Claudia Diaz-Combs is in her third and final year at the University of Arizona pursuing a dual Masters in Latin American Studies and Public Health with an emphasis on environmental health. Broadly, her work focuses on the relationship between state powers, multinational corporation natural resource extraction, and resistance from affected communities, in particular, Indigenous Peoples in the Amazon where oil extraction has been persistent for years. Her current research looks at the ongoing lawsuit in Lago Agrio, Ecuador with Chevron Corporation, a $9 billion class-action lawsuit filed by Ecuadorian citizens against Chevron for decades of drilling and contamination on ancestral lands. She evaluates the projected trajectory of the case and what animates such strong social resistance and organization from those involved. Claudia presented her poster, ” ‘Fluye el Petroleo, Sangra la Selva’ (As the Petroleum Flows, so Bleeds the Jungle): Ecuador vs Chevron” in the Poster Forum.


