I am Assistant Professor in the Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Visiting Fellow of the International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS) in Leiden, and Adjunct Researcher in Chile's Millenium Nucleus on the Impacts of China in Latin America (ICLAC). I practice the disciplines of economic anthropology and global history, and I am currently developing a research agenda exploring the links between finance and transition minerals in the production of a ‘green economy’ between China and South America.
The motivation behind my current concerns on sustainable transitions emerged from my work as a postdoctoral researcher in the ERC Worlds of Lithium. Working closely with the PI, Dr Cristóbal Bonelli, I led the Work Package China, exploring the ongoing socioeconomic and sociotechnical transformations around the production and consumption of ion-lithium battery-powered electromobility.
I did my PhD at the International Max Planck Research School of the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology in Germany, and received my doctoral degree (magna cum laude) from the Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg. My dissertation explored the dynamics of solidarity and exclusion between migrant workers in Southern China, emphasising the role of ethnicity, gender, and topographic identities as relevant forms or social differentiation and collaboration.
Besides my current work on green economy transitions, my research has explored diverse aspects of electromobility, migrant labour in China, and Sino-Latin American relations, and I have lectured and researched in several South American, Chinese and European institutions.
I am also a photo-documentalist, with part of my work published by the National Geographic, and host a Spanish-language podcast about the contemporary transformations in East Asia called ‘Todo Bajo el Cielo’.
