Mathematisch-Naturwissenschaftliche Fakultät - Geographisches Institut

THESys Public Lecture

Becoming River: intersecting decolonial, feminist and cosmopolitical hydrosocial relations 

Water is at the center of the struggle for life. Modern civilization's dependence on capitalist formations has led to the destruction of ecosystems and water-bodies as sacred entities. Rivers and mudflats, as complex hybrid networks, reveal ways of living in the midst of a planetary crisis and can offer creative socio-ecological care practices. Drawing from extensive fieldwork in Latin America and the Caribbean, Denisse Roca-Servat, proposes to think with water as a point of departure for envisioning alternatives to the extractive-capitalist model. Becoming river, therefore, implies taking into account geo-hydro-social diversity, its historical foundations, and ultimately, committing to build alternative hydrosocial relations, intersecting decolonial, feminist, and cosmopolitical justice approaches.

Dr. Denisse Roca-Servat
Associate Professor, Institute of Regional Studies, Universidad de Antioquia, Colombia

Date: Friday October 10th, 2025, 10:00 – 12:00

Location:
Rudower Chaussee 12B
12489 Berlin
room 3.25

Zoom link upon request: 
laura.betancur.alarcon@hu-berlin.de

Short Bio 

Professor Denisse Roca-Servat is a distinguished scholar in environmental justice and political ecology, holding a PhD in Justice Studies from the University of Arizona, USA. Currently serving as a professor at the Institute of Regional Studies (INER) at the University of Antioquia in Colombia, she is a prominent researcher in political ecology, water justice, critical studies of law, social and labor movements. Her 
research centers on the struggle for commons and alternatives to development in the face of extractivism, particularly through the lens of Latin American environmental thinking. She is the founder of the "Group for the Study of Political Ecology and Water Justice" (Grupo de estudio de Ecología política y justicia hídrica - GEEPJH), where she collaborates in trans and interdisciplinary research at the intersection of environmental politics and social justice. 

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