Many MMB members at the University of Bristol are scholars researching migration and mobility related issues in Latin America.
As a Specialist Research Institute (2018-2025) MMB profiled this very active group and published regular blogposts by its members – who work across many different disciplines – and their collaborators in the region. Although the MMB Latin America website is no longer active, we continue to support this area of research and facilitate connections with Latin American scholars.
Our archive of more than 40 blogposts from this group covers a wide range of subject areas including:
- political violence and post-conflict reconstruction in communities experiencing local, national and cross-border displacement;
- labour and mobility, and the historical legacy of slavery in contemporary work relations;
- representations of territorial boundaries and the tensions between political and ecological rights;
- neoliberal market expansion, wildcat economics and the movement of people and capital to and from the global margins;
- the circulation of ideas and translational exchanges across borders within Latin America and beyond.
Visit the MMB Latin America blog page to view our full archive.
Recent posts on Latin American from the MMB Blog
We have developed a blog series with contributions from scholars and activists in the region as well from those at Bristol. We welcome posts in Spanish, Portuguese or English.
- Bolsonaro’s paradox: a far-right leader’s pro-immigration strategy?A special series from the Migration Research Group of the School of Sociology, Politics and International Studies at the University of Bristol. By Maeli Farias. Immigration is a highly politicised and election-defining issue. Across the Global North, conservative, liberal, left-leaning and far-right leaders… Read more: Bolsonaro’s paradox: a far-right leader’s pro-immigration strategy?
- ‘Slaves’, migrants and museums: the struggle for places of African memory in BrazilA special series from the Migration Research Group of the School of Sociology, Politics and International Studies at the University of Bristol. By Julio D’Angelo Davies. Brazil is built on slavery. It was the Americas’ largest importer of enslaved Africans,… Read more: ‘Slaves’, migrants and museums: the struggle for places of African memory in Brazil
- Moving as being: introducing the SPAIS Migration Group blog seriesA special series from the Migration Research Group of the School of Sociology, Politics and International Studies at the University of Bristol. By Samuel Okyere. Welcome to the MMB special series by the SPAIS Migration Group, a collective of researchers… Read more: Moving as being: introducing the SPAIS Migration Group blog series
Current research projects in Latin America by MMB members
Infrastructures of Incursions: Deregulated Extraction in Rainforest Frontiers (INFRACURSIONS)
Principal Investigator: Amy Penfield, Associate Professor in Social Anthropology.
This project maps out the emergence and endurance of clandestine economic activities that invade the global margins and invariably result in environmental degradation. Over the past 50 years, between 17 and 20 percent of the Amazon rainforest has been destroyed, with some regions fast approaching the tipping point for dieback (Silva Junior et al 2020). Yet, environmental degradation of forests is not restricted to the clearcutting of trees; it is a multi-scalar process that builds over time. It starts with small areas of habitat fragmentation in which large and contiguous habitats get divided into smaller, isolated patches due to a multiplication in low-intensive enterprises such as selective logging, small ranches, and surface fires (Skole et al 1993). The resulting edge effects – ecological changes associated with forest fragments – penetrate deep into Amazon forests (Laurance et al. 2002; Lovejoy et al. 1986). Read more here.
PEATSENSE: Diverse Knowledges and Sensing Practices in Peatlands for Inclusive Climate Futures
Principal Investigator: Naomi Millner, Professor of Environment and Culture, School of Geographical Sciences
The project investigates the transformation of peatlands in Latin America and Europe as new global institutions and actors arrive as part of transnational climate mitigation action. PEATSENSE aims to document the implications of these transformations as well as identifying pathways towards just and inclusive governance. Read more here.