María is a PhD candidate in the Energy and Resources Group (ERG) and part of the Critical Ruralities Lab. Her research explores alternatives to food and nutritional sovereignty in smallholder communities, with a particular focus on farmer women’s agrifood knowledge. María draws from ethnographic and participatory methods, and her work is motivated by the possibility of co-envisioning pathways for smallholder farmers’ well-being in her home country, Mexico, and in finding ways to articulate different worldviews in search for equitable and just rural livelihoods. She believes in approaching research as an interdisciplinary, grassroots and socially committed practice. Prior to ERG, María earned her bachelor’s degree in Sociology at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) and her Masters of Development Practice at the University of California, Berkeley.