This past July, Juan Carlos Galeano invited me to join him and other members of the HfE Latin American Observatory (LAO) to learn more about their current research and projects.  Launched in 2016, the LAO is headquartered at the Universidad de Amazonia in Colombia, the country where Galeano, the Convener of the Observatory, was born. Because of its location in a region that has only recently emerged from thirty years of civil war, the Observatory has set as its focus a series of scientific, and academic exchanges with institutions and among academics throughout Latin America that are focusing on the themes of water justice and peace. The President of Universidad de Amazonia, Gerardo Antonio Castrillón Artunduaga, and professor Jorge Reinel Pulecio Yate, who has long been recognized as a key advocate and negotiator for peace in Colombia, have both signed on as key researchers with the observatory. They are working with Galeano to foster the idea that peace is key to sustainable development if long-term social justice and ecological flourishing is the goal.

Since launch, Galeano has been recruiting new members to the LAO including Rafael Chanchari Pizuri, a philosopher and Shawi Pueblo elder who teaches at FORMABIAP (Training Program for Bilingual Teachers of the Peruvian Amazon) near Iquitos, Peru.  FORMABIAP is the institutional base of the LAO in Peru and was established in 1988 to educate indigenous students training as bilingual teachers who are keeping their indigenous languages alive. Galeano met Chanchari during his years teaching summer Spanish courses for Florida State. These were the same years he was filming The Trees have a Mother (2006), a documentary that illustrates how people in the Amazon basin employ traditional indigenous stories to navigate the everyday ethics of living with increasingly disturbed ecological systems, was filmed here.

Rafael Chanchari Pizuri. Image by Juan Carlos Galeano.

At FORMABIAP, Chanchari teaches Shawi language and culture courses that delve into the ways that Shawi stories offer insight into complex Amazonian philosophies that speak of interactions between humans, animals, fish, plants, and spirits.  These stories are evocative of complex indigenous scientific literacies regarding significant biospheric, riverine or forest ecosystems. Over the years, Galeano learned from Chanchari about how the Shawi and other indigenous peoples, including the Kokama, employ these stories to help them face today’s environmental challenges. Galeano writes about these insights in a collection of stories, with explanatory notes, that he published in 2009 titled Folktales of the Amazon.

In his second documentary, El Río (The River), which became the first project undertaken by the LAO, Galeano makes Chanchari central to the narration about how Amazonian story cycles and spiritual beliefs provide frameworks through which contemporary people interpret globalization, climate change, and loss.

I accompanied Galeano in July as he returned to FORMABIAP and the Kokama indigenous village, Padre Cocha, on the Nanay River, to screen El Río.  At the Padre Cocha community centre, many of the film’s Shawi and Kokama storytellers were in the audience. A heavy rain fell during the screening, making the audio hard to hear sometimes, but no one seemed to mind.  Applause drowned out the sound of the rain at the conclusion of the film and it was clear that the audience was appreciative as they recognised their family, friends and acquaintances telling their own stories about life in the Amazon basin in a beautiful, high-quality film.

Galeano has also recruited Herman Vladimir Ruíz Abecasis, a biologist and Director of Reserva Nacional De Alpahuayo Mishana near Iquitos, to join the LAO.  Abecasis took us on a tour of the Reserve and showed us a place called “Chullachaki’s chakra (see featured image above).”  Chullachaki is the Quechua name for an androgynous spirit being said to take care of his/her “chakra” or “forest garden.” H/she is said to punish those who act unwisely in the forest.

Galeano and Abecasis are exploring how stories of Chullachaki and other forest spirits might be employed in programs of environmental education and natural resource management to teach more people, and especially young people, about the relationships between declining forest health and the encroachment of roads and landfills.

Herman Vladimir Ruíz Abecasis and Joni Adamson examining the fragile soil of the Reserva Nacional De Alpahuayo Mishana. Image by Juan Carlos Galeano.

Chullachaki must have been with us as we drove with Abecasis to see the landfill and new roads that are polluting the Reserve’s waters, disturbing animals, and causing erosion. We slowed when we saw some people by the side of the road bagging a young female anaconda. Abecasis told us that poverty is so great in the region that they were likely planning to sell the snake, displaced by the new road, to the local poacher for 50 Peruvian soles, about 15 USD, which is considered a fortune in Iquitos. Stopping to talk to the people, Abecasis convinced them to let us take the snake back to the reserve where we released it. This was a tiny victory for the Reserve and the LAO, and perhaps for Chullachaki, whose spirit still presides over the chakra.

