Contact
Karen Hudlet Vázquez is a PhD candidate in human geography at Clark University, US. Her research interests include feminist political ecology, extractives, agribusiness, justice, human rights, and legal geographies. At the Rachel Carson Center, she will be working on her dissertation project, “Contested Underground Water Territories: Law, Knowledges, and Social Movements against Agribusiness in Yucatan, Mexico.” This project attempts to analyze underground water conflicts by understanding the different hydrosocial territories that are being coproduced by space, law, and science in these aquifers. The research centers on the different imaginaries of water crafted by stakeholders—companies, rural communities, scientists, authorities, and lawyers—in relation to justice, development, and risk. Her case study is on agribusiness and meat production.
Previously, Karen worked on environmental justice with different Mexican and international human rights NGOs with a focus on the defense and promotion of economic, social, cultural, and environmental rights. Outside the academy, Karen enjoys scuba diving and swimming.
RCC Research Project: Contested Underground Water Territories: Law, Knowledges, and Social Movements against Agribusiness in Yucatan, Mexico
Selected Publications:
- “A Human Rights Approach for Resisting CAFOs: The Mayan Community of Homun against a 49,000-Pig Operation in Yucatan, Mexico.” Issue Lab, Candid (2022). https://doi.org/10.15868/socialsector.40708.
- with Melissa Bollman, Jessica Craigg, and James McCarthy. “Utopias and Dystopias of Renewable Energy Imaginaries.” In Energy Democracies for Sustainable Futures, edited by Majia Nadesan, Martin Pasqualetti, and Jennifer Keahey. London: Elsevier, 2022.
- “Agroextractivismo, cambio climático y resistencia del pueblo maya en la Península de” [Agroextractivism, Climate Change and the
Resistance of the Mayan People in the Yucatan Peninsula]. Revista Común (November 2022). https://revistacomun.com/blog/agroextractivismo-cambio-climatico-y-resistencia-del-pueblo-maya-en-la-peninsula-de-yucatan/.