Travelling Rivers Initiative in Colombia and Ecuador

From April to June this year, fisher and peasant communities, social movements and activists-artists María Benítez and Vanessa Roa, and researchers from the Riverhood and River Commons projects, engaged in local counter-mapping workshops in four rivers: the Magdalena (case study of PhD researcher Juliana Sandoval), La Miel (Ana Maria Arbelaez), Bogotá (Laura Giraldo), Sumapaz (Sebastían Reyes) and the Guargalla y Alao rivers (Masters researchers Sebastián Silva, Susana Zavala, Meike Klarenbeek). The aim of these collective counter geographies and the Travelling Rivers initiative (coord. Bibiana Duarte, Rutgerd Boelens) was to illustrate and mobilize the knowledges, imaginaries and conflicts around these rivers that are generally hidden, but that are perceived and experienced every day by the communities that inhabit and depend on the mentioned rivers. Through bringing the mapping workshops and the maps themselves from one context to the other, the different experiences and struggles were woven together; connecting stories, concerns, debates and movements. Making rivers travel and promoting transnational solidarity.

To watch the teaser of these actions, click here.