Miriam Knödler

Having my academic roots in horticulture, agroecology and gender studies, I encountered and imagine forests as one part of an agroecological landscape that rethinks traditional land use classes: What if forests are not just the subject of forestry but an element of a landscape that transgresses the boundaries of farms, fields, forests, mountains, water bodies and other elements? Which visions for forests and forestry and other disciplines emerge? Which new relations become visible and possible, and which collaborations necessary to reweave often compartmentalized landscapes into one interconnected system? Eventually, which imaginary can be created if such a landscape embodies humans and humans recognize that they embody the landscape, too? Looking for answers to these questions, I apply systems thinking and draw from women's lived experiences and material (eco)feminist theory. Learning and re-learning, engaging and reflecting to act is my way forward to conceptualize critical discourses and practices for a materially grounded, counterhegemonic notion of sustainability.

Together with Elias Andersson (SLU), Kristina Johansson (LTU) and Maria Johansson (UMU), I am currently involved in research projects that focus on the intersection of gender and forest ownership and gender and forest-/nature-based business in the context of the countries of the global minority. Through a systematic literature review, we create an overview of previous research and define avenues for future projects that contribute to more impactful gender analyses for forestry.