Profile: Cintia Gillam

Cintia is presently doing research for her MA in International Development at St Mary’s University. Her thesis title is “Socioeconomic importance of crab gathering and coastal conservation for the communities of Vila Esperance and Vila dos Pescadores, Cubatao, Sao Paulo State, Brazil. Cintia has a bachelor’s degree in agronomy. However, most of her research and her employment has been in aquaculture. In her submission Cintia noted that “the existence of healthy mangroves is extremely necessary for maintenance of marine life, and consequently, to maintaining subsistence fishing in many coastal communities in Brazil.”

Cintia will spend part of July – September 2014 working with crab fishers from two small coastal communities in the mangrove area near the city of Cubatao, southeastern Brazil. The residents of these communities are primarily migrants from northeastern Brazil who have few employment opportunities. Harvesting the land crab (Ucides cordatus), found in the mangrove areas and considered a delicacy by urban Brazilians, is one type of work with some economic return available to them. She plans to “document the lifestyle and empirical knowledge of crab gatherers and collection qualitative date through interviews and focus groups and to listen to community members about their problems with pollution, flooding, garbage in the mangrove, crab quotas and other issues.

Cintia published the first article focused on her field research in the urban coastal community of Vila dos Pescadores in Marine Policy 89 (2018) 77-84, “Fishers in a Brazilian Shantytown: relational wellbeing supports recovery from environmental disaster”. [https://doi.org/10-101/j.marpol.20i7.12.008]

Links:
Gillam Midterm Report (pdf)
Gillam Final Report (pdf)
Video: "Vila dos Pescadores" (https://www.dropbox.com/s/69hosvcp02du636/My%20Movie%20Guaras6.wmv?oref=e&n=289477215)
Gillan Thesis (pdf)
Article: "Fishers in a Brazilian Shantytown" Marine Policy 89 (2018) 77-84.