of spatialclosure.

Esme G. Murdock is Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Associate Director of the Institute for Ethics and Public Affairs at San Diego State University. She works in the areas of environmental philosophy and environmental ethics and social and political philosophy with particular attention to environmental justice, philosophies of race and gender, and settler colonial theory. Her research explores the intersections of social/political relations and environmental health, integrity, and agency. Specifically, her work troubles the purported stability of dominant, largely euro-descendent, and settler-colonial philosophies through centering conceptions of land and relating to land found within African American, Afro-Diasporic, and Indigenous eco-philosophies.

CITY RISING: The Informal Economy examines a growing segment of our economy, which consists of unregulated and unprotected jobs. It exposes this trend as the result of policy choices and practices that have historically kept many jobs out of reach for women, immigrants and people of color who have turned to the informal economy to make a living and support their communities. The film follows workers in California who labor off the books—often in plainsight—and are organizing to find pathways to legalization and protection.

Screening followed by Q&A with film co-producer Pascale Joassart-Marcelli.

The CITY RISING Series, produced by KCET in collaboration with the California Endowment, is a multi-platform initiative that highlights how individuals facing social and environmental injustice fight to change policy and lift up their communities.