Maroon Indigeneity and the (Re)Emergence of Caribbean Nature

My research centers on a nascent collaboration between conservationists and Jamaican Maroons. While conservationists wish to protect a "pristine nature" that is apart from humanity, Maroons care for the same spaces precisely because of their communities' long term interactions with local ecologies. As such I query the utility of conservation's ethos of human/nonhuman separation and its pretense toward universal applicability - wondering what locally meaningful climate action might look. In this same moment, Maroons have begun to articulate indigenous identity in Jamaica, initiating a conjoined identity and environmental politics which has opened up intriguing possibilities while posing new constraints.