Current PhD students

Cristian Erazo is a PhD student in Social Anthropology at the University of St Andrews. He holds a BA in Anthropology and an MRes in Social and Political Studies from Universidad Icesi (Colombia). His doctoral research focuses on ethnographically exploring how indigenous and non-indigenous actors perform formal and informal roles of brokerage in the Putumayo region of Colombia’s Amazon, skilfully navigating between and working across local communities, state institutions, and NGOs involved in a scenario of growing and varied state and non-state social interventions.

Lucrezia Milillo’s doctoral research aims to further our understanding of Andean khipus – colorful knotted cords for record keeping. Combining ethnographic fieldwork to the study of museum specimens through the practice theory framework, her research will provide new insights on the significance of colour and materials used in the production of Andean khipus. Lucrezia holds a B.A. in Cultural Anthropology and an M.A. in History and Anthropology at the University of Bologna (cum laude). Here, she studied collection, provenance and morphology of Andean khipus in Italian collections. Her email address is [email protected]

Grzegorz Palka

My name is Greg. I am a doctorate student at the University of St Andrews. My project focuses on conceptions of knowledge, and knowledge producing practices among the Kaxinawá of the Purus river region in Acre, Brazil. More specifically, I am interested in how knowledge is created, mediated and shared, and how it relates to other social phenomena such as the body and the environment. My general interests include human relationships with non-humans and the environment, perspectivism, animism, and different modes of knowledge production. I draw from intellectual movements such as phenomenology, post-structuralism, and the ontological turn, however, I do not have a major influence.’