An intercultural geographer from Indiana, and bridging worlds between California and Ecuador, Dr. Juli Hazlewood is Co-Founder and Executive Director of Roots & Routes IC. For almost three decades she has lived and walked with the Chachi, Awá, and Afro-descendant communities that inhabit the Ecuadorian Chocó Rainforest, joining them in their struggles to defend and protect their territories and ancestral cultures.

Juli’s research, writings, and teachings focus on “Geographies of Hope” that weave together threads of decoloniality, diverse cultural ways of knowing and taking care of the Earth, collaborative activist methodologies, and Indigenous, Human, and Nature’s Rights. She is a member of the United Nations Expert Network on Harmony with Nature. One of her most recent academic papers (2023), which compliments the material of Together for Water, is called “Be(y)on(d) the map: Collaboratively activating Geographies of (De)CO2loniality/H2Ope in the Ecuadorian Chocó borderlands.”