Biography
Liz Watson's research is based mainly in the dryland regions of Eastern Africa, where she has worked on indigenous agriculture, from extensive pastoralist practices in northern Kenya/southern Ethiopia to intensive terraced agriculture in southern Ethiopia. Her work explores the entanglements of everyday food production with cultural ideas, forms of social organisation, and economic and political processes, and the ways these change over time. She is interested in the changes that emerge from within communities, and in tandem with regional, national and international policies and politics. One example of recent work focuses on change to species preference, as pastoralists who customarily relied upon cattle have increasingly taken to keeping camels in a development that has been understood by observers as an autonomous form of climate change adaptation (Watson et al. 2016). A second example examines how communities are being impacted upon and responding to a new wave of large-scale infrastructural development projects. This research has been published in a special collection of the Journal of Eastern African Studies that she edited with Jason Mosley. At present, she is continuing to develop her research on the spatial dynamics of development planning in East Africa, first through research into the establishment of wildlife conservancies, and second, through a new collaborative project on development 'corridors' led by UNEP WCMC.
In 2011, Liz Watson was Mellon Teaching Fellow a the Centre for Research into Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities (CRASSH). In 2012, she was awarded a Pilkington Prize in recognition of excellence in teaching at the University of Cambridge. In 2012, she was awarded the Royal Geographical Society with Institute of British Geographers Thesiger-Oman International Fellowship. In 2015, she was the recipient of a Leverhulme Trust Research Fellowship.
Research
Rural livelihoods and landscapes; indigenous agriculture - from extensive pastoralism to intensive smallholder agriculture; institutions for managing natural resources; processes of change and transformation, including impact of climate change/climate change adaptation policies, conservation-related interventions and large-scale development projects in Eastern Africa
Publications
Harrison EA, Watson EE. Mind the Gap: Disciplinary Dissonance, Gender, and the Environment. Society and Natural Resources 25(9):933-944 2012 (Journal article)
Watson EE. A ohardening of lineso: landscape, religion and identity in northern Kenya. J EAST AFR STUD 4(2):201-220 2010 (Journal article)
Gildenhard I, Revermann M. Introduction. 1-35. 2010 (Chapter)
Watson EE. Living terraces in Ethiopia. 242 pages. James Currey Ltd Aug 2009 (Book)
Black R, Watson E. Local community, legitimacy, and cultural authenticity in postconflict natural resource management: Ethiopia and Mozambique. Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 24(2):263-282 Jan 2006 (Journal article)
Watson EE. Making a living in the postsocialist periphery: Struggles between farmers and traders in Konso, Ethiopia. AFRICA 76(1):70-87 2006 (Journal article)
Gelcich S, Edwards-Jones G, Kaiser MJ, Watson E. Using discourses for policy evaluation: The case of marine common property rights in Chile. Society and Natural Resources 18(4):377-391 2005 (Journal article)
Watson EE. 'What a dolt one is': language learning and fieldwork in geography. AREA 36(1):59-68 Mar 2004 (Journal article)
Watson EE. Examining the potential of indigenous institutions for development: A perspective from Borana, Ethiopia. DEV CHANGE 34(2):287-309 Apr 2003 (Journal article)
Adams WM, Watson EE. Soil erosion, indigenous irrigation and environmental sustainability, Marakwet, Kenya. LAND DEGRAD DEV 14(1):109-122 Jan 2003 (Journal article)
Watson EE, Adams WM, Mutiso SK. Indigenous irrigation, agriculture and development, Marakwet, Kenya. GEOGR J164:67-84 Mar 1998 (Journal article)
Adams WM, Watson EE, Mutiso SK. Water, rules and gender: Water rights in an indigenous irrigation system, Marakwet, Kenya. DEV CHANGE 28(4):707-730 Oct 1997 (Journal article)
Teaching and Supervisions
Liz Watson teaches across all levels of the Geographical Tripos.