[creative responses to climate change and sustainability]
As a member of Ceres 21, an interdisciplinary international workgroup on sustainability and climate change organized by Oslo University (www.ceres21.org), I am developing a new research focus on creative responses to sustainability. My particular interest lies in the ways in which people respond to climate change and take action as part of the global civil society to live with climate change and implement just solutions to mitigate it.
[protected areas and ecotourism]
This is an ongoing project I began in 2005. It focuses on the dynamic interactions between indigenous peoples and state-supported conservation and development projects with a focus on human-environment interactions, environmentalism, and conservation discourses and practices. Specifically, I look at conflict and cooperation in a number of natural protected areas, biosphere reserves or buffer zones in the Huasteca.
:: the Huasteca:: click map to enlarge
These sites are located in the vicinity of, or directly on indigenous lands and are managed or co-managed by the local inhabitants. Some of these areas are prime ecotourism and adventure tourism spots. In many cases, the latter seem to create conflict in the local hamlets and may even lead to the demise of traditional agricultural and ritual practices in favor of eco- and culture tourism. Over the next few years I plan to continue to examine the relationships between past and present land uses, meanings of the environment, changing ecological perception in the context of conservation and tourism projects.
 :: micos waterfall ::
© 2002 kristina tiedje |
:: tamul waterfalls ::
© 2002 kristina tiedje |
[politics of religion, nature, and culture]
From 1999 to 2004, I examined links between territory and identity in an indigenous rights movement to protect sacred sites at a time when indigenous activists have claimed rights to full citizenship. I was particularly interested in the ways in which indigenous leaders adopted and transformed the nationalist ideology of liberal multiculturalism and legal pluralism to advance some kind of Spivakian strategic essentialism. To understand the strategic utilization of indigenous religions and cosmology in their land claims, I collected specific ethnographic case material focusing on Nahua wisdom stories, beliefs, and ritual. I also analyzed regional practices that helped to mobilize indigenous peoples across ethnic and linguistic boundaries to claim sacred sites and other spaces in the landscape that have historically been inaccessible for indigenous public ceremonies.
© 2002 kristina tiedje
[gender and development]
From 1996 to 1999, I studied the characteristics and outcomes of gendered community participation and poverty alleviation projects as tools for empowerment in terms of challenging cultural stereotypes and gendered inequalities. I examined a grassroots movement in the Huasteca region that engaged in a gendered model of participatory development. Testimonials with rural and indigenous women highlighted the social complexity of their realities and emphasized the situational nature of ethnic identity as a political and strategic choice influenced by political agendas.
 :: la Flor del Café ::
© 2003 kristina tiedje |
 :: roasting coffee ::
© 1997 kristina tiedje |
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[film and video projects]
Based on my long-term fieldwork in Mexico, I have worked on several film and video projects.
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Ofrendas a Dhipaak: misa de agradecimiento para el maíz
© 2002 kristina tiedje |
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Ilhuicatl pa Xantolo: la musica de los muertos en una comunidad nahua in Xilitla
© 2002 kristina tiedje |
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Misa de agradecimiento para el maíz, Xilitla
© 2002 kristina tiedje |
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La danza de varitas
© 2002 kristina tiedje |
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Nukub Tzon: danza de fertilidad teenek
© 2002 kristina tiedje |
and 