The Anaconda, returning to the waters of the Reserva Nacional De Alpahuayo Mishana. Image by Joni Adamson.


Joni Adamson is a Convener of the North American Observatory and Lead Developer for the Humanities for the Environment international website.  She is Professor of English and Environmental Humanities in the Department of English and Director of the Environmental Humanities Initiative at Arizona State University. She was 2012 President of the Association for the Study Literature and Environment (ASLE).

Born in the Peruvian Amazon, Rafael Chanchari Pizuri is a philosopher and Amazonian from the Shawi ethnic group, whose spiritual ecological discourse, rooted in indigenous cosmovisions of the indigenous cultures of the Peruvian Amazon, foregrounds the current environmental challenges and complex symbolic narratives of indigenous Amazonians. He is also a shaman and teacher, who has contributed significantly to the education of indigenous bilingual teachers of many ethnic groups in the Zungarococha Formabiap school in Iquitos Peru.

Herman Vladimir Ruíz Abecasis is a Peruvian biologist, born in Loreto, with extensive experience in the evaluation of biological diversity, and practice in the management of natural protected areas by the government in the Peruvian Amazon. As an environmental specialist, Abecasis has worked in the development of scientific reports, and environmental impact assessments in connection to oil drilling in the Amazon basin. He has done extensive work with communities in the interior of the Pacaya Samiria National Reserve, implementing programs of environmental education and natural resource management, for the sustainable use of flora and fauna in Peruvian national reserves. As a biologist he has also worked as an Environmental Specialist of the Pacaya Samiria National Reserve and, and for Pronaturaleza, he has worked as coordinator of the project “Strengthening of Tourism Management and Management of Natural Resources in the Pacaya Samiria National Reserve”. In regards to the assessment of water systems of Amazonia, Abecasis wrote the book article “Amazonia: Looking for the Earthly Eden and Finding the Planet’s Next Landfill” (Ecological Crisis and Cultural Representation in Latin America, Lexington books, 2016) along with the Colombian biologist Diego Mejía and Juan Carlos Galeano. Through his career in Perú, Abecasis has held positions in public and private institutions, gaining experience not only in natural resources, but also in the management of human resources as he has served as head of the National Reserve of Pacaya Samiria National Reserve in the Amazon basin. He is currently director of the Alpahuallo Mishana Reserve in the Peruvian Amazon.

http://www.pronaturaleza.org

http://www.sernanp.gob.pe

Gisela Heffes is Professor of Latin American Literature and Culture at Rice University and Research Professor at Johns Hopkins University as well as a writer, ecocritic, and public intellectual with a particular focus on literature, media, and the environment in Latin America. Her most recent publications are the co-edited volumes The Latin American Ecocultural Reader (2020), Pushing Past the Human in Latin American Cinema (2021), Un gabinete del futuro (2022) and Turbar la quietud (2023); the authored monograph Visualizing Loss in Latin America: Biopolitics, Waste, and the Urban Environment (2023); the novels Ischia (trad. from Spanish, 2023) and Cocodrilos en la noche (2020; 2023), the bilingual poem collection El cero móvil de su boca / The Mobile Zero of Its Mouth (2020) and the hybrid book Aquí no hubo ni una estrella (2023). With George Handley, Heffes served as co-president of ASLE, the Association for the Study of Literature and the Environment (2022-2024).

