AWAREFOREST · Redefining socio-environmental struggles: contributions from indigenous women from the Ecuadorian Amazon

Redefining socio-environmental struggles: contributions from indigenous women from the Ecuadorian Amazon

AWAREFOREST'S main challenge is to study the sexual division of work in Ecuadorian Amazon, uncovering histories of struggles of indigenous women towards the advance of oil extractive activities. The objective is to understand if, and in which way gender constructions contribute to develop different perceptions and reactions between indigenous women and men with regard to the social and environmental impacts of extractivism.The original qualitative, bottom-up and interdisciplinary methodological approach of AWAREFOREST has allowed to collect oral histories of indigenous women in the context of their organisation, as well as to establish connexions and solidarities with similar social processes and movements in other parts of the continent and abroad. This last task in particular has been developed through this project in order to achieve one its main purposes: to co-create knowledge with indigenous women and to introduce their stories and experiences into the global Social Sciences theory and practice. For AWAREFOREST, it has been fundamental to disseminate this knowledge about resilience and emancipation processes, especially at this time of rapid socio-environmental changes and increasing pressure on indigenous peoples lives and territories. Moreover, this research studies gender in its multiple dimensions, as a product of the convergence between race, sex and class, and the expression of gendered individual roles in the struggle for access to land, for dignity and autonomy. Through the concrete example of the Movement of Amazon Women Defenders of the Forest, this project identifies how these women are currently mobilizing and redefining meanings about their bodies and territories, based on shared reflections of personal and collective, local and global experiences of struggles for autonomy and self-determination.The co-construction of knowledge with indigenous women from different peoples and organisations has been essential to build intercultural dialogues with society, with governmental and non-governmental institutions. Through scientific publications, oral communications, participation in policy debates and training, this research highlighted some elements of the political participation of indigenous women contributing to enhance existing interdisciplinary analytical frameworks on the understanding of current configurations of gender and socio-environmental issues in the context of the Amazon. Despite the limits in analysing the numerous difficulties that Indigenous women have to face in the context of extractivism, this research allowed to emphasise the multiple dimensions of their struggles, of the construction of an individual and collective political subjectivity in line with their idea of building the Good Living that they imagine for themselves and their communities.

Data: CORDIS, © European Union