Political ecology of caterpillar fungus and participatory conservation in the Nepal Himalaya

This talk will discuss how a tiny caterpillar fungus has invited a national park to enclose Indigenous territories and advanced Nepali state-making in the Himalayan borderlands. It will highlight how participatory conservation unfolds in practice and how “the state” emerges in and through biodiversity conservation and the contested governance of caterpillar fungus. Based on a case study of Shey Phoksundo National Park in Nepal, the talk will conclude with ethnographic insights on the messy practices of state-making and what that entails for Indigenous environmental governance in the Himalayas and beyond. 

Phurwa Dhondup Gurung is a Ph.D. candidate in geography at the University of Colorado Boulder. His dissertation research explores intersecting questions of state-making, Indigeneity, and multispecies worldmaking in Dolpo, Nepal.

Virtual session (via zoom) provided upon registration: https://forms.gle/mERQCfYd2uyTcbNGA