Marisa Wilson

Latin America and the Caribbean; Afrodescendant and Indigenous food heritage; food and climate justice; co-creative, sensory, ethnographic methods; decolonising food research; agrarian change; alternative food networks; transnational sugar histories; moral economies and moral economy research 

Geography of Social Justice Research Group, Cultural and Historical Geography Research Group, Sustainable Rural and Agricultural Development Research Group (University of the West Indies, Mona, Jamaica, steering group member), Centre for Contemporary Latin American Studies

Marisa Wilson’s work focuses on historical, political and cultural economies of agri-food networks, with a focus on Cuba, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica and trans-Atlantic sugar networks linking the Caribbean and Scotland. She uses ethnographic, historical and co-creative methods to increase understandings of food production and consumption in (post)colonial contexts. Her work on Caribbean food economies illustrates cultural, historical and political economic reasons behind food preferences, agricultural land use and, more recently, the outcomes of nutrition and other interventions aimed at re-localising food. She is currently exploring the use of performance and Caribbean-genres of music (calypso, soca, extempo, reggae, etc.) to co-create people-led understandings and alternatives to corporate food networks.

Research in a nutshell video: 

Research in a nutshell (from 2021)

Caribbean Food for Climate Research Group:

Caribbean Food for Climate Justice website

Living Histories of Sugar project, network and performance:

Living Histories of Sugar website