Author Archives: kimberlytheidon

Medellín, con colegas maravillosos.

26 Saturday Nov 2022

Posted by in News from Colombia

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A week of intense and insightful conversations with colleagues in the University of Antioquia in Medellin regarding Sentencia T-622, and the challenges of the Río Atrato as a subject of rights and a victim of the armed conflict. My mind is full of ideas, and my spirit lifted by the careful and committed research my colleagues are conducting. Optimism? Hell yes, in spite of it all. Pessimism would be indulgent.

Una semana de intensas y profundas conversaciones con colegas de la Universidad de Antioquia en Medellín sobre la Sentencia T-622 y los desafíos del Río Atrato como sujeto de derechos y víctima del conflicto armado. Mi mente está llena de ideas y mi espíritu se eleva por la investigación cuidadosa y comprometida que están realizando mis colegas. ¿Optimismo? Sí, a pesar de todo. El pesismo sería una indulgencia. Animo!

A River with Rights, People with but a few?

27 Tuesday Sep 2022

Posted by in Announcements, News from Colombia

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The sludge you see beneath this labyrinth of wooden planks is raw sewage. The river is laced with mercury and “cianuro” — cyanide, chemicals used in illegal mining. Tons of wood is trucked out at night, deforestation adding to the sedimentation that causes the Río Atrato to flood in a cyclical fashion. The last big flood was 2010, and folks in Rio Sucio constructed these air-borne walkways as a crisis management response. Twelve years on, the walkways remain. I embrace the “rights of nature,” but not over the welfare of the disenfranchised Afro-Colombian and Indigenous people who live in seemingly permanent precarity along the riverbank.