Gerardo Antonio Castrillón, President of Universidad de la Amazonia, in Florencia- Caquetá, Colombia, is a political and academic leader of the Colombian Amazon region and a public accountant. Since the beginning of his administration in 2017 Castrillón has helped the University to become a strong contributor to the reinforcement of peace and the development of a sustainable human development model for the national and continental Amazon. As a leader of the Universidad de la Amazonia, Castrillón plays a big role in the consolidation of the Peace Agreements signed between the FARC (Arm Revolutionary Forces of Colombia) and the Colombian State. His role as president of the university is vital in opening spaces for social research and applied sciences that aim to generate alternatives of sustained use of the Amazonian ecosystems and defending the rights of indigenous peoples. President Castrillón’s leadership has contributed to the development of programs of academic excellence, and advocacy for harmony with the environment in compliance with the environmental commitments entered into by Colombia at the Paris Summit (2015), specifically the commitment for reduction to zero of the logging of tropical rainforest in the Colombian Amazon. The 22 academic programs of the University have defined concrete goals of pedagogical transformation towards the culture of peace and promotion of sustainable human development. Castrillón is a public accountant, specialist in tax management and magister administration. During his years of administration in the Colombian Amazon, he has served as a Governor of the State of Caquetá (2009), State Comptroller (1998-2000), Treasury Secretary of the State of Caquetá (2008-2009) and director of The Chamber of Commerce of Florence-Caquetá (2004-2006). As an academic, in addition to being the President of the Universidad de la Amazonia, he has been Dean of the Faculty of Accounting Sciences, member of the Superior Council of the Universidad de la Amazonia and a professor of the same from 1983 to the present.

Jorge Reinel Pulecio Yate is a Colombian economist, peace advocate and writer born in the Colombian Amazon. Obtaining his degree in economics from Universidad Nacional de Colombia, and degrees from University of Campinas – Brazil and University of Andalucía –Spain, Pulecio worked as professor of economy at Universidad Nacional de Colombia for over two decades, publishing many articles concerning international economy. Among many political and administrative positions he served as an economy analyst for the The United States-Colombia Trade Promotion Agreement (CTPA) until 2007, and as a secretary for the office of development for the mayor of Bogotá in 2012. Growing up in the rural areas of the Caquetá river region of Amazonia, in the early years of his political career he participated in the peasant and union movements during the 70’s and 80’s. As a Secretary of Education of the state of Caquetá during 1982-1983, Pulecio advocated for indigenous rights to education and the training of bilingual indigenous teachers for schools of Huitoto and Coreguaje indigenous nations. During the years 1978-1984 he created the first ecology group at the Universidad Surcolombiana, an environmental initiative that implemented reforestation in the banks of the Dedo and Yuca rivers neart Florencia-Caquetá. The publication of his collection of short stories Amor y guerra en el Amazonas (Love and War in the Amazon) in 2015, brought national attention to Pulecio as a talented writer. His book gives powerful testimonial accounts of kidnappings, massacres, assassinations and suffering experienced by Amazonians during the “dirty war”, a conflict that involved peasants, students, members of unions, drug dealers, paramilitary groups and the military forces during the 70’s and 80’s in the Caquetá area. In 1998 he was a candidate for the presidential election of Colombia representing the independent group Amazonia Viva Es Colombia Viva. Recently his work surrounds advocating for human rights in the Colombian Amazon during the process of peace and agreement between the Colombian government and the FARC. Pulecio is currently serving as director of the Peace Office at the Universidad de la Amazonia en Florencia Caquetá where he is implementing programs in education for peace and environmental justice in the Colombian Amazon.

Leonardo E. Figueroa Helland (PhD) is an Associate Professor of Environmental Policy and Sustainability Management at The New School. He leads the Indigeneity, Decolonization and Just Sustainabilities section of the Tishman Environment and Design Center. He is a mixed-blood scholar (Indigenous Mesoamerican and Euro-America) whose work underlines how Indigenous resurgence, decolonization and the revitalization of biocultural diversity, alongside social, environmental and climate justice movements, are vital to overcome planetary crises. Building and extending beyond his doctoral work on Indigenous Philosophy and World Politics, his latest writings appear in the Journal of World Systems Research, the journal Perspectives on Global Development and Technology, the volume on Social Movements and World-System Transformation, and the volumes on Anarchist Political Ecology and on Contesting Extinctions: Decolonial and Regenerative Futures. He is currently working on a manuscript titled Indigenous Resurgence beyond “Anthropocene” Collapse: From Planetary Crises to Decolonization.

