The research team meets with project consultants Doña Leila Garro Valverde and Don Jose Carlos Morales Morales.
In June 2021, Dr. Black traveled to Boruca Indigenous Territory, Costa Rica with M.A. student Cassandra Eng and recent M.A. graduate Yanet Fundora (beginning with 5 days of isolation and negative COVID-19 test results, with masking and social distancing).
Their project, funded by National Geographic and conducted in collaboration with El Centro Interamericano Para La Salud Global (CISG—the Interamerican Center for Global Health), was focused on Indigenous knowledge, planetary health, and cultural sustainability.
Dr. Black stayed with the junior researchers for two weeks to launch the project. After that, Eng and Fundora lived in Boruca for six additional weeks, working closely with ten Indigenous youth on a photo-voice project designed to reveal contemporary Indigenous approaches to cultural heritage and environmental sustainability.
The research team met with project consultants Doña Leila Garro Valverde and Don Jose Carlos Morales Morales. Garro is the author of an award-winning ethnographic cookbook about Borucan cuisine with over forty years of experience working as a nurse and researcher in the village. Morales is an Indigenous leader of international renown, who helped craft both the Indigenous Law of Costa Rica and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
The researchers are in the process of analyzing data, writing papers, and preparing an ethnographic photo book to present to youth participants in the summer of 2022.
For more information, see https://sites.gsu.edu/historiasdeboruca/english/ and https://www.instagram.com/historiasdeboruca/.
Graduate students Cassandra Eng and Yanet Fundora on a walk overlooking Boruca Indigenous Territory in Costa Rica.
Eng and Fundora learn to brew coffee the traditional Costa Rican way in the open-air kitchen of host mother Doña Ana.
The research team leads an orientation and training session for ten Indigenous youth participants. Pictured here are Carlos Faerron Guzmán and Carolina Bolaños Palmieri (of the Interamerican Center for Global Health) with Dr. Black in the background.