Willamette University

Politics

Megan Ybarra

Megan Ybarra

Professor Ybarra joined Willamette University in 2010, after completing her PhD in Environmental Science, Policy and Management with the University of California, Berkeley. Her current research project, "Living on Scorched Earth," is on the politics of conservation and development in post-war Guatemala. More broadly, she is interested in questions of identity, territory, and nation, particularly as they relate to race and belonging in Latin America. She teaches courses on Latin American politics, environmental justice, political ecology and the politics of international development.

Education

  • PhD in Environmental Science, Policy and Management; University of California, Berkeley
  • BA in Latin American Studies; New York University

Courses

  • Poli218 -- Politics in the Developing World (MOI: US)
  • Poli362 -- Latin American Politics
  • Poli376 -- Latin American Revolutions
  • Poli386 -- Political Ecology (MOI: ARV)
  • Poli480 -- Senior Thesis (WC)

Recent Presentations & Publications

Ybarra, M. (2012) Taming the Jungle, Saving the Maya Forest: Sedimented Counterinsurgency Practices in Contemporary Guatemalan Conservation. Journal of Peasant Studies 39(2): 479-502. Special Issue: Green grabbing: a new appropriation of nature? guest edited by James Fairhead, Melissa Leach and Ian Scoones.

Ybarra, M., Obando Samos, O., Grandia, L., and N.B. Schwartz. (2012) Tierra, Migración y Vida en Petén, 1999-2009. Guatemala City: CONGCOOP-IDEAR. PDF

Ybarra, M. (2012) Voting for Mano Dura? Remilitarization and Political Activism in Post-War Guatemala. Paper session: Critical Geographies of Counter-Insurgency. Annual meeting of the American Association of Geographers (AAG), New York, NY; February 27.

Ybarra, M. (2011) Privatizing the Tzuultaq’a? Private property and spiritual reproduction in post-war Guatemala. Journal of Peasant Studies 38(4):793-810. Special Issue: New Frontiers of Land Control, guest edited by Nancy L. Peluso and Christian Lund.