Vera Coleman is a Continuing Lecturer in Spanish at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota. Her research explores the convergences of gender, class, ethnicity, and the environment in Latin American cultural production from interdisciplinary perspectives drawing on multispecies ethnography, material ecocriticism, and queer ecology. She has received awards for her scholarly work from the Asociación Internacional de Literatura y Cultura Femenina Hispánica (AILCFH), Feministas Unidas, and the Association for the Study of Literature and Environment (ASLE). Her articles have appeared in the journals Gestos, Confluencia, Letras femeninas, and Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment. She is currently working on a book project titled “Beyond the Anthropocene: Multispecies Encounters in Contemporary Latin American Literature, Art, and Film,” which examines multispecies relationships in twenty-first century Latin American cultural expression while uncovering indigenous and other-than-dominant epistemologies about human-nonhuman entanglements. She is co-founder and Production Manager of the digital humanities project Latam-Films, a bilingual website with critical resources on Latin American women filmmakers.

Dr. Abigail Pérez Aguilera researches and writes about contemporary Indigenous movements, literature written by women of colour and its connections to environmental social movements, forced displacement, gender violence, and global politics. Her most recent work appears in Ecocriticism and Indigenous Studies: Conversations from Earth to Cosmos (ed. Joni Adamson and Salma Monani; Routledge, 2017). She is currently teaching at Westminster College in Salt Lake City, Utah.

The River (El Río) is a documentary film by Juan Carlos Galeano. The film is a journey, both mythological and affectionate. Spectacular images bring the audience’s attention to ecological wisdom about the spiritual belief systems of Amazonians.

Latin American and North American artists who collaborated on this film are Leoncio Ramírez Vásquez and Xinguito Producción Audiovisual, Amy Elizabeth Sanderson, Carlos Odría, and Rember Yahuarcani. A 3 minute trailer of the content of this film can be seen at: https://vimeo.com/197846970.

The River (El Río) is scheduled to be premiered on Friday, June 23rd at the Twelfth Biennial Conference of the Association for the Study of Literature and Environment (ASLE) June 20 – 24, 2017 at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan.

Juan Carlos Galeano is one of the Conveners of the South American Observatory of the Humanities for the Environment network.  He is a poet, essayist and filmmaker born in the Amazon region of Colombia. He has published several books of poetry, and has translated  the works of North American poets into Spanish. Over a decade of fieldwork on symbolic narratives of riverine and forest people in the Amazon basin resulted in his production of a comprehensive collection of storytelling  (Folktales of the Amazon, ABC-CLIO, 2008. Cuentos amazónicos 2016) the documentary film (The Trees Have a Mother, Films for the Humanities and Sciences, 2008) His poetry inspired by Amazonian cosmologies and the modern world (Amazonia 2003, 2012, Historias del viento  2013, and Yakumama and other Mythical Beings, 2014), has been anthologized and published in international journals such Casa de las Américas (Cuba), The Atlantic Monthly and Ploughshares (U.S.).  He lives in Tallahassee, Florida, where he teaches Latin American poetry and Amazonian Cultures at Florida State University. He is the director of the FSU Service/Learning Program: Journey into Amazonia in the Peruvian Amazon rainforest.

Maria Cruz-Torres is a socio-cultural anthropologist at Arizona State University. She conducts research on the topic of gender, globalization, and the environment in Mexico, and is also involved in a National Science Foundation interdisciplinary, transnational collaborative research project focusing on the links between human and biophysical processes in coastal marine ecosystems in Baja California, Mexico.

Joni Adamson is President’s Professor of Environmental Humanities at Arizona State University. She is the Secretary General of the Humanities for the Environment Network and Director of the North American Observatory. She is the author and/or co-editor of American Indian Literature, Environmental Justice and Ecocriticism (University of Arizona Press, 2001), The Environmental Justice Reader: (University of Arizona Press, 2002),m American Studies, Ecocriticism, and Ecology (Routledge, 2013), Keywords for Environmental Studies (New York University Press, 2016), Ecocriticism and Indigenous Studies—Conversations from Earth to Cosmos (Routledge 2017) and Humanities for the Environment (Routledge 2017). She lectures internationally and has published over 80 articles, chapters, blogs and reviews. Her work has been supported by many awards and grants, including most recently, the 2019 Benjamin N. Duke Fellowship at the National Humanities Center in North Carolina. In 2012, she served as President of the world’s largest environmental humanities organization, The Association for the Study of Literature and Environment (ASLE).