Presentation short abstract

Drawing from "slow observation" and action-research, this presentation introduces "intimate sensing" to approach how Indigenous Amazonian communities see abandoned mining ponds not as degraded sites, but as spaces for ecological repair, aquatic livelihoods and territorial governance.

Presentation long abstract

For many conservation organizations, the moon-like, cratered landscape mining leaves behind in the Amazon is beyond recovery; reforestation, perhaps, is the only alternative for ecosystem restoration. This presentation explores how Indigenous communities prefigure the potential of abandoned mining ponds in the Peruvian Southern Amazon, to explore possibilities flying under the radar of remediation science and conservation organizations. I explain their perspectives with the concept of intimate sensing, developed at the intersection of feminist political ecology and critical approaches to ecological restoration. Intimate sensing appraises the formation of Indigenous territorial projects of ecological repair in extractive frontiers, which stem from the embodied experience of ecological renewal in areas profoundly transformed by mining. It is an alternative to remote sensing, one of the most common detection practices to account for Amazonian degradation, but one that has been better attuned to identify patterns of forest cover loss. This scientific orientation, derived from and informing carbon-centric environmental fixes, matches poorly with Indigenous quotidian observations of the same degraded areas. Abandoned mining ponds exhibit multifarious afterlives where amphibian and fish repopulation, and pond cleaning and renewal, animate indigenous projects for aquatic-based livelihood diversification and their aspirations to become environmental stewards in remediation processes. The findings interrogate the plausibility and long-term sustainability of remediation interventions developed in, but ultimately disconnected from, Indigenous territories. Instead, intimate sensing suggests that remediation science can more productively engage with Indigenous perspectives, acknowledging the embeddedness and embodied experience of socio-ecological change.