Nora Sylvander
Courses | Biography | Research | Publications
Courses
Anth 105/Geog 105 Introduction to Environment and Society
Anth 360/Geog 360 Political Ecology
Inst 200 Thinking Globally
Inst 207 Latin American Studies
Inst 314 Topics in Latin American Studies
Biography
I joined the faculty at the University of Mississippi in Fall 2022 as Croft Assistant Professor of Anthropology and International Studies. I received my B.Sc. and M.Sc. in Forest Ecology from the University of Helsinki, after which I worked with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) in Managua, Nicaragua. I received my Ph.D. in Human Geography from the Ohio State University in 2019, after which I worked as a Fellow in Environment at the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Research
I am a human geographer and political ecologist. My research focuses on the politics of environmental conservation and territorial and resource conflicts in Latin America. My long-term research project in Nicaragua problematizes the dominant framing of territorial conflicts between indigenous communities and non-indigenous migrants as “inter-ethnic” and “local.” I suggest that this narrative obscures the long histories of appropriation and colonization of indigenous territories, shaped by deeply rooted political and economic drivers and interests. Another part of my research looks at and challenges exclusionary environmental conservation approaches. In particular, I analyze how the establishment of protected areas territorializes space and leads to direct and indirect dispossession of indigenous and local communities. I am also interested in the production of environmental identities and the ways in which these constructions shape access to land and resources.
