Fieldwork: Zanzibar, Tanzania
Donor – Leibniz-ZMT Core Budget Funding (2017-ongoing)
PI – Dr. Gita Narayan, along with Dr. Rapti Siriwardane, Teresa Schwenke, & Mariman Jaddawi (Institute of Marine Science, Zanzibar
Our transdisciplinary study attends to three interrelated knowledge gaps regarding the linkages between scientific and local taxonomic classificatory knowledge, taking Zanzibar´s lucrative and gendered shell gleaning expertise as a case study. First, it stands as one of the first studies to focus on the use and transferal of locally situated understandings of taxonomic knowledge within marine and coastal contexts.
Second, the project explores an understudied facet of local ecological knowledge systems, primarily how community-embedded gendered knowledges are intergenerationally communicated and further transformed through practices of enskillment. Third, the study explicitly focuses on how far local taxonomic classificatory systems concretely influence community-based (informal) management practices, taking into account complex demand and supply-side socio-economic factors within the ‘shell economy.’
