I am Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of International Relations at Lehigh University, where I teach courses on international organization, Latin American politics, and the United Nations. During 2021-2022, I taught in Lehigh’s Department of Political Science.

I study the political struggles over the environment and economic development that emerge from conflicts between communities and companies undertaking mining activities. Broadly, I focus on how indigenous and agricultural communities pursue resource management through social mobilization, preservation of local knowledge, and negotiation with state and market forces. I am investigating these dynamics in the Amazon-Andes region, including varied geographic and political terrain in Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru.

I continue to look at ordinary people's participation in politics and violence during and after civil wars, including their activities in insurgent groups, political parties, and nonviolent movements. As part of this focus, I research processes of searching for human remains of disappeared persons and victims of armed conflict violence, primarily in Peru and Colombia. I incorporate the social and scientific processes of counting, locating, naming, and memorializing the dead following wars and atrocities into studying how these efforts mediate political relations between citizens and the state.

I completed my Ph.D. in political science (comparative politics and international relations) at Georgetown University in 2017. While I am in the field, I collaborate with the Peruvian Forensic Anthropology Team (EPAF).

Until 2021, I was a Researcher and Lecturer in the Department of Political Science at the Universidad de los Andes in Bogotá, Colombia. There I taught courses on research methods, international relations, and social movements. I served as the inaugural Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Escuela de Gobierno Alberto Lleras Camargo at Los Andes (2017-2018).

During 2014-2016, as a pre/postdoctoral researcher at the Josef Korbel School of International Studies, I formed part of a research team committed to studying nonviolent action in violent settings. I enjoy conducting research with colleagues from different disciplines and believe in our efforts to ask and answer questions about political and social realities with humanity and humility.

Curriculum Vitae  →