Maybe b/c I don't do Caribbean environmental anthropology but I see that a lot of the work done in that area is based on "natural disasters": hurricanes, volcanic activity etc. But very rarely does it look at "urban environmentalism" & how "postcoloniality & tourism effed us." 1/

This is changing in respects to the American colonial hold on Puerto Rico but there is only one book that I have seen that covers this: Rivke Jaffe's "Concrete Jungles." Maybe I'm biased b/c she focuses on Curaçao (& Jamaica) but it was the first time that I took a hard look 2/

at how our environmental concerns in the Caribbean have a deep rooted history beyond climate change. How setting up oil refineries changed migration patterns of people & created health problem. How tourism literally created severe environmental damage in our communities 3/

(not just in our natural areas). Also, how efforts & resources are largely controlled by European & American (mostly white) outsiders & elites. So money gets diverted from a proper sanitation department to saving the turtles.

Keisha Wiel

@BrilhanteAnthro

PhD Candidate. Linguistic Anthropologist. Papiamentu/o. Caribbeanist. Capoeirista. I listen to teens talk @ school. 🇦🇼 🇨🇼 she/her/hers/e/dje

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