Research & Supervisory Interests

Capacity-building for empowerment; community-based health and education; participatory methodologies.

My main research interest has been to elicit diverse epistemologies, which I have applied in the fields of adult capacity-building and formal education in indigenous communities in northern Chile and in community-based health activities in Malawi, Central Africa.

My research and action began in 1989 in the northern highlands of Chile, with Aymara communities.  Between 1995 and 2000 I resided in Arica, Chile and worked with the Aymara communities in the border district of General Lagos, focusing primarily on developing a culturally appropriate education program for the young.  I was also a contributing member in the Pachakuti program at the University of Tarapaca, that sought to legitimate urban spaces for the Aymara.  My work extended into a three-year consortium to build linkages between non-government organizations, universities and indigenous communities in the southern Andean region (Peru, Bolivia, Chile and Argentina), to explore effective ways to provide community access to resources, enabling the reproduction of local knowledges.

Between 2002-2006 I was Research Manager for an HIV and AIDS project directed by Dr. D. Willms in Malawi, where we sought to strengthen the role of faith-based community organizations in facing the complex challenges of the pandemic.  In this case my role was to enable alliances and networks that would open spaces for discussion and sharing of information for community empowerment.